Some sunny days in the first half of November have helped dry corn in the fields, but that's not to say there aren't still problems.

A producer in Iroquois County, Illinois called to say his corn had lost about 3 1/2 points in the last 2 weeks, but is still at 25 percent moisture, and his nearby elevator is charging 5 cents a point for drying.

"At 55 cents a bushel, on 200 bushel corn, that's $110 per acre," he told me.

That takes his cost of production well above his breakeven, so he has decided to leave the corn in the field in hopes that the weather will hold and it can dry some before he harvests.

But he said another risk to his strategy, in addition to the risk that the weather will turn, is that larger farmers, who have combined and paid the drying charges, may approach some of his landlords to argue they are better equipped to farm that land in the future.

Long lines at local elevators are slowing harvest efforts for producers who don't have on-farm drying facilities, he said.

Another cost he said people haven't talked much about is the added fuel needed for the combine when the corn is wet.

The fact that it was raining this morning in northeastern Illinois probably didn't help.