Small Town News

The view from Rural Route #8

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Wheatnot.

Are the steady wheat acreage declines and sagging demand and lower prices part of a pattern that might be telling us something nobody wants to say out loud about wheat? Is wheat dying as a major crop in the United States? Is wheat flour becoming a third world locally grown food, where wheat production is up? Will we grow much here in 20 years?

First, let us recall that hard red winter wheat and beef cattle together formed the foundation of Kansas' century-long standing as one of the very elite parts of the world, much less the nation, that cranked out excellent wheat and cattle. In so doing, the farmers and stockmen and their attending suppliers and ancillary businesses - were guided by certain realities to perform tasks that often built character, muscle and innovative thinking, in short, a fabulous work ethic. The offspring of these farms for generations took their good character and skills to the urban societies where countless of them did well and led our nation in many arenas. Oil and gas wells helped, too, but the real fact of the matter is that those families who toiled bringing in wheat and livestock built a stable and positive way of life.

It is well documented that beef is under severe attack, most of it unfair, but nevertheless it's the object of wrath from several mean corners. The slack economy has not helped demand, either, but as an institution, beef is besieged by all-comers who have media access. Even burning of the Flint Hills grass is undergoing new scrutiny from environmental regulators because Kansas City and Wichita have more ozone, supposedly because of the burning. Wonder what they will have when wildfires break out after a few years of fuel buildup? Will they send aid to the towns and ranches burned down and will they help identify and bury the dead, as has happened in Australia?

Many of us get stuck in our hearts and minds about how something ought to be. For me, I will always think of Kansas as filled with family-operated farms with at least some wheat fields on them. I see a family-owned combine and some two-ton trucks, maybe one owned and other leased from an uncle down the road. I see a long line of well aged straight trucks, no semis yet, at a nearby country elevator. Women are driving many of them, their tanned arms adjusting a bandanna or fishing for a pop bottle. There are no cell phones yet, but some of the trucks have AM radios and the farm report from one of the stations broadcasting from Colby or Garden City or Salina or Hutchinson is rapid-fire delivering the farm news and market quotes. So many people were engaged in "Harvest." Non-farmers were aware of "Harvest" and gladly made concessions to "Harvest."

For the record from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the nation's overall winter wheat seeded acreage is 37 million acres, the fewest since 1913 and down 6.2 million acres from last year. Hard red winter wheat, the lion's share of the overall figure, was pegged at 27.8 million acres, down 12 percent from a year ago.

Kansas, the leading hard red winter state, was said to have only 8.6 million acres planted, the least since 1957. In 1993 farmers planted 12.1 million acres, but the annual total has declined since. The wheat experts in Kansas note higher global production of wheat as a factor in undercutting exports. Also, the downward trend was exacerbated last fall in Kansas by late harvests of corn and beans, and unusually wet soils which teamed up to prevent some plantings. On top of that is the 900 million bushel carryover, or stocks on hand, that are sitting around unsold and weighing down prices.

In addition to all of that, breakthroughs in corn and soybean production and yields have stolen acreage away from wheat, in both soft and hard wheat regions. It is one thing to attain a gross dollar per acre with 45 bushels of wheat at $4 a bushel ($180) versus 45 bushels of soybeans at $8 a bushel ($360). Sometimes with minimum tillage, good weed controls and new varieties of beans, this is possible in places where it would have been unheard of 15 years ago. Ditto corn vs. wheat.



Copyright 2010 The Wabaunsee County Signal-Enterprise, Alma, Kansas. All Rights Reserved. This content, including derivations, may not be stored or distributed in any manner, disseminated, published, broadcast, rewritten or reproduced without express, written consent from SmallTownPapers, Inc.

© 2010 The Wabaunsee County Signal-Enterprise Alma, Kansas. All Rights Reserved. This content, including derivations, may not be stored or distributed in any manner, disseminated, published, broadcast, rewritten or reproduced without express, written consent from DAS.

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