What was your most profitable crop this year?

[Guest]

Looks like alfalfa seed didn't even make the list this year. Kind of depressing punching out bees that no one will buy!

and god damn blocks are right full
maybe we could sell them as food for protein now that we can't eat meat anymore lol

[sk_wheatking]

FCC told me the biggest profit on my farm is calling up the local BTO and then going to the Walmart hiring desk.

Local credit union guy told my dad 15 years ago that we'd be better off renting out our land for 5 bucks an acre!!!

[Hamloc]

In reading everyone's responses one glaring fact sticks out. No one listed canola as their number one money maker. The arguement being made by those who are in favor of EPRs or trailing royalties that we need more research dollars invested in cereal seed developement to make them more profitable. If this was true wouldn't canola be the most profitable crop?

[bigzee]

I like your statement but here is reality buying a quarter each year or more for new seed and using second year at 3 bus a acre.

15 x 3 = $45

My seed and my cleaning in our plant 8.50 per bushel x 3 bus x 5000 acres is $127500 seed cost commercial.

Or

$45 a acre x 5000 = $222000.

$222000- $127500 = $97500.00 towards my bottom line or my wage for me. Oh bad me wanting some money for me myself and I on my farm.

Idiots they will screw this ip like canola and farmers will loose.

You seed your wht at 3 bu/ac? Seed growers must love you. I can buy new wheat for under $13. I do agree should buy new seed at least for a quarter every couple years. Seed is “cheap” this year with commodity prices in the da shitter.

[seldomseen]

In reading everyone's responses one glaring fact sticks out. No one listed canola as their number one money maker. The arguement being made by those who are in favor of EPRs or trailing royalties that we need more research dollars invested in cereal seed developement to make them more profitable. If this was true wouldn't canola be the most profitable crop?

This is the part I don't understand? I have neighbours planting canola on canola and I hear that this is common in other areas. If its not the most profitable why ditch the a good rotations?

[helmsdale]

If canola is screwed up why is everyone seeding so much of it? Drive around in July and its yellow every where.

If you don't have the right to use your own seed the price of certified will go up dramatically.

I know I am a little mixed up on this issue!

The price of Canola seed is exactly why I don't seed it here. We are in the brown soil zone, with moisture as our limiting factor year in and year out. July heat/rain either graces us with a crop, or leaves us wondering whether our ass is punched or bored... Groceries involved with shooting for a profitable canola crop, and seed cost leaves WAY TOO much risk on the table for a guy just getting started around here. When actual long term average moisture is equated, a 20-25bu canola crop is likely the long run average. Try paying the bills on that, or worse yet, try getting a winter job to suck up the loss if it goes 10-12!

All in costs including all farm associated fixed(spread across all crops) as well as variable for each crop leaves my most to least profitable as follows:

1) Yellow Mustard (provided I can come up with a cost effective solution to getting 0.24% canola down to less than 0.1%) -> If sold with 0.24% canola it becomes the worst performing.
2) General Purpose wheat (proteined out this year, so dumped it into the milling market)
3) Durum (even when including selling some of it for feed)
4) Yellow Peas
5) Red Lentils

[Partners]

You seed your wht at 3 bu/ac? Seed growers must love you. I can buy new wheat for under $13. I do agree should buy new seed at least for a quarter every couple years. Seed is “cheap” this year with commodity prices in the da shitter.

Correct on seed price this yr.
Bought VB wht for $10.50..from seed grower..
Hardly pays to clean own.

[helmsdale]

My best is a oil seed that I pay 16$ acre for seed sell it fob and returned 400$ acre net this year. Keep eating hotdogs.

Shhh... When it goes hybrid, they'll screw that up for us as well...

Can't wait. I'll be paying royalties on what are my two most profitable and dependable crops...

Read an article here the other day that Sask Pulse growers is running a deficit, and complaining that their revenue is down by some 40% over previous years. They have a surplus sitting on the books, so have decided to draw it down. If prices stay depressed, one can only imagine that they will be looking for an increased levy, along with every other provinces pulse boards. And if wheat and durum go the way of seed cost levy's who's to say the pulse breeders wont want to get in on that action? or the flax breeders?

[fjlip]

Okay a little late but canola beat wheat for us in 2018. Over $200 return to labor and investment at current market prices. Yields were records for this farm. 2018 wheat yields for us were less than 2017, still almost $100/ acre return to labor and investment. I feel my Fixed and Variable costs are fair. Each must be honest estimating depreciation for sure. LOTS of iron = higher costs.

[bigzee]

No canola for this cat in 19. Before I put the tractor in the field it’s $150 ac. It’s getting past ridiculous to grow this high risk crop, at least in my area.

[Sheepwheat]

I am in a pretty easy 50 bushel canola area. Trouble is in the wet years I over time lost my yield guarantees, and 6 bushel canola ain’t good when the costs are so extreme. There is also this thing called net return. Oats at 140 vs canola at 50. Pretty clear winner when you talk NET RETURN.

I frankly have no idea the infatuation with canola either, and this from a good canola area. Seed costs are just sick. Fertility needs are extreme. And there are about seven million bugs and diseases that attack it ruthlessly.

Maybe everyone is closet input capital men?

I think I will order more alfalfa and orchard grass, brome. Can seed it for 25 bucks an acre, or around 4 bucks for seed per year, and have it produce well for 6 years or so. Once established, it sure doesn’t cost much, and the soil building is insane. A few bales an acre, even at 60 bucks a bale is pretty fair actually, let alone 120 bucks on a year like this. Rotate out and do organic 40 buck a bushel flax, a couple other crops like faba then oats, and then back to hay. Graze the sheep after baking for a bit of cheap lamb gain, and nutrient recycling.

Maybe I am as insane as the price of canola seed. ... lol There has got to be a better way.

[Oliver88]

I think I will order more alfalfa and orchard grass, brome. Can seed it for 25 bucks an acre, or around 4 bucks for seed per year, and have it produce well for 6 years or so. Once established, it sure doesn’t cost much, and the soil building is insane. A few bales an acre, even at 60 bucks a bale is pretty fair actually, let alone 120 bucks on a year like this.

I think alfalfa acres would of been a good net income this year if selling bales.

How heavy do you seed alfalfa?