Howdy Neighbors!

Here's your morning farm news headlines from the Director of Farm Programming for the Radio Oklahoma Network, Ron Hays. We are proud to have American Farmers & Ranchers Mutual Insurance Company as a regular sponsor of our daily update- click here to go to their AFR web site to learn more about their efforts to serve rural America!

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This morning- as we write this email- we are seeing the colder air settle in on the Eastern half of the state, with a 24 degree reading posted in the 4 AM hour at Burneyville, down along the Red River.

We have the Mesonet's Ag Weather website linked on the WEATHER page of our website- WWW.OklahomaFarmReport.Com, and you can check it out- as well as weather information and predictions from the two best weather teams in the state- Gary England and the folks at News9, KWTV in Oklahoma City and Travis Meyer and his crew at the News on 6, KOTV in Tulsa. Below, we have the link from the Mesonet for today's High/low temps- it will show you the colder air sitting on the eastern half of our state this morning.

Clcik here for the AgWeather's High/Low Temps for Oklahoma for Today.

Regarding harvest progress- "Ninety percent of the corn had been harvested by week's end, up 11 points from the previous week but seven points behind the five-year average. Twenty-nine percent of the State's sorghum had been harvested, 23 points behind normal. Soybeans mature increased four points from the previous week to reach 65 percent, 17 points behind the five-year average. Soybeans harvested were up eight points from the previous week to reach 35 percent complete, 19 points behind normal. Ninety-four percent of the State's peanuts were mature by week's end, up two points from the previous week but three points behind normal. Sixty percent of peanuts had been dug, up 15 points from the previous week but 11 points behind the five-year average. Peanuts combined reached 42 percent, nine points behind normal. Cotton harvested reached 21 percent by week's end, up eight points from the previous week but 11 points behind the five-year average. Cotton harvest was in full swing in several southwest counties."

Regarding the winter wheat crop- they report "In areas that received rain last week, producers were forced to bring small grain planting to a standstill. However, the recent rains will help wheat emerge in those areas. Some counties in the eastern part of the State remained dry and in need of moisture. Winter wheat planted increased four points from the previous week to reach 86 percent complete, three points behind the five-year average. Nearly three-fourths of the State's wheat had emerged by week's end, up 10 points from the previous week and one point ahead of normal."

Click here for the latest Crop Weather Update from USDA issued Monday afternoon.

Begemann says that he has great respect for farmers because of the risks that are a part of farming and ranching. He adds that Monsanto has been able to grow their market share by providing seed technology that farmers have made money with- and that Monsanto believes that the technology will pay- even with less than stellar crop prices that we now see.

Our colleague, Stewart Doan, has an audio report of his conversation with Begemann on this issue- and we have it linked on our website- the link is below.

Click here for more on the Monsanto Decision to Not Tie Pricing of their technology to Commodity Prices.

Eight of the 25 are from Oklahoma, including Charlie Baker, Calera, Okla.; Tate Cobb, Guymon, Okla.; Jonathan Cooper, Yukon, Okla.; Dustin Focht, Stillwater, Okla.; Kevin Magby, Atoka, Okla.; Mike Mawske, Shattuck, Okla.; Lane Rodman, Stillwater, Oklahoma and Paul David Rodman, Stillwater, Oklahoma.

Click on the link below to get to today's Beef Buzz and hear McBride's comments on the plans for Wednesday in Texhoma- the sale starts at 10 AM and the actual competition gets underway around 11:30 AM.

Click here for our Tueday Beef Buzz with Ron and John.

Ryan Reuter kicked off the presentation with an overview of Country of Origin labeling, reminding everyone that it is a law requiring retailers to provide origin information on meats, nuts and produce. A similar law for seafood went into effect back in 2002.
Reuter did some scouting at area stores prior to his presentation and gave some examples of how the label is being applied. On a ground beef chub from Wal-Mart, you "have to turn it over and read the very fine print to find out where it is from."

What it means for producers is that all cattle sold now require a verification process. "All cattle sold in the U.S. require some sort of origin documentation and it has to flow all the way up the chain to retail," Reuter summarized.
Barnhart followed up by talking about how things are working at his facility, which handles on average 5,000 head a week, or a total of 250,000 head annually. "During the grace period, we can use visual inspection," he said. The first load of Mexican cattle to come through the sale barn after COOL implementation - which were included in last week's sale - were immediately apparent. Sale officials called the individual who brought the cattle in and had him sign an affidavit certifying that they were of USA/Mexican origin.

We have the complete story that Candace Krebs provided us on the COOL meeting in Lawton- click here to read more.

The CME Globex electronic trading platform will remain unchanged. And the MGEX will continue to host the cash market from a newly remodeled location in the historic Grain Exchange Building.

The decision comes after a study done by MGEX Management at the request of the Board of Directors. The MGEX ownership has yet to give its approval. During the transition period to exclusively electronic trading MGEX will waive all fees associated with open outcry, beginning November first.

Agriculture, as a major user of water, has a presence at this conference, and that can be seen by who the Chairman is of the Oklahoma Water Resources Board- Mark Nichols from southwest Oklahoma.

We'll be covering some of the sessions of this meeting- and we'll have more on that tomorrow morning here in our daily email- as well as on our Radio Oklahoma Network reports- and of course on WWW.OklahomaFarmReport.Com as well.

Click here for the agenda of the Governor's Conference on Water.

We also invite you to check out our website at the link below to check out an archive of these daily emails, audio reports and top farm news story links from around the globe.

Click here to check out WWW.OklahomaFarmReport.Com

Here are some links we will leave in place on an ongoing basis- Click on the name of the report to go to that link:
Our Daily Market Wrapup from the Radio Oklahoma Network with Ed Richards and Tom Leffler- analyzing the Futures Markets from the previous Day-
Ron on RON Markets as heard on K101 mornings with cash and futures reviewed- includes where the Cash Cattle market stands, the latest Feeder Cattle Markets Etc.
Previous Day's Wheat Market Recap- One Pager From Country Hedging- looks at all three US Wheat Futures Exchanges and the why of that day's market.

Daily Oklahoma Cash Grain Prices- As Reported by the Oklahoma Dept. of Agriculture.
The National Daily Feeder & Stocker Cattle Summary- as prepared by USDA.
The National Daily Slaughter Cattle Summary- as prepared by USDA.
Finally, Here is the Daily Volume and Price Summary from the Texas Cattle Feeders Association.