Harvest Time
October 2024

Darcy Pralle, Crop Insurance Specialist

Things are almost too good to be true as we roll though very bountiful crops this Harvest. Last year’s Harvest was pretty decent, and this year will probably be even better. More bushels means more to track so keeping good records is always beneficial. Make sure to keep accurate load records from each farm and mark your bins when you change farms. If you can keep farms separated during harvest it makes life much easier when it’s time to report yields for Crop Insurance later on. Plus, the high 2024 yields could really help boost your 10-year averages, so you don’t want a mistake penalizing you. More operations are also transitioning to combine monitors and grain cart scales to track bushels, and we are happy to walk you through those options if you are interested. 

The weather has even dried out nicely for Harvest with just some small rain delays. This drier weather pattern has also started triggering our Rainfall Insurance policies to hit claim levels this Fall. So, if you are one of the operations with grazing or hay acres insured under Rainfall Insurance, you’ll probably be seeing some checks in the mailbox. If your operation has cattle or hay ground and would like to learn more, now is a great time to ask Jim Ward or Darcy Pralle about Rainfall (aka “PRF”) Insurance. The annual sign up is every November and we are expecting another great return on investment for these Rainfall policies in 2025. 

Wishing everyone a safe and successful finish to 2024! 

Rain Makes Grain
July 2024

Darcy Pralle, Crop Insurance Specialist

Most areas are seeing an abundance of rainfall as we head into Summer. June of 2023 was one of the dryest on record and June of 2024 might go down as one of the wettest Junes for our territory. The only downside is that most of the Corn Belt is receiving good rainfall, so the depressed grain markets predict a big harvest. If grain prices continue to drop, the producers taking advantage of new insurance products like Enhanced Coverage Option (ECO) could see some claims this year. ECO stacks on top of your current Multi-Peril Crop Insurance to give you a higher-level protection and it includes a subsidy as well. The drop in corn prices during 2023 produced a lot of ECO payments for producers, even though we harvested excellent yields (which led to zero payments from your Multi-Peril Crop Insurance policy). If you are curious how your neighbor got a Crop Insurance check with a bumper harvest, please reach out to the Risk Management Team and Jim Ward or Darcy Pralle would be happy to explain! 

Switching subjects, our cattle producers are seeing another good run in the cattle markets this year. Of course, it only takes an arm and a leg to buy a pen of calves to fatten out. The high prices look great to the naked eye, but they are causing a lot of thin margins for those buying and reselling calves later. If you can’t afford to let margins slip away, Ag Partners has Livestock Risk Protection to set a floor price now and give you peace of mind if markets fall later this year when you are selling those calves. If you’re 100% sure these high cattle prices are here to stay please share your crystal ball with us, we would love to take a gander! 

Last but not least, a little housekeeping topic. Please get your 2024 planted acres turned in as soon as possible to FSA and your Crop Insurance Agent. The deadline is July 15th and we want you to have plenty of time to make any edits or corrections. Also, when you receive your Schedule of Insurance in the mail outlining all the final coverages on your farm, please give it a thorough review. We want your crops, acres, shares, etc. to be perfect this summer so there are no bad surprises if we have a claim on those come Harvest time. If you have any concerns please reach out to Jim Ward or Darcy Pralle at Ag Partners for assistance. 

Hope everyone has an enjoyable summer!