From: Ron Hays [ron@oklahomafarmreport.com]
Sent: Wednesday, June 18, 2008 06:36
To: ron@oklahomafarmreport.com
Subject: Oklahoma's Farm News Update
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Oklahoma's latest farm and ranch news
Your Update from Ron Hays of RON for Wednesday June 18, 2008!
A service of Farm Credit of East Central Oklahoma, KIS Futures & Johnston Enterprises!
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-- Governor Brad Henry Says Oklahoma's Farmers and Ranchers Need A Helping Hand!
-- Harvest Slides Into the Mud
-- Over a Quarter of a Million Dollars for Little Dixie Rural Development Projects!
-- What About Sunflowers???
-- Looking at the Calendar...
-- Staggering Losses in Iowa Alone- $2.7 Billion Loss to Iowa Agriculture from Flooding!
-- Wyoming Close to Falling Off the Bangs Free Wagon.
-- Checking the Markets...

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 website or call them at 1-800-256-2555.

We welcome as our newest regular sponsor on our daily email Johnston Enterprises- proud to have served agriculture across Oklahoma and around the world since 1893. Johnston Grain wishes our wheat producers a safe and prosperous harvest this month- for more on Johnston Enterprises- click here for their website!
And finally, we are glad to have Farm Credit of East Central Oklahoma as a regular sponsor of our daily email update. Farm Credit of East Central Oklahoma has ten branch offices to serve your farm financing needs and is dedicated to being your first choice for farm credit. Check out their website for more information by clicking here!

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.


Governor Brad Henry Says Oklahoma's Farmers and Ranchers Need A Helping Hand!
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Governor Brad Henry sent a letter on Tuesday to U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Ed Schafer requesting disaster assistance for farmers and ranchers in nine northwest Oklahoma counties suffering from drought and extreme weather conditions.

Extreme heat, dry weather, high winds and stressful moisture conditions have damaged hay forages, livestock grazing lands, alfalfa, and other crops. The request for assistance covers farmers and ranchers in Cimarron, Texas, Beaver, Harper, Woodward, Ellis, Roger Mills, Dewey and Woods counties.

"Farmers and ranchers in the Panhandle and northwest Oklahoma are suffering due to drought and other severe weather conditions," Gov. Henry said, "and I hope the U.S. Department of Agriculture will act quickly to get them the relief they desperately need."

It is interesting to note that an email that was sent to me in response to a story on moisture conditions across the body of the state that called me out on the serious conditions in the Panhandle- especially the western part of the Panhandle. Some of our readers/listeners from the Oklahoma Climatological Survey picked up that information on the problems that were getting worse and worse in Cimarron County- that report from Cherrie Brown of the Cimarron County Conservation District prompted a more detailed look at the area- and that prompted an eventual upgrade in the drought description for that part of the state from a severe level drought to an "extreme" level drought. We are very proud to have had a very small role in that process- and it is a reminder to everyone reading this today that we really want you to drop us an email from time to time about crop and livestock conditions in your area- what is going on in your little slice of Oklahoma. It helps us- and in this case- it helped shine the light on an area that is really hurting here in 2008. In this instance- it's nice to have been a part of the process that made a difference!


Harvest Slides Into the Mud
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Not much was happening on the Oklahoma wheat harvest scene yesterday with the heavy rains that hit- especially north of I-40. It's likely that we had combines rolling in the Panhandle- we'll be checking with Rick Kochenower and others from that area later today.

We did add several reports to our Oklahoma Wheat Harvest webpage during the day yesterday- so you may want to check out those postings- we got a couple of nice pictures from Saska Koch from the Clinton-Weatherford area- cutting wheat a few days ago under some of those big wind turbines that you see along I-40 at the edge of Weatherford.

We also got a harvest report yesterday morning from Mike Thralls of the Oklahoma Conservation Commission- who farms with his family in northern Noble County. Mike writes "We are about 30% completed with wheat harvest. A couple of fields cut Friday and Saturday topped 50 bu/acre. The test weight has now dropped to 56-58. The Sunday nights storms was mostly wind uprooting two large trees, tearing away limbs and piling cut straw against fences. " He did acknowledge they were done for a day or two with about an inch and half of rain on his place as of yesterday morning.

Click here to jump to our Wheat Harvest WebPage on WWW.OklahomaFarmReport.Com


Over a Quarter of a Million Dollars for Little Dixie Rural Development Projects!
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State USDA Rural Development Director Brent Kisling and his team will be busy today- traveling across portions of southeastern Oklahoma today- handing out big poster sized "checks" to three Oklahoma communities that are receiving direct help from USDA on local projects.

Stops today will include:
10:30am Bennington. USDA will be presenting a check for $73,001as a Community Facility Grant - this to renovate a building for the Rural Water District.
2:00pm Durant - Kisling and the State USDA Rural Development will carry a check symbolizing $173,000 for a Community Facility Grant that will be used for the construction of a local facility;
and at
4:00pm Tushka - USDA awards $16,107 Community Facility Grant for the purchase police vehicle.


What About Sunflowers???
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We got an email from Brandon Winters of the Producers Cooperative Oil Mill (PCOM) yesterday with a reminder about one crop that might make a lot of sense for those that want to come behind wheat with a second crop this summer- especially in areas that end up with a lot of rain as they battle to get the wheat out of the field.

That possible double crop is Sunflowers. Brandon writes "farmers might want to look into the possibility of growing Nu-Sun Sunflowers behind wheat with all of the moisture we are receiving. Some late planting dates for Sunflowers are August 1, and Nu-Sun Sunflower price closed yesterday 6/17/08 at $0.295 cents per pound which is really good. Also, Producers Cooperative Oil Mill is contracting acres based act of God contracts.

If Sunflowers interest you as a double crop option- contact Brandon at PCOM- his phone number is 405- 232-7555- we also have their website linked below where you can see their daily price quote for both Sunflowers and Winter Canola.

Click here for the PCOM website and more information on their Sunflower Contracting.


Looking at the Calendar...
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This Saturday, the Lane Research Field Day is planned as a joint effort of OSU's Ag Experiment Station and USDA- both of which are involved in the projects at the farm there in southeastern Oklahoma. Howard Garrett, otherwise known as Doctor Dirt down in the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex, will be a guest speaker at this year's event.

Next Monday- the buses will roll for the annual Oklahoma Cattlemen's Summer Ranch Tour as they head for Red Carpet Country- touring several locations in northwestern Oklahoma. You can check with the OCA office for last minute registration of the event- that number is 405-235-4391.

There are also a bunch of other events coming between now and the end of the month of June- and we have gotten a lot of July events to include in the calendar as well- so use the link below and check out our Calendar of Events on WWW.OklahomaFarmReport.Com. REMEMBER- when you know of something happening that we don't have on our calendar- drop us an email and we will be happy to include it and help you spread the word.

Click here for the Calendar page at WWW.OklahomaFarmReport.Com


Staggering Losses in Iowa Alone- $2.7 Billion Loss to Iowa Agriculture from Flooding!
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Flood-related agricultural losses in Iowa will total roughly $2.7 billion, according to a preliminary estimate generated by researchers at Ball State University and the University of Tennessee. Using a statistical model developed after the massive floods in 1993 and verified through its use following Hurricane Katrina, Michael Hicks, director of the Bureau of Business Research at Ball State, and Mark Burton, director of transportation economics at UT, also estimated infrastructure damage in Iowa at $159 million. Revenue losses could exceed $20 million.

In the research published Monday, Hicks and Burton said they believed the current agricultural circumstances in Iowa were similar to the situation in 1993, when reported damage to Iowa agriculture totaled $978 million. However, given the rapid increase in commodity prices since 1993, the researchers adjusted the 1993 figure by the U.S. Department of Agriculture's May farm price index to generate the $2.7 billion damage estimate.

Hicks believes that 15% to 20% of the acres expected to be planted to corn and soybeans are lost to production, with the wet conditions making it very unlikely that many of those acres will be replanted this season.
Of the $2.7 billion in agricultural losses, Hicks said, roughly $2.6 billion represents losses of grain crops like corn or soybeans. However, other flood damage, such as the loss of hogs and other livestock, is also included in the agricultural estimate, he said.

Click here for the study released from the Ball State Bureau of Business Research


Wyoming Close to Falling Off the Bangs Free Wagon.
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The Wyoming State Veterinary Laboratory (WSVL) reported to the state veterinarian Monday that it has cultured Brucella abortus out of tissues from two cows from Daniel, Wyo. This is confirmation from the WSVL that the herd is infected with brucellosis. Official confirmation is pending culture results from the National Veterinary Services Laboratory in Ames, Iowa.

Blood from these cows initially tested positive at a sale barn- the blood was sent on to WSVL where testing confirmed the reaction seen at the sale barn. However, since false positive blood tests can occur, the cows were sent to the lab where they were necropsied and cultured. With culture, tissues are tested for the actual bacteria. In this case, the bacterium was cultured from tissues from both cows. The Wyoming Livestock Board and USDA Animal & Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) plans to test the remainder of the cattle herd this week to discover if additional cattle may be infected.

If the herd is not depopulated, the state may lose its brucellosis-free status granted by APHIS, the Wyoming Livestock Board said, noting that the producer may choose to undergo a repeated testing and removal program. Loss of this status would result in testing requirements for all cattle in the state when they are sold or move out of state.


Our thanks to Johnston Enterprises, KIS Futures and Farm Credit of East Central Oklahomafor their support of our daily Farm News Update. For your convenience, we have our sponsors' websites linked at the top of the email- check them out and let these folks know you appreciate the support of this daily email, as their sponsorship helps us keep this arriving in your inbox on a regular basis!

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


Checking the Markets...
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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.



God Bless! You can reach us at the following:
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phone: 405-473-6144
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