With fall comes corn harvest season, and the USDA is projecting one of the largest corn yields in US history.
In September, the USDA said 2025 will have the most acreage harvested in 92 years, and projected a record crop output as a result.
Reuters reports that could affect the farm economy, as the cash crop receipts adjusted for inflation are forecast at the lowest level in nearly two decades. The latest data from October hasn't come out from the USDA due to the federal government shutdown.
A peek at some producers in Eastern South Dakota
SDPB’s Jackson Dircks spent the day with farmers near Bridgewater as they hurried to empty the fields in hopes of filling their pockets.
Ross Glanzer walked on his land in Bridgewater, with cornhusks from already-combined land crunching beneath him. Glanzer raises corn and soybeans and runs a cow-calf operation. He said it's been a good harvest for his corn and beans, despite some hail and wind damage. However, as he looks to sell the crop, prices aren’t where he’d like…“We’d love to see a four in front of it,” Glanzer said. “We’re a ways away from
that on what we’re delivering right now.”
It’s hard to know what to expect when planting in the Spring, and this year was no different. With tariffs placed by the Trump administration having been the focal point for producers, Glanzer said a lot is chalked up to risk management.
“Selling ahead. There’s what’s called carry in the market right now. So, I have bin space at home, where today if I were taking it to town to the ethanol plant here, you’re getting roughly $3.60 a bushel," Glanzer said. "But if I would forward contract to sell out of my bin for June delivery, you get $.50 more a bushel right now. Just things like that. As far as you know farming, we do have other risk management tools, crop insurance is a big thing. When we planted this spring, oh boy, these yields that we have didn’t seem, boy, it just didn’t seem like you were going to get them.”
He finished saying if you don’t put it in the ground, you can’t grow a crop.
About a hundred yards away David Schrag was combining corn. He and Ross share equipment from time to time.
Schrag said the conditions for corn are a welcome sign. However, that comes with its challenges.
“You know, nobody has really, very few people have enough storage for all of it, Yeah, it’s the nicest crop I’ve ever had. Corn crop,” Schrag said.
He said normally he likes to sell about 30-40% of his crop ahead. That didn’t happen this year, coming closer to 15, 20%.
“Normally yes, but this year there was just never time to get above the cost of production and, you know, to get a price," Schrag said. "So, this is the least ahead I’ve ever had sold. I guess we’ll just have to wait. Some of it’s just going in the bin and hopefully the price will come back.”
Higher inputs mean less profit
Schrag said what he’d like to see is the cost of inputs come down.
"Fertilizer to replace, to put on a yield replacement like our map or mez is way higher than last year," Schrag said. "Fertilizer prices are going up, and we would love for corn and bean price to go up to match it.”
He went on, saying where higher inputs hit is the bottom line.
“Oh, it’ll hurt. You know the temptation is I mean do you put fertilizer removal on, or do you cut back a little bit because fertilizer is expensive," Schrag said. "So, you have to make those decisions. I mean you can’t do that every year, back off on fertilizer and then it hurts your fertility and then your yields go down.”
Corn prices could go up, but as Schrag explained, it’s not likely to happen.
“A drought, a nationwide drought and corn will start going up then every day, but that won’t happen for a long time,” Schrag said.
So, until then, he said he planned to keep combining and storing what corn he can. The rest, he’ll take to town or the ethanol plant NuGen in Marion to see what money he can get back.
About a mile down the road Lyndon Hofer and his son-in-law Lee Dockendorf were at work. They echoed Schrag’s concerns. Lyndon Hofer said the “bottom line isn’t there this year.”
"Inputs or everything else is still high. To me that’s one of the major things. Everybody complains about the low prices, they are low. But we work on a margin so if our expenses are high all the inputs, take seed, fertilizer, chemicals, they’re way out of line for this price," Lyndon Hofer said. "I mean if the price was down, that’s down. We work on a margin so we can make a profit. Right now, there is absolutely no profit whatsoever in beans, not even close. So, you do what you gotta do, but it’s discouraging.”
Lee Dockendorf put it simply.
“Well, fertilizer’s definitely a factor. The seed slowly crept up with the prices the last few years," Dockendorf said. "And now that the prices are down, seed and chemical prices don’t want to come down. Everything went up and only prices came down, not the inputs too.”
At another field nearby, Carlyn Hofer’s combining corn while her husband Darrell drove to the NuGen ethanol plant to drop off a truckload. She said they’ve had a good season.
“The farmer is the ultimate optimist. You go out and you plant," Carlyn Hofer said.
"Well then it started raining very timely rains, and the Lord sent those rains, and they just kept coming and nothing big at a time, just nice rains.”
Darrell said they take a percentage of their corn and lock in an average price to sell forward in the fall, a lot of farmers do this to hedge their bets.
“This year and last year it worked good," Darrell Hofer said. "If it would be a shortage of crop, the price would go up, so you just do a percentage, so you get kind of averaged out."
However, he said with the price of seed corn at nearly $100-an acre, and land taxes at 30-40 an acre and fertilizer up, the cost you put in right now is a lot, but you must take the good with the bad.
“We’ve been farming for about 50 years, and we bought some land. Had some from our folks and stuff. You know, there was dry years that was rough, but now at the end we don’t have as many expenses, especially land expenses," Darrell Hofer said. "We pay rent to my sister, she owns some of this land. Yeah, it’s tight. I’m sure this year if the expenses aren’t, we won’t get back what we have expenses. But hopefully, it’ll average out some time.”
So, while the per bushel isn’t high, the farmers here in Bridgwater are continuing to fill up their trucks with corn following a good harvest, hoping they’ll see a 4 in front soon.
On the Ethanol side
While lower prices don't spell good news for the farmers, South Dakota's ethanol industry can benefit from them.
Phil Madsen is the Risk Manager at Nugen Energy in Marion. He called the additional corn on the market a “good problem to have.”
"You know we’d much rather deal with a big crop than the alternative. We’ve had a lot of short crop years in this area in the last few years, so it’s nice having a big one,” Madsen said. “But, definitely presents its challenges. I think everybody in the area is stressed for space, us included. So, we’re doing all we can. You know, bins are getting
filled to the tops and we’re piling on the ground so we’re trying to stay in front of it.”
According to Nugen’s website, the company shows cash bids is teetering between $3.50 and $3.70 for October 2025. While producers would like to see a 4 in front, for ethanol plants that’s a good price for business.
He contended that cheap corn in the area is beneficial but said they like to help out the people working the land.
“But at the same time, we wouldn’t necessarily have to be piling on the ground. You know, we’re doing it more so as a service to keep guys in the field going,” Madsen said. “So, you know, we could shut off hours and shut off trucks, but at the end of the day we like to have good relations with farmers, and we’re doing all we can to stay in front of it.”
Madsen calls it a “record-breaking year.”
"Every year’s different, but I think this one’s really unique in that it’s huge and it’s hitting really hard and fast,” Madsen said.
Madsen said he’s shocked moisture hasn’t been a big issue with the crop despite a wet spring and summer. Nugen starts to discount prices at 15.5% moisture. He added that about 80-90% of the corn they’ve had come through has been under that mark.
