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Ag Squawk with Ted Hamer | An Iowa Farmer on Succession and Trust · AG Bull

0:11
SPEAKER_02: It is the first of July.
0:14
SPEAKER_02: This week so far has been pretty squarely focused on the reports from USDA.
0:20
SPEAKER_02: With those now behind us and the markets working higher so far, seems like a good time to sort of take a breath, a little bit of a pause, and have a conversation with a farmer who just happens to be a pretty good friend of mine.
0:33
SPEAKER_02: So we'll get the straight scoop from farm country on who knows what on this episode of Ag Squawk.
0:50
SPEAKER_02: From behind the big blue bodacious microphone of Ag Bull, it's Davis Michelson for Ag Squawk.
0:58
SPEAKER_02: Glad to have you along today.
1:00
SPEAKER_02: Ag Bull, the financial channel obsessed with agriculture.
1:04
SPEAKER_02: We're rounding toward the lunch hour presently.
1:08
SPEAKER_02: Corn, beans, and wheat all trending higher for the day so far.
1:12
SPEAKER_02: As I said earlier, we're going to turn our attention away from the markets today, although we'll keep them kind of in our peripheral view.
1:18
SPEAKER_02: And I think that's healthy.
1:20
SPEAKER_02: Sometimes, especially after the last couple of shows that we've had, we've been super laser focused on the market responses, what's coming up, what are the implications of the reports.
1:31
SPEAKER_02: We've got those now.
1:33
SPEAKER_02: Let's just take a second and think about something else for a little while.
1:37
SPEAKER_02: I can't think of a better guest to do that with.
1:41
SPEAKER_02: Before we get to our guests, let me just so you know, in case you've got bugs crawling under your skin, we're we're taping here a little bit earlier today.
1:49
SPEAKER_02: We're about quarter to 11 central time, about 10 45 central time.
1:54
SPEAKER_02: Corn is up, oh, call it four, four and a half cents.
1:57
SPEAKER_02: Soybeans up five cents-ish.
2:00
SPEAKER_02: Uh, we've got meal higher.
2:01
SPEAKER_02: We've got soybean oil working lower.
2:04
SPEAKER_02: Chicago and Casey wheat both higher.
2:06
SPEAKER_02: Looking over to the livestocks, feeder cattle higher, 45 cents higher.
2:11
SPEAKER_02: We get out to the October there, and uh, we're two and a half cents higher.
2:14
SPEAKER_02: And then the Nove is a dime lower in your feeder cattles.
2:18
SPEAKER_02: That's at mid-morning now.
2:20
SPEAKER_02: Mid-morning on Wednesday, and then the fat cattle unchanged in the October and the D.
2:25
SPEAKER_02: Well, just switched to two and a half lower in the October live cattle market there.
2:31
SPEAKER_02: There, that's as markety as we're gonna get at the moment.
2:34
SPEAKER_02: If you're looking for market intelligence, you can go to Agbull.com.
2:37
SPEAKER_02: They'll they'll be sure to fill you in.
2:39
SPEAKER_02: I'll have more details on that later.
2:42
SPEAKER_02: I just wanted to take a quick look at plus five hundred.
2:45
SPEAKER_02: Plus five hundred, we use T4 software every day for updated real-time quotes.
2:51
SPEAKER_02: Plenty of tools at our fingertips.
2:53
SPEAKER_02: Plus 500, that's plus 500.
2:57
SPEAKER_02: All right.
2:58
SPEAKER_02: That being said, we're gonna talk with an Iowa farmer and a heck of a good dude and see what's on his mind with that.
3:07
SPEAKER_02: Let me bring in Ted Hamer from Central Iowa.
3:11
SPEAKER_02: Ted, I couldn't be more thrilled to have you on the show with us.
3:15
SPEAKER_02: Thank you for agreeing to spend some time with us today.
3:18
SPEAKER_02: How you doing, buddy?
3:19
SPEAKER_02: How's everything?
3:20
SPEAKER_01: I would spend time with you anytime I could, Davis.
3:23
SPEAKER_01: I you know, hey, and I love the shot when when the camera's pulled back and I see that sign up there says Grundy Avenue.
3:31
SPEAKER_01: That's pretty cool.
3:32
SPEAKER_01: I like it.
3:33
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
3:33
SPEAKER_02: I so I'm a Grundy County boy.
3:35
SPEAKER_02: So you can see it right up there.
3:36
SPEAKER_02: The Grundy County boy, there was a there was a time I was out riding horses at my old place and it in the ditch.
3:44
SPEAKER_02: One of the signs had blown off or something.
3:46
SPEAKER_02: I don't know if I'm if I'm admitting to a crime right now or not, but I've I found the the Grundy Road, which is the gravel road that borders the section where my my people are from.
3:57
SPEAKER_01: So uh well Blackhawk, Blackhawk County and Grundy.
4:01
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, that's right.
4:02
SPEAKER_02: Yep, yep.
4:03
SPEAKER_01: The two best counties down that road a lot.
4:06
SPEAKER_02: What uh what county are you in, Ted?
4:08
SPEAKER_01: I'm actually well, I'm in Blackhawk.
4:10
SPEAKER_01: I live right on the Tama line, okay, two miles east of the Grundy line.
4:16
SPEAKER_02: Okay, okay.
4:18
SPEAKER_02: You and I have talked before many times, had a good time doing it.
4:22
SPEAKER_02: This is a new audience for me and and for you as well.
4:25
SPEAKER_02: Talk to the good folks out there.
4:27
SPEAKER_02: Tell us about what what you're doing there, tell us a little bit about your operation, tell us what you want us to know about Ted Hamer.
4:34
SPEAKER_01: Well, what do you want to know?
4:36
SPEAKER_01: I first of all, I'm actually in transition.
4:40
SPEAKER_01: My son Caleb and our business partner, Scott Binken, uh, took over the farming operation in 2019.
4:50
SPEAKER_01: I transitioned to them, they each own 40% and I own 20%.
4:57
SPEAKER_01: That was a tremendously good thing for me.
5:00
SPEAKER_01: I if I was gonna tell the older generation that's farming and they're worried about transitioning and things like that, I guess I'd say do it because I'm having more fun now farming than I ever have.
5:15
SPEAKER_01: These younger guys know way more than I do, and we have really blossomed as an as a farming operation since these two guys took over.
5:27
SPEAKER_01: They let me do what I want to do, and which is plant corn and run the combine.
5:32
SPEAKER_01: And they're doing their best to try to keep me from having to do as much any more physical labor than I already am.
5:39
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah, and you're you seem very comfortable in that role.
5:43
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, no, very comfortable.
5:45
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I to be honest with you, until I looked this morning because I knew I was gonna talk to you, I I couldn't have told you within 10 cents where corn was.
5:53
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, um, I did see, you know, we had good pop yesterday from the USDA report, but wow, I I don't pay attention anymore.
6:01
SPEAKER_01: And then other nice thing is when somebody drives in here, like a salesman, I get to tell them, hey, you're talking to the wrong guy, which is funny because if they pull in and the three of us are standing together, they immediately zoom in on me and I'm going.
6:19
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, I'm not in charge here.
6:22
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, well, and I don't even have succession planning on on my list here at all, but you you bring up a really good point, you know.
6:30
SPEAKER_02: For for some farmers, there's so much at stake, and they they take on so much personal pressure to keep the thing going that sometimes it's it's hard to let go.
6:40
SPEAKER_02: So you're talking about being fairly comfortable in in easing ownership and you know the the headship of of the operation to the next generation, but that had to come from years and years of groundwork and working together with your son and with others to to allow you to feel like, yeah, you know what, these guys have got this.
7:04
SPEAKER_02: Is that fair?
7:05
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and I would give a lot of credit to my dad.
7:08
SPEAKER_01: My dad was 44 years older than me, so when he turned 66, I was 22, and he had started farming when he was 38 years old, and learning from his father-in-law.
7:22
SPEAKER_01: And my grandfather was not necessarily an easy man, and I think dad didn't get to make all the calls that he wanted to make, and so when I came along, he uh he really got out of my way and let me make the calls from day one.
7:38
SPEAKER_01: Now, I always tell this story, but he kicked my butt when it needed to be kicked, but the decisions were all mine, and that's kind of how I've tried to bend.
7:49
SPEAKER_01: I'm sure that I step on those guys' toes once in a while, and I don't mean to, and I think I'm getting better at it, and they're also getting better at not necessarily asking for my opinion, they're just doing things, which I think is fantastic.
8:04
SPEAKER_01: But yeah, that said, I think I had good leadership ahead of me in my dad to know that hey, they got to build it the way they see fit.
8:15
SPEAKER_02: Well, farming is is a oftentimes a generational game.
8:19
SPEAKER_02: And actually, I'm gonna break in here really quick for an ag squawk shout out.
8:23
SPEAKER_02: Come on.
8:24
SPEAKER_02: This goes out to Bella.
8:26
SPEAKER_02: Bella, one of our younger listeners, Bella writes, Great to see you again.
8:31
SPEAKER_02: This is my new favorite show.
8:33
SPEAKER_02: That's a shout-out to Bella.
8:35
SPEAKER_02: Come on, all right, moving on, moving on.
8:38
SPEAKER_01: Can you do that again?
8:39
SPEAKER_01: Because that's my new favorite show.
8:41
SPEAKER_02: I absolutely can.
8:42
SPEAKER_02: Shout out to Ted Hamer.
8:44
SPEAKER_02: Come on, yes, a little shout-out there.
8:48
SPEAKER_02: Before we get too deep, I've I promised you that I would say this.
8:51
SPEAKER_02: It's my idea to say this.
8:52
SPEAKER_02: It's my idea to have farmers on the show every once in a while, just because you know, we can get in this bubble where the only thing that matters is the markets.
9:01
SPEAKER_02: And if you watch anything too closely, it will drive you crazy.
9:05
SPEAKER_02: There are professionals who who watch these markets constantly, and there are professionals to help them with the results of that pursuit.
9:14
SPEAKER_02: So let me just make it clear, Ted, I'm I'm not gonna ask you to speak for every farmer on every farm.
9:21
SPEAKER_02: My hope is to talk to somebody with boots in the dirt about every week or so, and let me declare for you and everybody watching, this is a backyard itis approved zone.
9:35
SPEAKER_02: Backyard itis approved zone.
9:37
SPEAKER_02: He his experiences in the present moment, in the future, in the past may not reflect yours, beloved viewer, but there's something to be gained here, and we've already hit on something with the succession planning.
9:50
SPEAKER_02: Ted, that was fantastic.
9:51
SPEAKER_02: Let me start with let's go straight to your backyard.
9:54
SPEAKER_02: Are you knee-high by the 4th of July, buddy?
9:56
SPEAKER_01: I just took a jumped on the golf cart and was just driving up and down around a couple of fields this morning, and I I that very thing crossed my mind, and all our corns over my head.
10:09
SPEAKER_01: So, yeah, that over your head.
10:11
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, how tall are you though?
10:13
SPEAKER_01: Uh well, I'm shrinking, probably five, ten and a half.
10:17
SPEAKER_02: Oh, you're a tall guy then.
10:20
SPEAKER_02: That's so is that pretty typical for the corn that's tall?
10:24
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I would say so.
10:25
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
10:26
SPEAKER_02: Well, they do call it the tall corn state as I recall.
10:29
SPEAKER_01: True, true.
10:31
SPEAKER_02: Have you have you had?
10:32
SPEAKER_02: I know some areas, especially out east in the eastern belt, have you had too much rain around your area?
10:41
SPEAKER_01: Uh we were we were hurting in May.
10:43
SPEAKER_01: I think May we had uh 40 percent of normal rainfall.
10:48
SPEAKER_01: Now in June, since we just finished June last night, we had five and a half inches, which would be about 125 percent of normal rainfall, and it came very, very nicely.
11:00
SPEAKER_01: We didn't have any okay flooding type rain now.
11:03
SPEAKER_01: Just south of us, 10 miles, they caught two and a half inches in about 20 minutes one night, and that didn't bode well in that area.
11:12
SPEAKER_01: But right where we're sitting, I would say the rainfall has been absolutely perfect.
11:17
SPEAKER_02: All right.
11:18
SPEAKER_02: If you're because I was gonna ask about nitrogen loss, but if you've got six foot tall corn by the first of July, yeah, I don't imagine there's been a whole lot of nitrogen loss, and if there has been, it's probably too late to get out there, wouldn't it be?
11:29
SPEAKER_01: Well, you can always use drops, or you could, you know, rare and do the nitrogen with this laying it down that way.
11:38
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
11:39
SPEAKER_01: And there will be some of that done, I'm sure.
11:41
SPEAKER_01: And some guys will use the drops to catch up, especially if they've had that.
11:46
SPEAKER_01: Well, I know areas I think around old wine, I was hearing, you know, maybe it's close to nine inches.
11:54
SPEAKER_02: Well, very good.
11:56
SPEAKER_02: Sounds like you're in good shape there, buddy.
11:57
SPEAKER_02: I'm sure I'm glad to hear that for you and for your for your operation.
12:01
SPEAKER_02: When we were when we were kind of chatting ahead of this taping here, you had talked about, and I wanted to bring up, you know, it's not the 1900s anymore.
12:10
SPEAKER_02: I was gonna go into some technology changes and some things like that, and we can get there.
12:16
SPEAKER_02: But even as we've already said, farming is generational, it's also extremely relational.
12:22
SPEAKER_02: A lot of relationships, you know, your neighbor, you know the if you and I are sitting here around the coffee, when I when I say something like that, I think about my granddad.
12:32
SPEAKER_02: Every day he'd go down to the coffee shop in Dyke, Iowa, and sit there, and all the farmers would show up, everybody's having coffee, everybody's chatting, everybody's talking, but it feels like things are beginning to change relationally in farm country.
12:47
SPEAKER_02: You wanted to talk about that a little bit.
12:49
SPEAKER_02: I'm gonna I'm gonna give you some rope here.
12:51
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I in saying that, I could, you know, and when I 30 years old, I would go to the elevator every morning, have coffee, and maybe even go back up later in the evening, and we played cards, you know.
13:04
SPEAKER_01: Pepper got a lot of pepper games played in my lifetime, especially in the winter months up there.
13:10
SPEAKER_01: But yeah, I and I would say that I the one thing that I've think is really disappointing more and more is corporations are they they become so money oriented that they forget what built their business to begin with, and I would say it's relationships.
13:37
SPEAKER_01: I just think of everybody all these industries seemingly, and I mean all of the industries, seemingly are letting the top people go.
13:53
SPEAKER_01: They're too expensive, we can't afford them anymore.
13:56
SPEAKER_01: And then they move on, and we've lost you know, I I didn't do business with those people because they were brand X or brand Y or brand Z.
14:09
SPEAKER_01: I did business with them because of the relationship we had built.
14:14
SPEAKER_01: And maybe that did get started with brand X, but maybe they moved on to brand Z and I stayed with them because I think far and the problem is what that's teaching us is I would say is that we can no longer, and I'm using this in quotations as a as a question, we can no longer have these loyalties, we're not allowed to have these loyalties because oh my gosh, you know, I it it bothers me, it really bothers me.
14:47
SPEAKER_01: And and what it does to those families, what it does to those people who felt like they had a secure place and all of a sudden they're done.
15:00
SPEAKER_01: And it it actually kind of makes me mad.
15:04
SPEAKER_01: It just makes me mad because I I trusted these people to be in these areas and now they're not there.
15:12
SPEAKER_02: Well, and there's and I feel like a part of that is when companies began selling data, suddenly email lists were for sale, click reports were for sale, and and I think you're right.
15:25
SPEAKER_02: That no that means it's no longer about the people, it's about the data that those people generate.
15:32
SPEAKER_02: And I think that does put us in a in a very uh difficult position.
15:37
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and I yeah, I'm not sure I know all about that, but I would say that yeah, I I we do we do business with people.
15:49
SPEAKER_01: And you know, and I can tell you that some of these people have moved on to different industries and things like that, or different companies.
15:59
SPEAKER_01: In a lot of cases, we're following them, and it doesn't matter what the brand is.
16:04
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah, it is about people, it is about people, yeah.
16:08
SPEAKER_02: All right, um let's uh let's go to something I kind of wanted to talk about that's a little bit along those lines.
16:16
SPEAKER_02: I said it's not the 1900s anymore.
16:19
SPEAKER_02: You know, I remember it was good enough to ride around on on a 1950, I think, four massie Ferguson with a loader on it, and they would they would cultivate with that, they would spray with that, they would do everything with that on the farm where I grew up.
16:34
SPEAKER_02: That's a tractor that taught me how to drive tractors.
16:37
SPEAKER_02: Things are things are changing technologically, and not just with with implements, but I'm I'm curious from your perspective and watching your son kind of in this bold new world and ain't the 1900s anymore.
16:51
SPEAKER_02: How do you decide?
16:53
SPEAKER_02: Okay, this is a technology that we'll try.
16:55
SPEAKER_02: This is a technology that I that creeps me out a little bit, but I'm gonna give it a try.
17:00
SPEAKER_02: Or I mean, how do you know?
17:01
SPEAKER_02: How do you know?
17:02
SPEAKER_02: How do you decide?
17:03
SPEAKER_02: I guess is is the better way to ask the question.
17:07
SPEAKER_01: Well, uh, I would say for first of all, for me, uh in our operation, about seven years ago, we got involved in a peer group, the farming peer group, corporately sponsored.
17:21
SPEAKER_01: The corporate sponsorship has gone away.
17:25
SPEAKER_01: We as a group did not want to break up in my unique situation with you know Caleb and Scott running the operation.
17:33
SPEAKER_01: It left me with a little more time.
17:34
SPEAKER_01: I I told the group, I said, if you guys are okay with it, I'll facilitate it.
17:39
SPEAKER_01: Doesn't mean I'm running it, I just facilitate it and line up our stuff.
17:43
SPEAKER_01: That's where we would go, I would say would be our number one stop on figuring out whether that you know who's doing this with what technology.
17:52
SPEAKER_01: That would be my first go-to spot.
17:55
SPEAKER_01: Also, of obviously other farmers that I think very highly of to give them a call to see if they're using that type of technology.
18:03
SPEAKER_01: But there again, Davis, I'll tell you it comes back to relationships.
18:08
SPEAKER_01: We we use a lot of ag leader, we have a lot of ag leader technology because guess what?
18:15
SPEAKER_01: We trust our salesman Mike Hofer at Park Farms in DeWitt, Iowa.
18:23
SPEAKER_01: And it's because of that relationship that we have a lot of ag leader on this farm uh right now.
18:30
SPEAKER_01: It doesn't mean they're the best, doesn't mean that they that there isn't something out there that would be better, and maybe we ought to think about it.
18:38
SPEAKER_01: But there again, it comes back to a relationship.
18:43
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
18:44
SPEAKER_02: Let me uh let me jump the tracks.
18:46
SPEAKER_02: I I pulled from something that Jim Wiesmeyer wrote for us and get your thoughts on this because I think there's kind of a rub here.
18:55
SPEAKER_02: USDA is taking another step toward reducing farm program paperwork with the farm service agency launching a limited acreage reporting modernization pilot ahead of the major July 15 reporting deadline for most spring planted crops.
19:10
SPEAKER_02: The effort is tied to the Trump administration's broader one farmer, one file initiative, which is intended to move USDA away from duplicate records and disconnected agency systems toward a single more streamlined producer file across FSA on our NRCS RMA.
19:30
SPEAKER_02: Set a larger modernization project.
19:32
SPEAKER_02: It began in 2025, will advance this year, expected to be completed in 2028.
19:37
SPEAKER_02: So it sounds like they want to electronify the way that that farmers file with the FSA office and the way that they do that, hoping to take some paperwork, some hopefully some red tape out of the way.
19:51
SPEAKER_02: So now here we see well, you know, we used to have all these papers to fill out, and it was like paper after paper after paper, and we got to go to the office and this whole thing.
20:00
SPEAKER_02: Now there does seem to be a way, they're trying at least a way forward to do this electronically with less paperwork, less confusion.
20:07
SPEAKER_02: I I wonder what your thoughts might be on on something like that.
20:13
SPEAKER_00: Well, I've heard it's gonna be really good, and nobody has ever seen anything better than this.
20:17
SPEAKER_00: It's just gonna be huge.
20:19
SPEAKER_00: Nobody's ever done a bitter.
20:22
SPEAKER_00: That's pretty good.
20:26
SPEAKER_01: But we've switched, we're doing uh, we're letting the crop insurance company here again, Davis.
20:36
SPEAKER_01: It kind of goes back to that data collection thing, yeah.
20:39
SPEAKER_01: But we're doing it electronically.
20:42
SPEAKER_01: They're pulling from our ag leader SMS program, they're pulling our acres planted, which is a good thing because they will tie it actually to GPS acres and not use FSA acres, because almost always our acres planted by GPS are less than what we have to report with FSA.
21:05
SPEAKER_01: That's another thing that I I think about goes to the whole issue of is the USD overestimating or you know, it's small, I know, but it at times it's a couple acres of field that we didn't plant as many acres as FSA says.
21:22
SPEAKER_01: But this whole electronic thing, I think yes, it's definitely gonna we're gonna have more of it, not less.
21:28
SPEAKER_01: And hopefully less paperwork because good grief.
21:31
SPEAKER_01: I always love the fact I think it was under Reagan, all of a sudden that they would stick another piece of paper in the report that says this was a paper reduction act report.
21:44
SPEAKER_01: I'm going, really?
21:45
SPEAKER_01: You stuck another piece of paper in to tell me it was a paper reduction act.
21:52
SPEAKER_02: Let me ask you this.
21:54
SPEAKER_02: Because the way that people do are doing things just in general, like for example, do you do you still watch network television using an antenna on your on your TV?
22:03
SPEAKER_02: I don't know if you watch TV at all.
22:05
SPEAKER_02: A guy like you probably just sits and reads all the time.
22:07
SPEAKER_02: Play Doh and Soccer, what?
22:09
SPEAKER_01: No, no, but to be honest, I do not wa I have not watched the local news.
22:14
SPEAKER_01: I, you know, obviously I'm 65 years old because so I would be a Fox News person, right?
22:21
SPEAKER_01: I haven't watched Fox News since 2018.
22:24
SPEAKER_01: I don't, I I'm getting most of mine.
22:27
SPEAKER_01: I I'm on Twitter, I'm on X there.
22:30
SPEAKER_01: So as soon as there's a trusted news source out there that's got a story, I'll click and read that.
22:37
SPEAKER_01: I that's that's where I'm that's how I'm getting my news.
22:40
SPEAKER_02: And there's something kind of freeing about that, isn't there?
22:43
SPEAKER_02: Very.
22:43
SPEAKER_02: I mean, I think there's risk in it that we we find ourselves in little echo chambers and things, and people do, too many people have, but at the same time, we've we've got the freedom to pick and choose.
22:55
SPEAKER_02: Well, this is interesting to me.
22:56
SPEAKER_02: I'm gonna spend eight minutes of my life reading this article, and I'm not gonna waste eight minutes of my life reading that.
23:03
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, that's what I hear you saying.
23:05
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and you do have to be careful because you know you could get a tinfoil hat up here a lot on a lot of things, but it's I I don't know it to be honest, Davis.
23:17
SPEAKER_01: I don't know how I ended up there.
23:18
SPEAKER_01: It's just like, okay, it's right there, and plus I can scroll past there, and all of a sudden there's something really funny on there, and that that helps relieve a lot of stress, especially after you've just read something totally annoying.
23:33
SPEAKER_02: Right, right, right.
23:35
SPEAKER_02: Very good.
23:37
SPEAKER_02: Uh I'm gonna ask you one more big question here, and then we're then we're gonna move on and talk about the weather.
23:43
SPEAKER_02: But we we just had the June reports come out.
23:47
SPEAKER_02: We had grain stocks, we had acreage.
23:49
SPEAKER_02: The June Agricultural Survey, which underpins both the annual acreage report and the quarterly grain stocks uh figures released June 30, drew a 39.8 percent uh uh response rate.
24:01
SPEAKER_02: This according to uh Agstat's board chair Lance Honig that marks a modest uptick from 37.6 percent recorded for the Marching Prospective Plantings Survey, but well below the historical norms of an earlier era when the response rates ran 80% to 85% back in the 1990s and last held above 50 for 2019.
24:30
SPEAKER_02: I've experienced it in in other pursuits previous to this.
24:35
SPEAKER_02: People are sick of surveys, they've had it with surveys.
24:38
SPEAKER_02: On one hand, you've got farmers saying USGA is never right.
24:42
SPEAKER_02: On the other hand, they're saying, Stop sending us so many surveys.
24:46
SPEAKER_02: Where do you lie on that continuum, buddy?
24:49
SPEAKER_01: Well, I I'd still say they don't we have I thought we were told we have the ability from satellites to pull all this data and they could they have it, and plus we have RMA with the crop insurance.
25:02
SPEAKER_01: Why aren't why aren't we why are we still using numbers from the USDA?
25:08
SPEAKER_01: I mean, I'm not I I personally think Lance is a really I think Lance wants to do the best job he can possibly do.
25:17
SPEAKER_01: I really do.
25:17
SPEAKER_01: I don't think he's trying to blow smoke or anything else.
25:21
SPEAKER_01: I but why are we why are we letting the government do this?
25:26
SPEAKER_01: The technology is there, evidently.
25:29
SPEAKER_01: I have to report our yields every year, I have to report the acreages that we planted.
25:37
SPEAKER_01: They have it, they have it, so let's use it.
25:42
SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
25:43
SPEAKER_01: I I think they can anybody can get that data.
25:47
SPEAKER_01: You know, it but I do think the private sector probably has a way better handle on it than you've than the USDA possibly could.
25:55
SPEAKER_02: I think I heard you say that you've had it with your sick of surveys, it's just too many.
25:59
SPEAKER_00: Yes, yeah.
26:01
SPEAKER_02: Because you get them from the private sector, you get them from you know the the government, you get them from all different sides, and everybody has their own little nugget that they're looking for in that data, whether it's your actual response or not.
26:13
SPEAKER_02: Is that fair?
26:14
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely, absolutely.
26:17
SPEAKER_01: So I don't know.
26:18
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, very good.
26:20
SPEAKER_02: You know what?
26:21
SPEAKER_02: Let's move on to the weather.
26:23
SPEAKER_02: We can always talk about the weather.
26:25
SPEAKER_02: It's been hot here in Kansas City, brother.
26:28
SPEAKER_02: Um, and I think you're under the heat dome there as well, aren't you?
26:32
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
26:33
SPEAKER_01: Unfortunately, we're I would say not unfortunately, but we've been fortunate.
26:37
SPEAKER_01: I always just checked my weather station.
26:40
SPEAKER_01: We 90 was at our high the last two days, which was surprising.
26:44
SPEAKER_01: However, we were sitting there at 78 to 82 percent or 82 degree uh dew points.
26:51
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you put those two on top of each other.
26:53
SPEAKER_01: Wow, is that oppressive?
26:55
SPEAKER_01: Yes, but but pure was not the issue.
26:58
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it it doesn't feel too terrible bad if there's a little bit of a breeze, but once that humidity starts to kind of sink in on you, man, it uh it does feel a bit warm.
27:08
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna go to the breeze and the breeze has saved us.
27:11
SPEAKER_02: Yes, yes, yeah.
27:13
SPEAKER_02: The National Weather Service, I've been saying this for a couple of days now.
27:17
SPEAKER_02: Dangerous record-breaking heat will intensify across most of the central and eastern U.S.
27:21
SPEAKER_02: this week.
27:22
SPEAKER_02: Thank heavens it's it's Wednesday already.
27:25
SPEAKER_02: Heat indices will likely exceed 100 degrees, severe thunderstorms forecast across parts of the upper Midwest, into the Great Lakes, the Northeast, and the central high plains.
27:33
SPEAKER_02: Critical fire weather conditions will continue across portions of the four corners and the Great Basin.
27:38
SPEAKER_02: PharmaLogic says heat like this, Ted, is going to be broken by thunderstorms.
27:42
SPEAKER_02: And when they do, boy, they may go crack, eh?
27:45
SPEAKER_01: Well, they usually do usually get that ring of fire where you've got that uh you know where that heat is, and then those storms that override that, they just keep training along there.
27:56
SPEAKER_01: And I've seen it time and time again.
27:59
SPEAKER_01: It it can be devastating.
28:01
SPEAKER_01: I mean, if you look, I go back to 93.
28:04
SPEAKER_01: That really, I mean, well, that was always cool and damp, but boy, when those storms started to form against, they just kept building and training and then one right after the other.
28:16
SPEAKER_02: I think I was in third grade in '93, as I recall.
28:21
SPEAKER_02: That's not true.
28:22
SPEAKER_02: Close to true, Ted.
28:23
SPEAKER_01: Okay, thanks a lot.
28:24
SPEAKER_01: You just blew me out of the water right there.
28:26
SPEAKER_01: There we go.
28:27
SPEAKER_02: Let's move on and uh wrap up our conversation with some items of mild interest.
28:32
SPEAKER_02: Are you uh are you mildly interested in some items of mild interest, Ted?
28:37
SPEAKER_02: Mildly.
28:38
SPEAKER_02: Add a boy, add a boy.
28:39
SPEAKER_02: 1847.
28:41
SPEAKER_02: The United States issued its first official postage stamps, a five cent stamp bearing a picture of Ben Franklin and a 10 cent stamp depicting George Washington.
28:51
SPEAKER_02: And before this, get this, Ted.
28:53
SPEAKER_02: Postage was paid by the recipient, not the sender.
28:57
SPEAKER_02: My mom wrote me another letter, and now I owe the government money.
29:01
SPEAKER_02: I'm kind of glad they flipped that.
29:02
SPEAKER_02: That's it seems a lot to make a lot more sense.
29:05
SPEAKER_02: 1952, actor and comedian Dan Aykroyd was born.
29:09
SPEAKER_02: Let me just say something that might be kind of controversial to some, Ted.
29:12
SPEAKER_02: I don't know if you if you used to watch Saturday Night Live.
29:16
SPEAKER_02: I can't stand Saturday Night Live anymore.
29:18
SPEAKER_02: Aykroyd was was in the original crew or you know, toward the beginning there.
29:23
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it was funny then.
29:24
SPEAKER_02: I don't I just I don't know, maybe the jokes just aren't aren't for us anymore.
29:28
SPEAKER_02: Ted, any thoughts on Saturday Night Live?
29:31
SPEAKER_01: And to be honest, the only thing I ever did watch a Saturday Night Live was the opening skit.
29:36
SPEAKER_01: And uh you know, you go back and you pull some of those up, man, they were hilarious.
29:42
SPEAKER_01: Now, the only ones they've done really good, and I never quite sure how to pronounce pronounce his name, but the could the ones they did with uh Nate Benghazi doing uh George Washington, the last those yes, those are hilarious.
29:58
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, point taken, point taken.
30:00
SPEAKER_02: Uh63, uh the Battle of Gettysburg started on July 1st, and finally in 1941, it all began to fall apart, Ted, when the first television commercial aired on NBC during a baseball game between the Brooklyn Dodgers and the Philadelphia Phillies.
30:19
SPEAKER_02: Bolivar Watches paid nine bucks for the 10-second spot, which showed apparently a clock face against a map of the U.S.
30:26
SPEAKER_02: with the words, quote, America runs on Boulevard time.
30:32
SPEAKER_02: Big plans for the fourth, Ted?
30:33
SPEAKER_02: What you up to?
30:34
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, uh, usually we have the family, uh, my family here.
30:39
SPEAKER_01: We're gonna be kind of small this year.
30:40
SPEAKER_01: There's only gonna be 42 of us.
30:42
SPEAKER_01: Oh in uh 2020 when none of us were supposed to get together.
30:48
SPEAKER_01: I think we had 82 here.
30:50
SPEAKER_01: Wow, but we turn, you know, get the shop clean, the shop floor will be clean, and we uh pull in a actually we pull in Farm Bureau's um portable um picnic table that's on wheels, and I think we can get about 32 of us can sit at that or something like that.
31:11
SPEAKER_02: So you know, I used to have a spot um out just west of Ryanbeck to watch the fireworks.
31:17
SPEAKER_02: You might know exactly what I'm talking about.
31:19
SPEAKER_02: The big curve up by the golf course.
31:21
SPEAKER_02: We used to park out there, yes, take the kids up there with some lawn chairs and some snacks and see the incendiaries over Rhinebeck, Iowa.
31:28
SPEAKER_01: That's I think we're actually gonna go to Dyke um on the on the fourth night because they're shooting off at the new baseball complex down there west of the golf course.
31:38
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
31:39
SPEAKER_02: I spent a fair amount of time spitting sunflower seeds down at that uh baseball complex with my little league fellas.
31:46
SPEAKER_02: Yep.
31:47
SPEAKER_02: All right.
31:48
SPEAKER_02: Well, I think we're gonna we're gonna put a lid on it there.
31:50
SPEAKER_02: Thanks for watching, everybody.
31:52
SPEAKER_02: We've turned our gaze away from the markets just a little bit.
31:55
SPEAKER_02: In fact, let me just check my plus 500 T4.
31:57
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, nothing's much really changed here.
31:59
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, everything is oh, looks like the cattle market is higher across the board.
32:04
SPEAKER_02: Um, we're up to uh 1115 now, so about a half hour later.
32:08
SPEAKER_02: Things really haven't changed that much.
32:10
SPEAKER_02: We can catch you back up.
32:12
SPEAKER_02: Um, if if you feel like you got bugs under your skin, go to agbull.com, take your marketing by the horns with AgBull Intel, agbull.com or give us a call at 855-737 Farm.
32:23
SPEAKER_02: That's 855-737, the letters F-A-R-M-R.
32:29
SPEAKER_02: Tommy will be back first thing in the morning, and I will be back tomorrow afternoon with Brian Split from Agmarket.net.
32:36
SPEAKER_02: Uh, Ted Hamer from Central Iowa.
32:39
SPEAKER_02: Brother, thank you so much for your candor today.
32:42
SPEAKER_02: Um, and and just uh for spending some time with us.
32:45
SPEAKER_02: It's uh it's a real pleasure to have you as my first of many, many farmers right here on the Ag Swap Podcast, brother.
32:52
SPEAKER_02: I I so appreciate your time.
32:53
SPEAKER_01: Well, thank you.
32:54
SPEAKER_01: And tell BJ, I'm ready to get long silver again, but he's got to give me the right number.
32:59
SPEAKER_02: So talk to Brian about silver.
33:02
SPEAKER_02: Absolutely.
33:02
SPEAKER_02: It's in my notes here, buddy.
33:05
SPEAKER_02: Hamer.
33:06
SPEAKER_02: All right.
33:07
SPEAKER_02: Well, thanks for watching, everybody.
33:09
SPEAKER_02: Um, Tommy will be back tomorrow morning to get you caught up, and I'll be back tomorrow afternoon.
33:13
SPEAKER_02: Brian split from AgMarket.net.
33:15
SPEAKER_02: See you later, gang.