Be careful around farm equipment on the roads
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Tariffs eat into profits and are a moving target right now
Spring work has started in Douglas County. Most of that has been limited to nitrogen applications. The warm, dry weather has given us a window to finish up from last fall and get a jump on this year’s work. A trip west of Decatur for parts saw more tillage done in that part of the state than here.
This early opportunity to get some nitrogen on is immensely helpful. The anhydrous ammonia form we use to supply nitrogen can hurt corn germination if the seed is too close to a concentrated band of the product. It disperses into the soil with time and should not hurt the corn seed at planting in April. Other forms of fertilizer can damage seed as well and care is taken in its use at planting.
I am sure you have already seen farm machinery on the roads this spring. The March newsletter from our rural electric cooperative had an article titled “Share the Road with Farm Equipment.” It advised drivers to be patient and cautious on the roads as planting begins.
I will reiterate that point. Our machinery is large and slow compared to a car or pickup truck. We are dodging around posts or signs that the driver behind us might not see. Most farmers try to move when the roads are not as busy but that is not always possible. Please be patient and cautious this spring.
I feel like I should comment on all the tariff news, but I do not really know where to start. The actual amounts of tariffs and the products involved are a moving target and it is hard for me to track. Generally anything that restricts free trade is bad for agriculture. We depend on many imported products and need to export our excess production to be profitable.
That said, there have always been restrictions on trade. Countries have used tariffs on imports to protect domestic industry for centuries. For years, Russia restricted the importation of U.S. poultry products to protect their own farmers. Brazil charges an 18% tariff on U.S. ethanol imports. Brazilian ethanol comes into the U.S. mainly duty free. It is supplanting our homegrown ethanol in the production of sustainable airplane fuel. With the current system, Brazilian ethanol has a better carbon score than U.S. ethanol. Carbon scores are an entire column, so I will not go into that now.
Most of the potassium fertilizer we use comes from Canada. They tightly control the quantity mined to support the price. A tariff on Canadian products into the U.S. adds dollars to our cost for that important nutrient. Canada is protective of their dairy industry and levies heavy tariffs on imports from the U.S., although it appears that those do not usually kick in until a certain quantity is reached. Fair trade and free trade are admirable goals but are seldom achieved.
We drove some of our fields trying to decide if it was dry enough to work. We found more things to do as we did that tour. A large tree had fallen out of a fencerow into a field and had to be cut up and moved. Luckily, we could get to it with a tractor scoop and pile the pieces up. It was three feet through at the bottom.
We also found a broken tile. It is an old clay tile that often has broken sections in the spring. Many of the tile mains are one hundred years old and showing that age. The usual problem is that there is more than one of the twelve-inch-long tiles broken. The hole keeps getting bigger as you hunt a tile in good enough shape to start and end the repair. We keep an inventory of various sized tile pieces but had to go to a local contractor for the tile to complete this repair. Replacing the entire half mile run would be best but big replacement tile is so expensive that even our drainage districts have trouble funding large projects.
We assumed that plastic tile will be pretty much bullet proof if it is installed with a little care. However, we have heard that some of the early plastic tile is collapsing after several years in the ground. I have not heard of a reason for this but perhaps it was not made heavily enough. Most of the larger size drainage tile made now is called dual wall tile. The outside is corrugated for strength. The inside layer is smooth for better water flow. It is not flexible and comes in 20-foot sticks instead of rolls.
We have been updating the GPS subscriptions that our tractors use to drive straight lines. The free signals do not give the accuracy we like for our planter tractors. The planters still have markers on them, but we used them only a handful of times last spring. I need to check the program that runs our big planter for updates too, before we get busy and try to use it.
A website directed at livestock producers talks about a novel use of the global positioning concept. The cattle in some operations are equipped with collars that sound like the dog fence collars people use. Instead of a buried wire, these collars work off satellite signals. The costs vary as well as the number of animals that can use a system.
Some operations use intensive grazing. They put a lot of animals in a small area and move them frequently. GPS fencing makes moving them easier. One producer was in an area where fire had burned his fences, and this system let him keep grazing cattle without rebuilding all his fence. We have areas where the auto guidance signal does not reach well. I can see problems with this in a hilly pasture.
As planting starts, there are more articles prognosticating weather for the growing season. The US Drought Monitor map shows large parts of the Cornbelt and western wheat growing area in moderate drought. A well-respected forecaster at the University of Illinois is calling for a wet spring and dry summer. That is a bad combination. A late planted crop with shallow roots from lots of rainfall does not fare well if you go into extended drought.
Thank you for reading about agriculture this month. Please remember to watch out for farmers as we travel the roads to put this crop in the ground.
Larry W. Dallas
Douglas County Farmer