Combines Combine Report

If I figure your numbers right, a separator hour cost you $103 this year just to make the payments. I know a guy who rented a lexion 485 this year with a cornhead and a MacDon head for $85 per separator hour. That is exceptionally cheap and a big machine. Would you be able to figure your cost per acre, if you included all your labor plus the graincart and its labor plus all the trucks and their laborIJ Thanks for being honest.

Il NH, Did you say 32.5 bu. on cornIJIJIJIJIJ That wait for next year thing , I have had about all of them I can take. Me and the good woman was talking about that last night. She said here we go again. I said that farming is like being a cub fan : wait tell next year it will be better. At least Im a Cardinal fan. As for the farming I dont have the answer, other then the good year aint ever going to get here. Illinois Gleaner P.S. What are you going to do at the FSA officeIJIJ

Il Gleaner, yes 32.5bpa farm avg. for corn this year. That 10bpa stuff can sure bring your avg. down. Best was 85. lowest corn yield I have ever had farming. FSAIJ I suppose wait in line. Didn't try to figure any of it out yet. Don't really look forward to digging all the papers out. How was your yields this yearIJ Ilnh

Dakota, back a few years ago I could rent a new TR-97 for $90 sep. hour but it would be much higher now. I never figure my labor cost because it is what is left over at the end of the year for me(not much this year). Our farm is all family worked. How do your cost work outIJ Ilnh

Il NH, Our crops were better then I thought they would be,but not good. Corn was 62 to 129 most in the 90 bu. range . Beans were 17 to 40 with most in the 30bu. range give or take a few. At our FSA office you have to make an appointment,and know what you will do on each farm before coming in. Illinois Gleaner

The numbers don't work at all this year. Because of the drought there were not enough acres. The farmers get crop insurance, what helps a little. Custom harvesters get nothing.

You are so right!! USCHI has been workng very hard to try and get some relief for us. So far the farmer gets all of the insurance money. I see no relief for us custom harvestors. It really hurts when you loose almost half of your business in a year as we did this year because of drought. The harvestor has his equipment and labor just the same. Custom harvesting is often breakeven at best, so losing half of your income is a disaster. u

Don, as a farmer who will get some insurance money for my corn this year there is not much to share with anyone else. I know what you are talking about a small crop that hurts other people than just the farmer as I also have a grain and feed trucking enterprise and no grain around here to haul this winter. I'm not sure you would want the gov to help you as we all see in farming how that misses up everything. I could see some kind of custom harvester insurance but I am sure the premiums would be costly. I know insurance for my trucks is and it don't cover lost income. We need better prices worldwide for all crops so everybody could make a living. Ah a person can dream, can't he. Ilnewholland

Dakota, I redid some numbers on my sep. as I would need to add the 260 acres of wheat I did in the summer, about 30 more sep hours as I did not keep track of them. That would put my payment cost at about $84 per hour. like I said speed was up this year also with lite crop so in a more normal year I would also put more sep. hours. Thinking about trading combine this year and to keep cost about the same I will need to add more acres. A never ending cycle! Ilnewholland

Ilnewholland, There are a lot of custom harvesters that do not realize that the government help, what ever it is and for who ever it is, does not come free. If we start taking money from the government in some kind of dissaster payment you can bet your last dollar that the money will come with some kind of strings attached. Maybe not right away but it will come and it will be just another thing to take time away from running our operations the way we want to run them. There must be a lot of custom harvesters out there who have never gone to an FSA office and sat for six hours waiting to sign up for a farm program only to be told to come back another day because you don't have all the information you need. Do harvesters really want to do thatIJ Most of the custom harvester I know do not even want to take the time to fill out the papers for the CHAMP program that the USCHI offers. Yet they want the government to send them some mony! Makes me wonder of those that have taken part in the CHAMP program ever year since the first year like I have need mony form the government. We know what our per acre costs are and we know what we have to do to survive. K.A