times I wish I wasn't a wood burner. 8/12 price down to $3.55/bushel, approx 125/ton. anybody thinkin of using it?
record corn crop and prices dropping
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Bob Sorjanen
Member
TimfromMA
Minister of Fire
LMPS
Feeling the Heat
Bioburner
Moderator
You have to go to a real farmers elevator or feed mill. Farmers get well under Chicago board of trade prices because of handling and shipping costs etc. The farmers sell price here before any deductions for fines, mold, to wet or dry was 3.02 Friday up from a weeks low of 2.89 here in West central Minnesota. If I buy in bulk I pay about 15 cents above buy price. I bought my supply on the 8th of July for 3.50/bu or about $125 a ton as I feared a uptick in prices and new crop not being of a vey good quality.
Bob Sorjanen
Member
LMPS hearing prices are $390.00 to $400.00 ton bagged. I have no way to transport or store bulk corn.
Bioburner
Moderator
Find a feed mill that mixes animal feed and they usually are a better way to buy or have them bag corn for you. Used to feed a few horses and had custom feed blends and bagging was not bad. They usually have a pretty good corn too as moldy feed stock is not tolerated.
I'm going to burn some corn this winter. My Englander will burn corn, and I'm working on putting in a St. Croix SCF 050. Just need to pick up a few more barrels and then borrow my neighbor's hopper wagon, and it's off to the elevator for me.
@chrispr1 - when it comes to ethanol, I understand and agree completely with your point. However, small scale operations such as a few people burning corn has much less of an impact on food supplies. Frankly, the only reason I'm even burning corn is that there is a surplus of corn and the price came back down. I was planning on burning pellets, I have 5 tons of Somersets in the shed. If I can save a few more bucks burning corn, so be it.
@chrispr1 - when it comes to ethanol, I understand and agree completely with your point. However, small scale operations such as a few people burning corn has much less of an impact on food supplies. Frankly, the only reason I'm even burning corn is that there is a surplus of corn and the price came back down. I was planning on burning pellets, I have 5 tons of Somersets in the shed. If I can save a few more bucks burning corn, so be it.
Bioburner
Moderator
You didn't catch the article of food companies adding cellulose to food? Even ice cream! Still trying to figure why pellet prices in area went up 20 percent plus. One of the easiest forms of renewable cellulose to grow would be hemp. Cellulosic conversion to ethanol is happening now and will expand fast. One of the better market plays is the companies that are making the bugs that digest cellulose.
Owen1508
Minister of Fire
TimfromMA
Minister of Fire
Owen1508
Minister of Fire
I have Was in Central America In the late 80's early 90's at JOTC (US Army Jungle School)...but I'd rather eat worm, bugs, snakes 1st.
Arti
Feeling the Heat
Corn is a renewable fuel that can be grown in a year, much shorter time than growing a tree. Other than making sure that it is clean and dry it is ready to burn as harvested, no expensive machinery needed to make it into a pellet.
Corn is available from elevators, feed mills or directly from the farm. It is handy to have more than one supply source, last year the wood pellet supply was short in some area's of the country.
In this area millions of bushels are harvested in a year so the equipment to handle it is readily available. It's not for everybody however when I purchased my pellet burners part of the selection process was that it had to burn corn as well as pellets. Sort of like Not putting all your eggs in one basket like when I was married to a propain company.
That's just my thought's on it however I'm in an area where corn is grown and readily available.
Personally we prefer to burn pellets however at the price of corn this year I will more than likely burn around 75 bushels of corn with some pellets mixed in.
Besides corn smells great when it burns !
Bioburner
Moderator
Maybe the real question is why are the arid countries that can't grow or support a population are continuing to have the largest families?
allied35
Member
I get my corn cheap. I mix about 50/50 and cannot believe the difference in heat. I will be burning as much as I can get!!
rona
Minister of Fire
Maybe you should try eating the corn we are talking about. Not meaning to attack but get very tired of seeing this comment from people who do not know there is different kinds of corn grown. The easiest way to learn is to buy a bushel and bring it home then eat it. One bushel will be enough to answer your question of why some people choose to burn corn instead of eating it. This corn is raised in great quantities and right now is priced cheaper then pellets that is why we burn it. kind of like shopping for the best deal in pellet prices. With a multi fuel stove and proper exh pipe this is simply a attractive price for keeping your home warm.
Several reasons why not to burn wood. Try burning wood in Phoenix AZ in the winter and you will get a very stiff fine. Wood is not available every where, Sometimes we get older and can't cut ,load, split wood anymore but can handle a 40# bag.
With todays prices decent wood pellets are twice as high as corn.
Bioburner
Moderator
Power plant south of us is burning poultry litter. Talk about a recycle program. Ethanol production didn't get profitable till distillers grains caught on as feed stock and now is more profitable than the booze.
TimfromMA
Minister of Fire
Bioburner
Moderator
Phoenix Hatchling
Minister of Fire
With Russia "refusing" food products sourced in the US and other countries, grains were among the top of the list. Now that there won't be that avenue to dump our over production, that should drive the prices lower yet, until the govt steps in to "subsidize" the farmer.
Bioburner
Moderator
Around 12 or even a bit under. Biggest bite for farmers is that Russia imports large amounts of pork, mostly Canadian and poultry. Both are large consumers of corn. Break even on corn around here is $4/bu. We just had a very nice finishing rain around the state so if no real hot spells the crops should be pretty set for awhile. Hard to believe that we have had only 2 days that the temps got into the 90's. Same with Indianapolis that's in the middle of country and may be a record cool summer for them.
Bioburner
Moderator
Our area had a big problem last growing season with corn coming in to wet and contributed to the propain shortage as so much was used to dry corn but as most in the US found out the winter was very early with the heating season starting in early October instead of late October to early November. Maybe the beef prices will come down more. I know the egg prices are.
rona
Minister of Fire
Beef prices won't drop until demand slows down. ranchers lost a lot of cattle last winter and with that exotic disease in hogs they figure 10% of the baby pigs were lost which makes a shortage of pork. Evidently everywhere else is looking at a bumper crop of corn. Time will tell. When beef is high the rancher will hold back breeding stock which will inflate the beef price in the short run but will increase production in a couple of years. There is still places facing drought conditions plus the gov is trying to keep ranchers from renting grazing land so there is a lot of things that enter this discussion about higher food prices. When corn drops below 4.00 we are below cost of production and farmers will not be buying expensive equipment. I think John Deere laid off 600 workers in anticipation of sluggish sales.
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