Finalizing the 2024 crop year for Nebraska’s Bryan Pippitt

[Yeager] Hello, I'm Paul Yeager, this is the MToM podcast, and we are inside the studios of Iowa PBS and the Market to Market TV show. We are going to continue our conversation with farmers. We do that quite often here on this podcast. But this one is a farmer. We have talked to two times before. Bryan Pippitt is a farmer from northeast Nebraska. We talked to him a couple of times this year, kind of set up what's going to happen for this season then we talked to him when everything was green. Everything looked good. You know what happens? We start talking about the weather and it changed. We're going to find out how, it might not have been all about the lack of rain that caused issues for him, this season. But we'll find out what optimism remains and what is ahead. If you have feedback for me, hit me up in an email. Paul.Yeager@IowaPBS.org. Now let's get to our conversation. You know, Bryan, once you mentioned the rains have been good. You. We knew. We knew at that exact moment what was about to happen. And it came true, right? The rains kind of stopped.

[Pippitt] Yeah. Maybe for a couple more weeks after that. But it was pretty short lived and, yeah, about two straight months without anything.

[Yeager] So what did that mean then?

[Pippitt] Yields all around are down a little bit. And, for the fact of rain, probably most of the soybeans, but in corn we also had some disease of this year. We had to spot, which is new to us from southern rust, which the guys around here blamed on the hurricanes come out a little bit further north than normal. But, yeah, it got challenging. After I talked to you last, we were on a pretty high note when we were spraying in that last chat. I know I think it's probably first week of July somewhere. First week of July. And, we had rain through the month of July, but about July 31st was the last decent measured one. And after that it was it kind of shut off. The harvest was over.

[Yeager] At that point. Can you if the pivots haven't been on, do you turn them back? Do you turn them on or. I know, dry and you have no choice. You have no pivots. But what's the strategy there? I don't always understand it.

[Pippitt] Yeah. We irrigate nonstop and I don't know our goal. Whether right or wrong, we always kind of try and run around once a week and they vary, but we kind of try to put on like three quarters of an inch once a week. And, we probably end up making like six circles and 6 or 7 circles because we are in a water district that we have to turn in our readings at the end of the year. And it looked like I put on between like five and six inches on most of the irrigators that I ran for, at least for corn, corn wise and beans are similar. We went a bit longer in season with beans, but we also got to the end and just maybe for the corn side with the disease coming in, it died fast, but it just went from irrigating to dying to drying down. And we had a bunch of 12 and 13% corn in the first part of October. It just went from one extreme to the other.

[Yeager] And that's weird. I mean, that, but it's not uncommon for so many, in the corn growing areas. It just seemed to be the story I have heard. Your story is not unique. Does that give you any solace that you know you're not alone?

[Pippitt] Well, yeah, it does me feel a lot better, but at least. Yeah, like you say, we weren't the only ones. It seemed like it's kind of a general consensus around here where, I mean, there was little showers not far away, honestly, 20, 30 miles east of us. Had a nice rain, early September. But at that point, it probably helped more for the beans. I don't know if it really helped the corn or not, but they're also dry. They're drying over there anyway, so I say I feel like the corn irrigating we were supplementing able to keep up. But I just the idea when the disease moved in we just it was unforeseen, unexpected. And it was a lot harder than we thought it was going to be, than we anticipated.

[Yeager] A lot harder. In which way?

[Pippitt] just on the yield, I would say we're probably 25, 30 bushel short on corn from we're expecting.

[Yeager] Is it mostly because of the lack of moisture or was heat a factor?

[Pippitt] I would say corn mostly for disease and I would blame the soybeans. I would say we're probably five bushel short, and I would blame that on getting dry in the month of August. And it's just tough to irrigate beans. It just seems like we need a rain in August to get our high end beans. And I know had a lot of mid 60 bushel beans and a lot of 222 bushel corn, which last year I think we're all 242 to 260. So I mean, it looked like it was there and I just dried fast. I mean, we were combining soybeans in the corn is 24.5% yet we got, a couple weeks later and it was we didn't come on anything. Hardly over 15%. All through all year long.

[Yeager] Nothing over 15.

[Pippitt] I think. Two fields averaged over 15. Yeah. Only two.

[Yeager] Well, I guess you saved on drying costs.

[Pippitt] Yeah, yeah, yeah. I wish you would have had the bushels.

[Yeager] I'm sure you would. I'm sure, I'm sure exactly. That's what you want. so let's go to the disease. Part of this discussion for a minute is, was it easy to diagnose to the agronomists? Were they stumped, or was it just the run of the mill stuff? We all knew what was going on.

[Pippitt] Well, once we knew what it was, it wasn't hard to see. And I guess at that point we thought it was late in the season. We're kind of under the assumption that it maybe was going to affect the yield too much. It was probably we were hoping it was late enough in the game, and we thought we were through the filling part and as long as didn't affect test weight or, you know, you know, jeopardized start quality, we thought we're gonna be all right. But, yeah, I think we lost the yield just as it dried so fast. I mean, it went from grain and irrigating to, I mean, just brown and dry in a matter of a couple weeks. Seemed like we irrigated till mid-September and we combine mid-October, and it was 12 or 13%. So it just it just way faster normal. Usually on a normal year we drive around looking for something drying at the combine. You know, we don't have a real good way of drying. So we like to combine around 18, 19%. And we usually we'll do end rows and move to another field or, you know, we don't always just keep going. And this year we went to a field and we combined it with move to the next one. There was just everything was dry.

[Yeager] Did you get the sense you were isolated or was it your neighbors were going through the same thing?

[Pippitt] Yeah, it was I would say it's a huge area, but our immediate area, everybody talked at the same way. I mean, you can just tell just talking people just everyone's getting tired of harvest. I mean, we were done October 28th. We've never been done in October that I can remember. And we were two weeks early. Once we started to 10 or 26, we took a weekend off our wedding, took some Sundays off and we were done October 28th. So I mean, we could it's about a month straight and we were done.

[Yeager] So yeah, well, that means you had to watch the bad part of the Husker football season. That. Yeah, because the good part was early.

[Pippitt] Yeah, yeah. That was, Oh. Well, we won a bowl game. We're maybe making progress.

[Yeager] That's right, that's right, that's right, that's right. Volleyball had a good season too I know. Now making the national championship considers it a bad thing, but it's still good. it's still a good squad. Yeah.

[Pippitt] We have something to cheer for, so. Yeah. Yeah, it's not a success.

[Yeager] So that allowed November to be open to do things. So how much field work got done or was what was the strategy?

[Pippitt] It was a little slow. And we don't, we're almost all no-till and do some cover crops. We're kind of slow getting that done just because it was so dry. And worship is a mountain thing or not. But there wasn't a lot of field work done, not a lot of fertilizer spread. And then we did get a couple rains. Oh, exactly. When they were in the middle November. And that's the you like some guys are going to start spreading fertilizer again. But, we're not in hydrous areas. I mean, a lot of stuff has just been getting for some of the manure got spread. We spread a little manure. But, even just talking to, like, the fertilizer places, they were slow until it seemed like they just weren't. No. Maybe that's part of the economy. Nobody want to spend your money on fertilizer or just dry or for whatever reason, it just normal. It seems like when there's over, there's guys doing field work spreading fertilizer plant that, you know, just a lot of stuff. And this year it seemed like there wasn't much action, at least to me. It seemed like there was.

[Yeager] Did you get the sense that it was more of, well, you mentioned cost, but do you think it was more cost or drought related for that lack of action?

[Pippitt] I would probably say are just being too dry, I think. I don't know if you got and part of it just being the economy too, but I think guys probably just weren't willing to spend money if they weren't sure going to get rained down or didn't watch it on top of the ground. And I don't know, maybe for both reasons, I'm not sure which one more so than the other, but just the combination. I think we're just guys reluctant to pull the trigger.

[Yeager] I think you, the farmers, are always optimistic. There's always optimism. Is it out there right now, given there was some rain in November and maybe, a little bit of rain in December?

[Pippitt] I think so. I mean, I think everybody's concerned and it seems like maybe equipment sales. It seems like we've had a lot of salesmen approaching us trying to get to do stuff. So I get the idea that they're slow or things aren't moving, which makes me think that guys maybe aren't doing their normal year end things. But I know you're starting to see grain moving again, and guys are hauling grain, and it's starting to seem a little more normal for this time of year to me. I think we got some corn to move. We I got started, yeah, we dealt with snow two days ago. So the ground's white and we're just kind of waiting for the roads to dry up, but it seems like there's trucks moving again and kind of start to see more like January. I would, I would say.

[Yeager] Do you get the sense anybody's going to hold on to grain or they're going to sell thinking that worse is ahead?

[Pippitt] I think some guys right now are hoping it gets better. But I, in the back of my mind word kind of get to the point now where we're hoping for a little bit basically washed up on the board. So we're kind of waiting for a little bit better basis. And I guess we're kind of being patient for now. But I know we gave it a few more weeks. We get them into January. I think we're to pull a trigger if it doesn't show a lot of improved by then, and it's gonna be time to start moving, I think. So we like to move grain during the winter time and especially before planting time. So we're I don't know if it's stubborn or optimism or just patience, but we're trying to hold off for a few more weeks unless something happens. I think this report Thursday, we can see what the rest of this week holds, but I guess we're kind of itching to do something. And we got a little bit to go, but maybe not as much as normal. I just I like.

[Yeager] To use optimism, not stubborn, okay? In that discussion, but sometimes you're going to have to use both words. I get it.

[Pippitt] Yeah. Yeah. So if they were optimistic then that the base. Yeah.

[Yeager] Like it is in say July, June, July, August is you know, fair season. People kind of get around to travel. You're about to go on the farm show season. What do you think is going to be the opening line a farmer says to one another, to kind of feel out what they're thinking, like you selling? You holding? You making any changes for next year?

[Pippitt] I think there will be some of that. But I think, like in our immediate area, a lot of guys, there's a few little conventions the are putting us nothing. You know, speeches are these talks or whatever. And it seems like the folks have a lot of diseases. It seems like last year we got hit with my mold real bad, our soybeans an issue we had to spot, which are kind of new to us. And seems like a lot of guys are a little paranoid about that, and especially in our area. I told you earlier that there's a fair amount of corn on corn here, and they said that the residual leftover from the corn stalks and tar spot can linger and stick around for a few years. And I think guys that are going back to corner just that mindset. I mean, last year the beans depressing. But then we combine some very good corn. So you kind of got out of your mind. And this year when you combine some average beans, then go through a average a tiny bit below average corn, it just it kind of takes a little bit more. It seems like I think a lot of guys are focusing, or at least in our immediate operation, we spend a lot of time looking at hybrids that, we use some fungicides. This year we looked at hybrids that had it, you know, what effect from a fungicide pastor that didn't see response or that's kind of what we focused on immediately after harvest. And it seems like there's been a lot of talk about that. Hybrids and fungicides and just disease in general.

[Yeager] Again, soils are different. And you kind of said you don't do much tillage, but that's also because your whole family is, you know, you're more into no tail, but is crop rotation, a solution. Or when you said it might be around for years, it doesn't matter what you plan.

[Pippitt] You know, I think rotation helps. They say tillage helps, baling corn stock to help or grazing cattle on. It helps. But then the next guy will tell you that unless your neighbor does the same thing you're doing, they can still, you know, blow in or move in. So it's not unless it's kind of either everybody tells or everybody be able to corn stalks or this or that. So I guess we're reluctant to tell just we're not sure that's going to be a guaranteed solution. And I guess we've seen the downsides of erosion. So we're not willing to make that. I guess we're we're going to try and we're not to have a lot of corn on corn. I would say maybe 400 acres next year will be corn on corn. So it's not it's a huge portion of our acres, but it's still something that we got in the back of our mind and considering and we're trying to place hybrids out this year, we didn't necessarily see the response. We thought a little bit healthier, hybrid or a little more defense against those kinds of things is what we were looking at for next year.

[Yeager] Or all the acreage decisions made on what's going to be planted where.

[Pippitt] Yeah, and we're going heavy corn again just for so.

[Yeager] But nothing would change that mind right now.

[Pippitt] No. Probably not. Yeah. I think that with what we're going to I don't know. I don't know if I'm right. We're probably around two thirds a little over. We'll be corn next year and that.

[Yeager] But you would have the option if you, if something dramatically changes in the next two weeks or two months since you didn't do much, fall work, you have that option. But the bean market's not exactly acting like it wants more acres.

[Pippitt] Yeah. And I say I would, honestly, I would rather just be in a 50/50 rotation. But just for my cash flow standpoint and just, we're kind of in our third year, just average yielding beans. It seems like it seemed like three years ago we were real dry. Last year we had white mold. This should we got dry at the end and we probably planted a little too wet. And maybe we had some of those, you know, symptoms showed up later in the year. I don't know. But in 2021, we had very good beans. It seems like since then we've just been very average and been, I don't know, mid 60s. And at some $10 beans, that's just not a lot of dollars an acre. And I guess we're not comfortable. It's just easier to raise the revenue with corn that is for beans. And I guess we're willing to take our chances and plant corn.

[Yeager] You are giving agreement to what the analysts who sit on market to market say. I think it's easier for everybody to plant corn. I think we're going to see more corn. I mean, that's what they're saying because that's what they're reading. and I'm sure they're having conversations with guys like you. And that's what that's that sounds like the sentiment for many, many, many people.

[Pippitt] Yeah. And that's what we are. Two of them. I just, it seems like you may not down here, which I wouldn't say this year's a flop, but it was definitely disappointing. And I mean, we still raise 220 some bushel corn, which on irrigated we'd like to be more than that. But I mean 220, we can still get over $4 for today. I mean, I feel like that's another 200 bucks versus 65 bushel beans at $10. So I just we got more room. We're a little more consistent. yeah. It takes more inputs and. Yeah, it takes no more logistics at harvest time and moving it and handling it, storing it. But it's just easier for us to manage. It seems like our at least account on than raising soybeans at the moment.

[Yeager] Which means you're not going to rotate in a third or fourth crop because you've got the infrastructure set up. It's not to that point yet.

[Pippitt] Well, we're not there yet, but I would never say that either. I mean, we've done cover crops for probably at least somewhat for ten years now. And, if there's nothing we can make work, I think we would seriously look at a third crop someday. But we're just not sure what that is or what the market is or what that might be, but I think maybe that would help some of our Zs just to have another break in the cycle. And, would, you know, lessen the load at harvest time if you had something you can harvest about earlier, a different season or I know we don't really have any better trays. We have some guys do crops for silage or for cattle or something, but never really on the grain side. So I have nothing in the immediate future, but I wouldn't say we wouldn't try something different at some point, especially if things stay in this trend.  I think it would be we at least consider the idea of if there's something that we could get to make sense.

[Yeager] Being open is fine. but economics might force the discussion sooner than later. I mean, if we continue on a trend of these prices and low, below the cost of production, I think there'll be many people having that same thought process that you're talking about. Bryan.

[Pippitt] Well, and I think, too, if it would help with our breaking the cycle or some of these diseases or something, or, you know, we might get away with less and when they do go back to corn, might get away with less inputs if we're not using a fungicide or two, pass the fungicide or the insects. I mean, it just, you might have to kind of average three years together. I don't know how it would look. And I know the banker just like to hear that you don't want to average or take away from one year. But at the same time, I do think we're I wouldn't say we're in a rut, but it does feel like we need to address some, either on the fertility side or some side that we're overlooking, because it just seemed like when I started farming, we never dealt with the disease. We used to spray fungicide because we thought we were getting a yield, but we never really were concerned or focusing on just the disease side of it. But now, two years in a row, we've had a disease in something. And, yeah, when it gets to the point where it's too hard to do something, you just kind of out of options and then it kind of hurts the harvest time. So it or like be a little more proactive, I guess.

[Yeager] Give me again give us, where in Nebraska you are. And tell me what, what your drought monitor level is right now.

[Pippitt] Northeast Nebraska. We're 40 miles west of Sioux City, 40 miles north of Norfolk, Nebraska. I'm 40 miles south of Yankton in South Dakota. So we're kind of right between three bigger cities. And, I saw something in harvest what our drought map was and, I, I think we're like the second category. What I'm in, there's five categories, but we were the second one from whatever the most severe one was. But I would think it was like 70 some days without rain or something like that.

[Yeager] And that's, that's unfortunately a common way of life for many. in your state, it seems in recent times you've been in more droughts than not in droughts.

[Pippitt] Yeah. And the frustrating part this year, which is that way every year, I guess, honestly. But this year there was chances. I mean, there was rain. It would just whenever never get here or, you know, would go past us or it go south of us. And I mean, it wasn't like everybody's getting these huge rains, but, I mean, there was times we thought we were going to get something and we just never could quite get it to amount to anything. I mean, it was close and there was chances, but it wasn't like it was just no chance. It just dried up. I mean, there was some optimism for a while, but we just could never quite get it to get here.

[Yeager] Well, quarter a quarter inch buys you another few days. even 2/10, can, can keep you alive until that that pattern changes and gives you the half inch to three quarters.

[Pippitt] Especially when that did stop, because, I mean, we are through the month of July with the corn and corn got planted. So a little bit earlier, normal, mostly about average, but I mean we were through the heaviest usage for water. I mean, so if we could have, just like you said, got something to kind of something, it would have been anything would've been appreciated. But it just yeah, we just couldn't get one.

[Yeager] Well, it's, it's the story of our life, is always dependent on the weather. Yeah, but that hasn't changed. Your grandparents and mine always depended on that. whatever falls from up above.

[Pippitt] Yeah. And like I say, corn. It seems like if we have the right rains, you know, we can get by with irrigating. Kind of a win, but it seems like the rain is more of a critical factor in soybeans. It just, we need a rain in August to get our top end in soybeans. I mean, we can get an irrigating area, but it just it doesn't need to be a two inch rain. That just makes all the difference in the world.

[Yeager] Well, I appreciate you squeezing me in. I know it's a busy week and busy life for you always. I mean, there's always nothing at the school to do today or something. Or what?

[Pippitt] Yeah, we had school board meeting last night, so we're okay. We're. We're too good for this month.

[Yeager] Just once. one month, one meeting a month.

[Pippitt] One maybe a month. Yeah. Then we have some special meetings throughout the summer and when we do our budget. But most of the year, it's just. Yeah. Once a month.

[Yeager] Yeah.

[Pippitt] Kids went back to school yesterday. Christmas break's over. So we're back in, we're back in the groove. I guess you'd call it. So we're getting back to reality.

[Yeager] Yeah, that's the way that is, the way it goes. Sometimes I appreciate, fitting me and Brian great to talk to you all year. I appreciate it a ton. And, thank you so much.

[Pippitt] Yeah, I appreciate it. Glad to get to meet you and glad to have the conversations with you.

[Yeager] My thanks to Bryan Pippitt for his time, and thank you for watching. We appreciate you supporting this podcast. Subscribe. New episodes come out each and every Tuesday through YouTube or your favorite podcast player, and be sure to subscribe to the Market Insider newsletter comes your way each and every Monday, you find out what's going to be on this podcast before your friends and neighbors do. Isn't that fun to be ahead? That's kind of a value. That's a niche. So we do. We'll see you next time. Bye bye.