Cost and return question.

oldtanker · Jan 6, 2016

A neighbor that I don't know too well took a 40 acre field out of CRP last year and put it back into production. Very sandy soil. Bad enough that once tilled if the surface gets dried out and we get a good wind, the wind will blow the field level. No ridges from tillage at all. He also had a pivot irrigator, new put in. Here 45 BPA beans are the norm with 60 being considered very good. The guys with good soil are getting 200 BPA corn and sometimes more. But that "blow sand" as we call it doesn't produce well. Is this buy going to recover the coast of that pivot?

Rick

paul · Jan 6, 2016

I've heard CRP bids are very high right now, surprised it wasn't re enrolled.

Recovering his investment depends on his management skills. I need tile about everywhere, I get too much water on heavy clay and peat soils.
What I hear of irrigation is that weed control is easy, let them burn up when no crop is growing, with good water management you can really
control your crop and if you build up and spoon feed the fertilizer you can raise amazing yields. But it takes a lot of attention to the spoon
feeding and water management..... If he can add 1/4 to 1/3 of the good yields you mention, he should make it work.

Right now this year and next the ecconomic cycles might say none of is make anything no matter how we farm, but over 20 years it should
average out?

Paul

oldtanker · Jan 6, 2016

(quoted from post at 10:26:30 01/06/16) I've heard CRP bids are very high right now, surprised it wasn't re enrolled.

Recovering his investment depends on his management skills. I need tile about everywhere, I get too much water on heavy clay and peat soils.
What I hear of irrigation is that weed control is easy, let them burn up when no crop is growing, with good water management you can really
control your crop and if you build up and spoon feed the fertilizer you can raise amazing yields. But it takes a lot of attention to the spoon
feeding and water management..... If he can add 1/4 to 1/3 of the good yields you mention, he should make it work.

Right now this year and next the ecconomic cycles might say none of is make anything no matter how we farm, but over 20 years it should
average out?

Paul

Paul I don't know. He got about 20 BPA off of it this year with the irrigator. It's just sand. With the amounts of fertilizer he's going to have to dump on that I really don't know. That's why I ask.

It's kinda funny how much land can change in a mile. I have sandy loam that without a pivot on a normal year can produce 45 BPA beans yet about 1/2 mile away it's sand. Another 1/2 mile east is sandy loam and in another 1/2 mile you start getting into clay.

Rick

Goose · Jan 6, 2016

There's an area of the Nebraska Sandhills roughly south of O'Neal, NE where in the 1970's people plowed up the natural grass, installed center pivots, and tried to put the land into crop production. Ten years later, when you drove through the area all you could see was abandoned pivots beside fields of destroyed natural foliage.

Iowa Jim · Jan 6, 2016

With the crazy CRP rental rates I'm hearing I'd put that bugger right back in to CRP.

4520BW · Jan 6, 2016

In my area its about$1000 an acre to put a pivot in. The wells are shallow here the deeper your water the more cost of drilling and pump will be.

Spook · Jan 6, 2016

(quoted from post at 10:38:10 01/06/16)

(quoted from post at 10:26:30 01/06/16) I've heard CRP bids are very high right now, surprised it wasn't re enrolled.

Recovering his investment depends on his management skills. I need tile about everywhere, I get too much water on heavy clay and peat soils.
What I hear of irrigation is that weed control is easy, let them burn up when no crop is growing, with good water management you can really
control your crop and if you build up and spoon feed the fertilizer you can raise amazing yields. But it takes a lot of attention to the spoon
feeding and water management..... If he can add 1/4 to 1/3 of the good yields you mention, he should make it work.

Right now this year and next the ecconomic cycles might say none of is make anything no matter how we farm, but over 20 years it should
average out?

Paul

Click to expand...

Paul I don't know. He got about 20 BPA off of it this year with the irrigator. It's just sand. With the amounts of fertilizer he's going to have to dump on that I really don't know. That's why I ask.

It's kinda funny how much land can change in a mile. I have sandy loam that without a pivot on a normal year can produce 45 BPA beans yet about 1/2 mile away it's sand. Another 1/2 mile east is sandy loam and in another 1/2 mile you start getting into clay.

Rick

The locals call my place blow sand. It does grow trees, and anything else, given inputs. Very little irrigation around here.

I used my Kubota and phd to put some post holes for a deck last year, about a mile away. I couldn't believe how hard the clay was. I was breaking off shear pins, several of them, not because I hit a rock or a root, but because the ground was so tight. I had a pin in there for 10 years, probably 100 holes, then went thru 9 in 24 holes. I ended up wood pecker style, the only way not to break pins. When done, the holes looked like they had been drilled in metal, I could see the threading marks on the sides of the holes. No loose dirt on the bottom, either.

GordoSD · Jan 6, 2016

Are ypu trying to buyit?

oldtanker · Jan 6, 2016

NO, just a question about the cost and returned based on soil conditions.

Rick

4020 electrician · Jan 6, 2016

I'm taking my ground out CRP this fall. Depends on
how he farms the sand. We have a couple farms
that are sand. Irrigation around us and a big gravel
pit 1 1/2 miles away. We don't irrigate average 150
bpa corn and soys 45 bpa. A guy 5 yrs ago could
pick that ground up cheaper. It comes down to
management. We cover crop and use alfalfa in our
rotation.

coonie minnie · Jan 6, 2016

It depends on the year and on management. We have 300 acres of irrigation. The last few years, with high crop prices, irrigation was a no-brainer... we installed two new pivots in the spring of 2012, the
yield increase that year combined with high prices meant we paid off 75% plus of the new machine in one season.

However, that was a fluke year ( I hope!). If the land can be productive with water, odds are he will recoup his investment... it costs the same to plant 200 bu corn as it does 100 bu corn. With today's low
prices, it won't be the same as the last 8-10 years, though.

Lazy WP · Jan 7, 2016

And then when corn hit $8.00 a couple years ago, they put most of the pivots back in.
Give it a few years and every darn one of them will be crying that they need the "NEW" CRP payments to stay in business.
That being said, given water, nutrients, and proper farming techniques, blow sand can raise 300 bushel corn.

The problem with the Nebraska Sandhills is freight.

Cost and return question.

oldtanker

Well-known Member

paul

Well-known Member

oldtanker

Well-known Member

Goose

Well-known Member

Iowa Jim

Member

4520BW

Well-known Member

Spook

Well-known Member

GordoSD

Well-known Member

oldtanker

Well-known Member

4020 electrician

Member

coonie minnie

Well-known Member

Lazy WP

Well-known Member

Similar threads