Sunflower Highlights

Post Date: Jan 29 2018

Reduce Your Fertilizer Bill

With tight profit margins projected in 2018, ag producers generally are cautious about spending on crop inputs. Fertilizer costs can take away profit from the bottom line. Sunflower mines nitrogen left behind by other crops reducing your fertilizer bill and the efﬁciency of nitrogen utilization by sunﬂower is relatively high. New nitrogen and phosphorus recommendations based on general productivity history and not a yield prediction model is now available. Use these links to access more info: www.sunflowernsa.com/uploads/3/Fertilizing.Sunflower.NDSU.SF713_Feb.2016.pdf
Sunflower Nitrogen Calculator: www.ndsu.edu/pubweb/soils/sunflower/

2018 NSA Gold Award Nominations

Nominations are now being accepted for the 2017 NSA Gold Award. Click here for the eligibility and criteria requirements. Nominations must be received by February 23, 2018. The NSA board of directors will review all submitted applications and choose a winner. The Gold Award will be presented during the NSA Summer Seminar, set for June 26-28, 2018 in Alexandria, MN.

Monitor Moisture of Binned Seeds

If you’ve got some of last year’s sunflower crop stored in bins, make sure you keep an eye on the seed’s moisture level. The maximum recommended moisture content for stored sunflower is 9.5% through the winter months and 8% if the storage period is longer than about six months. It’s also important to check the sunflower weekly and make sure you check the sunflower, not the bin. Check by getting into the storage each time and walk, feel, smell, and probe the seeds. Remember, walking around in filled bins can be dangerous, so take extra precautions. Click here for more storage tips.

Markets

Sunflower prices at the crush plants ended the week mixed at down 5 to up 5 cents. The birdfood market remains rather quiet. The markets were all about the dollar last week as the US dollar continued its decline to the lowest value in more than three years. Historically a declining dollar generally boosts demand for dollar-denominated products. This has prompted speculation that demand for US exports will improve. US officials at the international gathering in Davos, Switzerland appeared to back a weaker greenback as a way of improving the US trade deficit. Export news for traders has been thin the past few weeks. Some worry that overseas buyers are starting to shift seasonally to South American supplies. Brazil’s soybean crop looks very good at this point, while Argentina’s soybean losses from dry weather conditions are still being assessed by the trade. Some traders feel large global soybean supply, slower demand for products, normal South America production and US farmers adding soybean acres in 2018 could weigh on 2018 new crop oilseed prices. New crop sunflower prices are out at the crush plants with cash and Act of God (AOG) contracts available. Something else to consider is the oil premiums that are offered at the crush plants on oil content above 40% at a rate of 2% price premium for each 1% of oil above 40%.