Fundamentally Speaking

Impact of Late Soybean Plantings on Yields, Acreage

The grain and oilseed markets that have been pre-occupied with one of the latest corn planting seasons in memory are now taking notice of soybeans where the seeding pace is also lagging well behind normal.

As of May 26, a mere 44% of this year’s soybean acreage had been seeded about half the year ago pace and well behind the five year average of 61%.

Though late plantings are said not to have the impact on bean yields as opposed to corn, some effect is assumed.

This may be linked to having the critical bloom and pod developmental stage occur in the hottest part of the summer and perhaps having some plants not mature prior to the first fall freeze.

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There is also the possibility of some intended acreage not being planted if the calendar is past the last planting date for crop insurance policies.

This graphic shows the percent of the U.S. soybean crop planted by June 1 vs. the percent change in planted soybean acreage from the March intentions to the June acreage report.

Also plotted is the percent that final U.S. soybean yields deviated from the 30 year trend.

One additional comment is the chart shows the trend of greater plantings of soybeans by June 1 than in the past due to more modern equipment and better seed technology.

Each year the pace of plantings increases by 0.84% per year.

Adjusting for this factor, year ago seedings as of June 1 that appear to be the fastest ever at 93% are actually 66% de-trended with 1987, 1988, and 1993 having an adjusted planting pace of 70%.

Looking at the data this way there are six slow planting years where the de-trended pace of plantings was less than 40% by June 1 including 1983, 1990, 1993, 1995, 1996, and 2011.

The average de-trended planting pace was 46% with final yields down 5.6% from trend but acreage from the March to June reports only falling by 0.5%.

Other studies have shown that late soybean seedings do not necessarily result in a drop in soybean acreage and actually late soybean plantings may be due to late corn plantings that can actually result in higher acreage than the intentions indicated.

As for yields, the years 1983, 1993, 1995, and 2011 featured adverse summer growing conditions that probably had more impact on the below trend yields than the late date the crop got planted.

(KA)

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Freeport IL
6/5/2013 | 7:58 AM CDT
In next Wednesday's (June 12th) WASDE Report, do not be surprised if USDA defers the estimated corn and soybeans acres to the June 28th acreage report. The Acreage Report may not change the numbers very little, sighting wetness and the need to resurvey. The big news in the June 12th report might be hard red winter wheat (HRWW). Of the batch of reports released June 28th, the stocks report could be the most interesting. Freeport, IL