DeKalb Co Ag Mag November 2018

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WINTER 2018

The waiting iting game Daily Chronicle 1586 Barber Green Rd. DeKalb, IL 60115

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Local farmers storing grain as they await outcome of tariff battle between U.S., China

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Table of Contents

4

THE WAITING GAME

7

‘THE NAPA VALLEY OF CORN’

10

GOOD, NOT GREAT, YEAR FOR PUMPKINS

Local farmers storing grain as they await outcome of tariff battle between U.S., China

Whiskey Acres Distilling Co. uses DeKalb County’s signature crop in craft spirits

14

A TAR SPOT OF TROUBLE

17

TRACTOR SAFETY:

DeKalb County farmers say fungus makes real impact on yield for first time Important for both farmers and drivers

Some growers say heavy rains led to higher rate of disease amid a signature Illinois crop

12

SMART TECH FOR SMARTER FARMING

DeKalb County farmers increasing use of GPS, drones, other tech to maximize efficiency

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DK C

Published by Shaw Media Publisher: Laura Shaw Project Manager: Lisa Angel Design & Layout: Allison LaPorta

Articles and advertisements are property of Shaw Media. No portion of DeKalb County Ag Mag may be produced without written consent of the publisher.

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The waiting game

Local farmers storing grain as they await outcome of tariff battle between U.S., China

By KATRINA J.E. MILTON – kmilton@shawmedia.com

On July 6, in response to the U.S. imposing a 25 percent tariff on Chinese steel, aluminum and other products, China imposed 25 percent tariff on a list of U.S. products, including corn and soybeans.

The tariff has caused a reduction in Chinese imports of those crops. The loss of access to that important market has led DeKalb farmer Gene Reid and other DeKalb County farmers to opt to play a waiting game: wait for a better market price of grain before selling it.

But waiting requires putting the grain into storage, either in bins or silos on their own farm or in rented space at a local grain elevator.

“Usually I store only a portion of my grain, but because of the market, I’m storing 80 percent of my corn and 100 percent of my soybeans this year,” Reid said. “Sometimes I sell at harvest, but I’m storing more bushels this year. I think all farmers are sitting and waiting with their grain. We just have to wait and watch the

markets and the basis.”

The basis is the difference between the Chicago Board of Trade’s price and the price offered by the local grain elevator operator. A wide or widening basis is often a signal that the grain market doesn’t want the product, in other words, there is too much supply and not enough demand.

“With the tariffs against China, they’ve quit importing our beans, so the basis is widened,” Reid said. “The basis is tremendously wide, wider than it’s almost been at around $2 a bushel for soybeans.

Farmers have to wait for that basis to narrow and hopefully match the Board of Trade. Hopefully the tariff issue will get solved soon.”

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Farmer Terrie Tuntland of Waterman has decided to store all of his corn and soybeans this year at the DeLong Co., Inc. elevator in Waterman.

“I had quite a bit of grain sold before harvest and before the tariffs went into place,” Tuntland said. “My first choice is storing the grain because it takes a lot of the responsibility off of me as a farmer. I don’t have to worry about moisture, insects or damage. Once I take the grain across the scale, the elevator takes care of it for me.”

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Kent Hamm, general manager at Waterman’s DeLong Co., Inc. elevator, described the function of a grain elevator as “absorbing local crop during harvest and be a reliable supplier of grain throughout the year.”

The Waterman grain elevator has a capacity of 3.5 million bushels, or 100,000 tons, of grain. At the end of the 2018 harvest, it will have a soybean inventory worth about $5.6 million and a corn inventory worth about $8 million.

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“We offer three services for grain: offering a local market, storing and drying,” Hamm said. “About 40 percent of every U.S. corn bushel grown is used for ethanol in gasoline fuel, 16 percent is exported and the rest is sold for animal feed.”

Dave Kerber, grain merchandiser with CHS Elburn, said a grain elevator’s role is to “provide a market for grain and a convenient location for storage to make harvest as easy as possible for local producers.” CHS Elburn’s grain elevator in Malta has capacity for approximately a million bushels of grain.

Every grain elevator has a bid sheet, which lists its posted price for grain that day.

“It’s pure economics: low supply, high price; high supply, low price,” Hamm said. “Generally, harvest is the lowest price because there’s such a high supply. Generally, late summer is the highest price. To sell the grain later, it needs to be stored.”

To store grain at an elevator, farmers enter into a contract agreement. There is a storage charge from harvest through Jan. 1, then rates are prorated by day and charged per bushel monthly.

The grain, once delivered to the elevator, mixes with other farmers’ grain and becomes a commodity.

“Every time a load of grain comes through, the grain is sampled and graded for moisture, test weight, foreign material and damage,” Kerber said. “If corn is wet, it’s dried to approximately 15 percent and we look for soybeans to be about 13 percent moisture.”

Once the grain is stored, farmers monitor the bid sheet daily. Once a farmer deems the market price acceptable, they sell the grain

to the elevator. The elevator negotiates the price with the buyer, and the grain is removed from the elevator and delivered.

Farmer Steve Bemis of DeKalb stores and dries his grain in bins on his farm. His bins have a capacity of 440,000 bushels.

“I like having our own storage, it gives us more freedom,” Bemis said. “We don’t have to rely or depend on a grain elevator. We can work our own hours and don’t have to pay a rental price.

Depending on the basis, I usually sell my grain in December, but it could be March or May or July.”

With good grain yields this year, Hamm and Kerber said their elevators will be at or near capacity by the end of the harvest. For added capacity, the DeLong Co. built and completed a new bin this year that will hold 840,000 bushels.

“We generally try to be empty before harvest and then start filling up by the end of November,” Hamm said. “With better technology, GMO seeds and better farming practices, yields per acre offset the loss of farm acres. Even though we have bigger yields, we have new markets. The ethanol market didn’t exist more than 10 years ago, and now it’s where the majority of our corn goes.”

Tuntland said that as a farmer, he’s happy to have so many options for what to do with grain, whether it’s keeping it in storage, making a forward contract and selling it before harvest or selling it at harvest.

“There are many different options for farmers, whether it’s selling the grain or storing it on their farm or at an elevator,” Tuntland said.

“I think we’re all thinking about money and about profit. But it all depends on the farmer, what they decide to do.”

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‘The

Napa Valley of corn’ WHISKEY ACRES DISTILLING CO. USES DEKALB COUNTY’S SIGNATURE CROP IN CRAFT SPIRITS

By KATRINA J.E. MILTON – kmilton@shawmedia.com

DeKALB – Farmer Jim Walter of DeKalb said that most people don’t get excited about corn – but they do get excited about whiskey.

began operating in December 2014. Whiskey Acres is the first estate distillery to grow its own grain in Illinois and the second in the United States.

Walter’s family has been farming since the 1800s, growing corn for the past 48 years. Jim Walter said that choosing to grow and use corn grown on the farm to make whiskey was an easy choice.

“Bourbon is a type of whiskey made predominantly from corn,” Jamie Walter said. “Bourbon requires a minimum of 51 percent of corn. Ours contains 75 percent.”

“We wanted to diversify and branch out, going from seed to spirit,” Jim Walter said. “Growing corn as a commodity, we don’t meet the end user. By distilling whiskey, we meet consumers face-to-face. We can answer questions about our farm and educate our visitors. In general, people find whiskey distilling fascinating. Nobody gets that excited about corn.”

Whiskey Acres produces more than 100,000 bottles of spirits each year and hosts 400 to 500 visitors each weekend. Visitors have come from 45 states, 45 countries and all seven continents, including a research team from Antarctica.

Walter’s son, Jamie, was enjoying a bourbon in 2011 when he came up with the idea for a distillery on his family’s farm in DeKalb. Bourbon refers to whiskey distilled in the United States, using corn as the main ingredient.

Jim and Jamie Walter and friend Nick Nagele co-founded Whiskey Acres Distilling Co., 11504 Keslinger Road in DeKalb, which was licensed and

To expand and offer more room for their customers, Whiskey Acres is building a new visitors center.

Construction began in May and is planned to be finished the weekend after Thanksgiving. The current tasting room is 400 square feet, and the new visitors center will be about 4,000 square feet.

Jamie Walter said that he saw distilling as a way to enhance his farm’s profitability.

“The vast majority of our corn still goes through

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“Bourbon is a type of whiskey made predominantly from corn, Bourbon requires a minimum of 51 percent of corn. Ours contains 75 percent.”

- JAMIE WALTER

normal commodity production and is used for ethanol, animal feed and export,” Jamie Walter said. “Our challenge now is to grow our distillery business to process more and more of the corn.”

He also said another difficulty is the booming number of craft distilleries. In 2000, there were about 12 distilleries in the U.S.; by 2014 there were 600.

This year, the number has ballooned to close to 2,000.

which varieties have the best characteristics for making whiskey.

We like to joke that the yeast is our livestock.”

“We look for the yield of the grain itself, the alcohol yield through the fermentation process and most importantly, flavor,” he said. “By growing our own corn, we can control production. If you buy the corn on the market, it’s a mixed commodity. We know exactly what’s going into our whiskey.”

Whiskey Acres’ bourbon is made from a mixture of about 75 percent corn, 15 percent winter wheat and 10 percent malted barley. Once the grain is harvested, it is dried, cleaned and ground. The ground grain is then added to water and cooked in a mash cooker. Yeast is added for fermentation, then the fermented mash is distilled. After distillation, the clear whiskey is aged in barrels before being bottled.

“As farmers of the corn that goes into the whiskey, we know that it is highquality grain and can keep our identity preserved,” Jim Walter said. “Most distilleries buy a mix of grain.”

Nagele also knows a thing or two about corn – his family has been farming and growing corn since the 1860s. He also describes the fertile soil of DeKalb County as the Napa Valley of corn.

To make the best whiskey possible, Jamie Walter said his farm grows around 15 varieties of yellow dent corn and five varieties of artisan series corn. Experimentation helps determine

“We plant more than a dozen different varieties of corn. We look for the best quality of corn to feed to the yeast,” he said. “The better nutrients in the corn, the better flavor of the whiskey.

The cooking and fermentation process takes five days to a week, but barrel aging can take two to five years or longer. About 500 gallons of fermented mash are distilled at Whiskey Acres every day, yielding about 50 gallons of whiskey.

Whiskey Acres also makes rye and

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high rye whiskeys, vodka and nocino, a traditional Italian liqueur derived from black walnuts.

Jamie Walter said Whiskey Acres’ spirits are sold at the distillery and at about 500 locations throughout Illinois, including Binny’s Beverage Depot, Hy-Vee, Whole Foods, Mariano’s and at independent liquor stores, bars and restaurants.

“We have chosen not to sell outside of Illinois as we work on our inventory and build a solid customer base,” he said. “The easy part is always making the spirit, the hard part is selling it. But we’ve

had great support from the community and we’ve won awards, been featured in magazines and newspapers. With our new visitors center, we can really show the story of agriculture here in DeKalb County. It’s not only about whiskey and distilling.

It’s also about corn and farming.”

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GOOD,

not great, year for

PUMPKINS Some growers say heavy rains led to higher ratee of disease amid a signature Illinois crop

By KATRINA J.E. MILTON – kmilton@shawmedia.com

F

armer Rob Wessels said that this year was “an unusual year” for pumpkins.

“The pumpkins we did have were excellent,” he said. “But there were more bad pumpkins than normal. This year, disease was very high. I try not to spray, and this year I didn’t spray. … You’re always fighting diseased pumpkins, but this year was worse than normal. The rain kept germinating new

weeds, and we had to keep fighting the weeds, more than normal.”

Wessels’ Family Farm grows produce in Waterman and sells it at 2023 Sycamore Road in DeKalb. Wessels, the owner of the farm, grew 17 varieties of pumpkins on about 12 acres. He said that his pumpkin planting started slightly later than normal because of heavy spring rains.

“There was also some rotting from weather-related disease and not as many big pumpkins this year,” he said.

“This year, it seemed like the whole year was early: planting crops, produce growth and harvesting. People have been wanting pumpkins earlier and earlier. By Labor Day, I’m selling corn stalks, hay bales and little pumpkins for decorating. Jack-o’-lanterns for carving are popular around October, but pie pumpkins are always popular.”

Illinois is the top pumpkin-producing state in the country, producing more than 700 million pounds of pumpkins on about 17,000 acres in 2017, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Illinois typically is the

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l d in leader i pumpkin ki yield, i ld averaging more than 35,000 pounds per acre in 2017, the USDA reports.

But like other crops, pumpkin yield can be affected by the elements during the growing season.

For Jenna Spychal, an owner of Jonamac Orchard, 19412 Shabbona Road in Malta, rain that led to disease and pest damage was her pumpkin patch’s biggest concern.

“We’ve had a good crop this year, but too much rain in spring has been our biggest problem,” Spychal said.

“Pumpkins are actually pretty hardy.

They do very well with the hot, dry summer. It was just the late start with the rainy spring that was tough.

Although it has been a good crop, we’ve had to worry about powdery and downy mildew, bacterial spot and pest damage.”

Jonamac Orchard had 25 different varieties of pumpkins growing on 12 to 14 acres this year.

h iin “Another issue was fastt changes temperature,” Spychal said. “We’ve had a big swing in temperatures this year, from 80 degrees Fahrenheit to a freeze in the same week. … It’s just been a bizarre year for us, starting with all the rain in the spring.”

K th B k owner off H Kathy Bock, Honey Hill Orchard, 11783 Waterman Road in Waterman, said she usually plants her pumpkin seeds in early to mid-June, but planting was delayed this year.

Honey Hill Orchard had 18 varieties of pumpkins growing on 3 to 5 acres.

According to Northern Illinois University’s Department of Geography’s climate summary, both May and June were wetter than average.

“We had a lot of heavy rains, and with some slopes and hilly areas, some parts of our field were washed out,” Bock said. “We replanted about a fourth of the field because of the rain in June. We had to choose to either replant or have bare patches.”

In May, DeKalb received 7.27 inches of rain, 2.72 inches above the 30-year average. This May was the ninth wettest May on record.

In June, DeKalb received 8.81 inches of rain, 4.63 inches above the historical average of 4.18 inches. This June is tied with June 1972 for the fourth wettest June on record.

July and August had below-average rain totals: July saw 2.15 inches, or 2.17 inches below the historical average, and August saw 3.88 inches, or 0.48 in. age. below the historical average

Both Wessels and Spychal said that they didn’t have to replant, but Spychal said that she lost some crop planted in lowlying areas.

“Everything, from planting, harvesting and selling is so dependent on the weather,” Bock said. “We were worried about the dryness and excessive heat during the summer, but we did better than I would have thought. It has been an average crop year for us.”

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Smart tech for smarter farming

DeKalb County farmers increasing use of GPS, drones, other tech to maximize efficiency

By KATRINA J.E. MILTON kmilton@shawmedia.com

S

teve Bemis’ family has been farming in DeKalb for more than 140 years.

He said that if his grandfather could sit up in the combine during harvest, he would be overwhelmed at the advances in technology – especially the screens, knobs, buttons and internet capabilities of current farm machinery.

“The technology surprises me. I don’t know what my dad or grandfather would think,” Bemis said. “We’ve had quite a few changes in just the last 10 or so years. I know I didn’t envision some of these changes when I started farming in 1984. But I’m sure glad we have them.

“It helps add functionality and efficiency to my farming. I can put in long hours and not be so fatigued.”

Bemis’ farm equipment has more than leather seats, cupholders, air conditioning, heat and the radio.

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22 SUCCESS  YEARS  OF  

“Tractors can basically steer themselves now and can lock right on the row,” Bemis said. “We have GPS, yield mapping and adaptive cruise control. Farm managers or fertilizer suppliers can easily pull up info from our cabs in real time. With variable rate application, we can apply to the exact spot that it’s needed. There’s even automatic row shut off on sprayers.”

Bemis’ farm is what is known as a smart farm, one that uses modern technology to maximize efficiency.

Eric Shearer, farm manager at Babson Farms in DeKalb, defines a smart farm as one that uses technology, such as GPS, unmanned aerial systems, also known as drones, and precision agriculture tools like variable-rate technology.

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By doing soil tests and grid maps, Shearer said that farmers and farm managers can better understand their fields and crops.

“We can determine what is needed in the field, from fertilizer, seed, pesticide, fungicide or water, and apply only what is needed where it’s needed,” Shearer said. “Then we can overlay that information with harvest data. We can analyze and georeference areas that were applied and not applied. Our hope is that it makes farms more efficient.”

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According to a report published in 2009 by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, by 2050, agricultural production will have to rise by 70 percent to meet projected demand.

“We hope using [modern technology] translates into more yield,” Shearer said. “We have limited land. We need to maximize what we can produce on those acres.”

To oversee the farms he manages, Shearer uses a drone to take pictures and video of fields.

“Drones are great for scouting and making management decisions,” he said. “They can catch a lot of things, things like misapplications, flooding and drought. With a drone, you can cover many fields in a day and revisit fields in a day. In years past, you could maybe visit a few fields only once a year.”

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Bemis said the only negatives he can think of with the advancements in technology are the startup expense and the learning curve.

“I continue to be amazed by technological advancements,” Bemis said. “It’s just amazing to see how technology has evolved.”

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A TAR SPOT OF TROUBLE DeKalb County farmers say fungus makes real impact on yield for ďŹ rst time

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Farmer Steve Drendel of Malta had heard about tar spot before, but had never seen it in person – until this year.

The disease, new to the continental U.S., was first observed in Illinois near DeKalb in 2015, with additional sightings in Indiana.

Since that time, the leaf disease has been detected in northern Illinois each year, but, until now, infections have been sparse and have occurred late in the season, minimizing yield loss.

This year, Drendel saw tar spot in all of his cornfields. He planted between eight and 10 hybrid corn varieties, and all were affected by the black-spotted fungus.

“Once we were made aware of it, we found it in more and more locations, but never as much as we’ve had this year,” Higgins said. “In 2016 and 2017, we saw it late in the season and didn’t know if it would overwinter in fields. For whatever reason this year, the infections started much earlier and it has been much more prevalent.”

“Every hybrid was effected, each differently,” Drendel said. “Some lost 30 to 40 bushels per acre, others 10 to 20 bushels per acre. I’ve been aware of tar spot the last three or so years, but this is the first year I visibly saw it in my fields and had yield reduction.”

Eric Shearer, farm manager at Babson Farms in DeKalb, said he and his tenant farmers have seen tar spot for about four years, but that this year “was definitely worse.”

“This was the first time it was noticeable and that we had yield loss with it,” Shearer said.

“Our fields went from green to dead in five days.”

Tar spot’s symptoms include black raised bumps or lesions on corn leaves, and in some cases, necrotic fisheyes or dead tissue surrounding the lesions. The embedded lesions resemble a spot of tar on the corn plant. Significant infection can limit photosynthesis, reduce yield or potentially kill the plant.

Russ Higgins, commercial agriculture educator with University of Illinois Extension, said tar spot has been an issue in Mexico and Latin America, where it’s known as tar spot complex and can cause severe yield losses. It is now an issue in Florida and a growing number of states surrounding Illinois.

“Tar spot has historically been found in southern climates and has been associated with high humidity and moderate temperatures,” Higgins said. “One theory is that the spores from the disease traveled north through weather, maybe a tropical storm or a hurricane.”

Higgins said that this year, tar spot has appeared in the fields of nearly every DeKalb County corn farmer. It has also appeared in southern Wisconsin, Michigan, Iowa and parts of Indiana.

According to an article written by extension Plant Pathologist Nathan Kleczewski, little is known about tar spot, how the pathogens interact with one another, the epidemiology of the diseases and how the pathogens interact with their corn host. The disease may act different in Midwest production systems because hybrid genetics, production practices and environments differ from those in Latin America.

“It really hasn’t been an issue until this year, so there haven’t been extensive studies or specific trials,” Higgins said. “It’s hard to validate just how we’ve been effected by tar spot. We’d have to compare an effected area to an area without it, and this year that’d be hard to do. It infected just about everything.”

“We still have a lot to learn on the subject, so much is still unknown,” Higgins said.

“We don’t know why it took hold in northern Illinois but skipped central and southern Illinois. We don’t know what extent fungicides or tillage will help. We have no idea how it functions here.”

Higgins said one experiment has been done: sweet corn planted in September that emerged and grew two to three inches also was affected by tar spot.

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“That means that tar spot can continue infection through the season if given the right conditions,” Higgins said. “We know that it is here and we are positive that it is overwintering. But we don’t know why this year has been so severe.

We’ve had a fair amount of moisture this year, but we’ve also had it in recent years as well. We’re not sure what made 2018 so unique.”

Shearer said that he is talking to his tenant farmers to decide how to combat tar spot next year.

“We have to ask ourselves how to fix this, if it can be fixed,” Shearer said.

“Will we use fungicide? We have to figure out what it will cost us. Will we have to spray every acre next year?”

Drendel said next year he plans to look to plant hybrid corn varieties and possibly spray multiple applications of fungicide.

“My plan for next year is to plant hybrids that didn’t show as much yield reduction and spray fungicide that will prevent the disease from spreading,” Drendel said. “All corn, at varying degrees, was effected this year. Tar spot was very severe because it had a multiplying effect with other diseases and weather.

We have seen how the combination of below-normal rainfall in July and August and the diseases of anthracnose and tar spot have impacted overall corn yields this year.”

Kleczewski said that current models predict the spread of tar spot across the Corn Belt.

“Models predict that tar spot may be more severe in the north Midwest area near Lake Michigan because that region shares a lot of similarities climatically with Latin America, where the disease may have originated,” Kleczewski said. “In Latin America, the best way to prevent tar spot has been through hybrid genetics. Our end goal is that in the next few years, the industry will have better hybrids and we’ll develop tools to determine a window to help growers make profitable and efficacious fungicide applications, hopefully avoiding the epidemic we had this season.”

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: Y T E F A S TRACTOR h t o b r o f t n a t Impor s r e v i r d d n a farmers

Sharing g the road requires patience, working equipment and commitment to safe driving

By KATRINA J.E. MILTON kmilton@shawmedia.com

E

ven with a strobe light, multiple blinkers and a large reflective orange and red “slow-moving vehicle” sign on the rear of her 60,000-pound tractor and wagon loaded with grain, Jeanette Erlenbach of Waterman feels invisible.

Erlenbach has been driving tractors on public roads for 46 years.

Through the years, she said not much has changed when it comes to drivers paying attention to farm vehicles.

“The majority of people don’t pay attention to me or my signals,” Erlenbach said. “They have no respect for us [farmers] on the roadway. They try to pass me when I’m turning, they pass in a no passing zone, they even try to pass me on a bridge or a low shoulder, where it’s impossible for me to move over.”

While empty, Erlenbach’s tractor can reach a speed of up to 25 mph. That drops to 18 to 20 mph while carrying a load. She said that one of the most dangerous situations is when she is forced to stop make an abrupt, unexpected stop because of reckless drivers ahead of her.

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The following pre-trip inspections can help reduce the risk of tractor accidents: Are roll-over protective structures in place and seat belts used?

“I can’t stop fast because of the weight in the wagon,” Erlenbach said. “I drive on rural roads, there’s usually not much of a shoulder to go on without falling off, rolling over and tipping my load.”

For added safety, Erlenbach has added a strobe light on the top of her tractor cab and a rearview camera.

“As the vehicle’s owner, you have a lot of responsibility,” Erlenbach said. “You have to have liability insurance and maintain the machinery, tires, flashers, etc.”

According to the National Safety Council, tractor accidents are the leading cause of injury and death among farmers and farm workers. The National Agricultural Tractor Safety Initiative reports that tractors cause about 130 deaths annually – about half of all farm worker fatalities.

DeKalb County Sheriff Roger Scott said tractor road safety “is all about being patient and alert, especially near hills and curves.”

“Tractors and farm vehicles have a right to the road, we just have to be cautious,” he said.

“Every year, there are two to five incidents involving farm vehicles in DeKalb County. Drivers must be alert: watch for equipment, pay attention to crossroads and no passing zones and don’t pass without visibility. Even if passing is legal, pass safely and carefully.”

Scott also had advice for farmers driving the tractors and farm vehicles on the roads: doublecheck all lighting and be sure to display the “slow moving vehicle” sign on the rear of equipment.

“Farmers are out almost every day with harvest underway,” Scott said. “It’s important for everyone to pay attention, stay alert and drive safely.”

Is a power take-off master shield in place?

Is the operator’s platform clear of debris?

Is a reflective “Slow Moving Vehicle” emblem posted?

Are lights and flashers operational?

Are tires properly inflated?

Are the hydraulics free from leaks?

Are brakes locked together?

Is a 20-pound “ABC” fire extinguisher in place?

Is a fully equipped first aid kit on the tractor?

Source: National Safety Council

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