You know how much residue is left on the field after you harvest a corn crop (you can probably look out the window and get a good idea), but did you know that the residue amounts to about half of the total crop weight? That’s right, 50% of the biomass you grew is still sitting on the field after harvest.

That corn residue can be used as a winter feed source for beef cattle, squeezing another use out of the crop and greatly cutting winter feed costs for combined operations. One acre of corn residue is about two months of feed for a 1,000 pound animal. Getting the most value out of the residue requires a little planning and some awareness of what can go wrong, however. It doesn’t save you any money if you end up with a beef herd with nitrate poisoning, or if the vet bills for foundered cows exceeds what you saved in feed.

To get the most out of the nutrition left on the field, animals should be allowed to graze immediately after harvest, as wind and rain quickly break down the nutritional quality of the residue. Cows can get about 65% total digestible nutrients, and about 7% of crude protein, from corn residue. Depending on the age and breed of the animals, you might need mineral supplementation to keep them healthy while they’re foraging on your corn fields.

Over the course of that 60-day feeding window, the cows will only eat about 20% of the residue – and you thought your kids were picky eaters! That’s actually good news, as it means that erosion and soil compaction will be greatly limited by the large amount of biomass that will be left on the ground. Compaction caused by hooves is usually limited – but just as with a tractor, wet soils will compact more and you might want to bring the herd back inside if the soil is damp, especially if you already have soil compaction issues on that field. Frozen ground is generally well-protected against compaction by animal hooves.

If you had a dry year, then the lower stalks (which comprise a large percentage of your residue biomass) are likely to be high in nitrates. That can cause nitrate poisoning in animals that feed on them – be careful about grazing on fields that suffered drought. Nitrate levels will break down over time, though, so you don’t usually need to worry about what happened in prior years. In addition, if there is grain on the field as well as corn, be sure that your cows get hay or other feed before they get at the grain to prevent foundering.

Not only does residue foraging save you money on feed costs, it also cuts your fertilizer bill for the next season. Cows like to eat, and eating has a natural consequence – and that 1,000 pound cow is going to drop about 63 pounds of “natural consequence” on your field every day. Be sure to take that additional fertilizer into consideration when designing your fertilizer strategy for next year.

Farmers are always on the lookout for better information about the weather – there’s nothing that has a greater impact on growing crops than what Mother Nature has in store each day. Weather trends, projections, and forecasts are one of the most important tools on a farmer’s belt. That’s why I was extremely pleased to discover StormWire, a news site that focuses not just on the weather, but on its impact on business and investment. Not everything on StormWire is farm-related, but there are a lot of great stories that are extremely relevant to farmers, as well as a wealth of material that is 100% agricultural in focus.

One recent story caught my eye; there have been high hopes for near-record corn harvests this year, but it looks like bad weather in Kansas is putting the kibosh on that. The latest federal projection is for the harvest to be 7% below last year’s level. These are still relatively high production levels, just not the record-setters that many of us had hoped for. The late rains are good for wheat farmers whose crops are still growing, however, and the wheat harvest is expected to get a boost.

I was about to embark on an epic research journey to find other great weather sites that would be helpful for my farm readers, but – this being the Internet – I was very pleased to discover that someone else had already done it for me. The good folks at IlliniWeather have built a fairly comprehensive index of agriculturally-oriented weather sites. There are great sites that aren’t on that list, but every site on that list is great. Happy forecasting!

The US Rice Producers Association (USRPA) has created a survey-based production estimate to produce statistics on the annual rice crop, citing fears that the USDA’s crop production estimates are inaccurate. Apparently a wide range of people in the rice market, from farmers to rice warehousers, are concerned that the USDA’s forecast are much too optimistic.

It hasn’t been a good year for rice farming. A series of hurricanes, a cold growing season, and heavy rains in the spring that delayed planting have all combined to push yields down, according to the folks out in the fields. The USDA projects that the rice crop will be more than 204 million hundredweights. Conducting extensive research and surveys of rice farmers, and drawing on the analytical talents of agricultural extension staffers in rice-growing states, USRPA forecasts a total crop of around 170 million hundredweights – a significant variance from the government figure. (34 million hundredweights difference, or 20% lower than USDA expectations) Rice industry figures are concerned that the government’s projection will push down prices, as futures markets expect a much larger crop than will actually materialize.

USRAPA predicts that there will be significant competition between the domestic market and export buyers later this year because of the reduced harvest. They also say they intend to work closely with the USDA to improve the government’s forecasts. Government statistics play a huge role in the agricultural marketplace, as futures traders, farmers, commodities buyers, investors, and others all rely on that data in making plans and pricing commodities. We will have better figures in a month or so, and that should give us an idea of whether USRPA’s critique is correct, or whether the USDA got it right.

So the thought of the day comes from a Chinese proverb that says, “Without rice, even the cleverest housewife cannot cook.”

I’m not sure yet if I’ll be able to attend this year’s DTN/Progressive Farmer agriculture summit in Chicago, but it looks like a terrific program. This is the second year that DTN has hosted this conference for farmers; this year’s program will be held at the Chicago Marriott Downtown Magnificent Mile from December 7 to December 9. The title of the program this year is “Brave New Worlds: Your Map for Managing Ag Risk” and the main focus of the conference will be looking at the volatile commodity markets and helping farmers plan their strategy for 2009.

DTN chief executive Robert Gordon notes that “Today’s producers are faced with more market swings and agricultural policy changes than ever before,” and says that the summit will provide agriculture professionals information to meet these challenges. Events will include farmer panels, sessions on dealing with lenders and landlords, and panels on handling revenue risk, crop insurance, and the growing problem of input cost inflation. DTN has lined up an impressive group of speakers and event coordinators for the program, including Blairo Borges Maggi, the governor of the Brazilian state of Mato Grosso and the largest soybean farmer in the world, Mark Palmquist, executive vice president of CHS, the nation’s largest grain and farm supply cooperative, former USDA undersecretary J.B. Penn (now the chief economist at Deere & Company), Allen Lash, president of AgriSolutions, and Mike Rahm, a vice president at Mosaic, among many others.

The registration fee for the summit is $445 ($395 before November 8) and includes food and program materials. Full information on the program and instructions on registration are available at the DTN website, http://www.dtnpf.com/promo/2008agsummit, or you can call them toll-free at 1-888-576-9881.