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 KIS Futures as a regular sponsor of our daily E-Mail. KIS Futures provides Oklahoma Farmers & Ranchers with futures & options hedging services in the livestock and grain markets- Click here for their recent TV Commercial or call them at 1-800-256-2555.

We are also pleased to have as a regular sponsor on our daily email Johnston Enterprises- proud to have served agriculture across Oklahoma and around the world since 1893. For more on Johnston Enterprises- click here for their website!
And 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!

If you have received this by someone forwarding it to you, you are welcome to subscribe and get this weekday update sent to you directly by clicking here.

This is a fairly narrow band of rain that has stalled out over Major County as Watonga has received about a tenth of an inch since 7 PM last night- and Kingfisher nothing. This system is moving up from the Pacific and has not moved overnight- thus the extreme amounts of rain falling in Major County.

Still to come is a potential rain event courtesy of Ike. Ike is expected to make landfall tonight near Galveston and then move inland up across east Texas and turn and head northeastward towards Little Rock, Arkansas. This is a big storm(miles across) and it will easily extend its bands of rain into Oklahoma- how far and how much rain those bands bring remains to be seen. The southeastern half of the state will likely get the wettest from Ike as he rolls in over the weekend.
We have linked Gary England's weather webpages below- check in from time to time there as Gary is watching all of the systems that can impact Oklahoma- and as he has said for decades- "we'll keep you advised."

Click here for the latest on the rain making systems- and possible flooding that is ahead today and into the weekend.

We talked a few weeks back with Francie Tolle of the American Farmers & Ranchers about the implementation of the Farm Law- about ACRE as well as the importance of signing up for NAP in order to be eligible for the permanent disaster program for the current crop year- deadline to sign up as we have mentioned is September 16- Click here to go to that interview with Francie.

Click here this weekend and look for the Crop Insurance Stories with Scott Bulling of OFB

The August report predicted a 12.288 billion bushel corn crop, a 2.973 billion bushel soybean crop and a 410 million bushel sorghum crop. Prereport guesses are on both sides of all three of those numbers- and the question continues to be- with the crop so late here in 2008- what will be the eventual yield impact.

We will have additional analysis on the numbers later this morning on the website- go to our front page and look for those stories that will have an Oklahoma perspective and rundown of the size of our Oklahoma crops here in 2008.

The CFTC claims that while there has been some traders who have been able to circuvent normal limits of how many contracts they could control- but it was a limited number and CFTC believes these specs did not unduly impact the market.

Oklahoma's Third District Congressman Frank Lucas was one of those who dialogued with Walter Lukken- Lucas asking specifically about the wheat market and why "index investors" had such a huge interest in the wheat market earlier this year. We have that give and take between Congressman Lucas and Chairman Lukken as a webstory on our website- click below for that report and to hear what they discussed.

Click here for the CFTC Story on our website- www.OklahomaFarmReport.Com

Dr. Flinchbaugh says that he believes there are really two issues that are of most importance to farmers and ranchers- biofuels and their relevance in a national energy plan and the issue of expanding global trade opportunities. He says on Trade that John McCain earns an "A" while Senator Obama flunks. However, the opposite grades are handed out by the cigar chomping professor when it comes to biofuels- Obama earns the "A" while McCain flunks the course.

Dr. Flinchbaugh believes that ethanol- and especially cellulosic ethanol needs to be a part of helping the US gain energy independence from the thugs that we are forced to buy oil from- and he believes that well negotiated free trade deals with countries like Columbia and South Korea are tremendous benefits for US agriculture.
We have a review of both of these issues and how the candidates stack up in the eyes of Dr. Flinchbaugh- click on the link below to to go that audio report.

Click here for the audio report card from Dr. Barry Flinchbaugh

The crop is Teff, which is an annual grass indigenous to Ethiopia. The crop has small grains that can be used for human consumption in many forms. Teff seed contains 11% protein, 80% complex carbohydrate and 3% fat. As food for human consumption, Teff has unique qualities in that it contains high level of several minerals such as iron, magnesium, calcium, phosphorus, and thiamine. It is an excellent source of essential amino acids, especially lysine, the amino acid that is most often deficient in common grain foods including wheat and millet.

You can read more about this crop- as well as how to determine best dates to dig peanuts and the question of the right pH for a no-till strategy in the latest newsletter- we have a link to that newsletter below.

Click here for the latest PASS newsletter from OSU

According to Moran - the provision was designed to increase administrative efficiency at USDA - but more producers than anticipated are being denied payments. He says many in Congress believed the farm bill provision would allow producers with multiple small farms to combine base acres to avoid payment suspension. But USDA has determined the farm bill language does not permit aggregation of base acres for producers with 10 base acres or less. Moran says the legislation he's co-sponsoring will restore the original intent of the provision - granting farmers the ability to aggregate base acres from multiple small farms.

Moran has also asked for a meeting with USDA Ag Secretary Ed Schafer as he says that he is concerned about how other parts of the farm law may be implemented by USDA.

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.