Today we are cross posting a very helpful blog from Brock Grain on the importance of protecting your grain.
When it comes to safeguarding your grain, there’s nothing wrong with being a control freak. An on-farm grain storage system can put you in the driver’s seat when it comes to avoiding bottlenecks at harvest, protecting your grain’s value, and getting the most out of market timing. Iowa State University grain quality specialist Charles Hurburgh talks about some of the considerations for storing, handling and drying grain.
Keeping pace with higher yields.
“Increasing crop yields and larger operations puts more pressure on farmers to be able to handle and store their own grain,” explained Hurburgh. “Ten years ago, 150 bushels was a high yield for corn, but now farmers are hitting 220 bushels or even higher yield targets. In some areas, just one large farmer can exceed the dump capacity of the local elevator. There are times when you might have to sit in line for two or three hours before you get to unload.”
It’s important for farmers to have enough wet holding storage and have enough drying capacity to avoid bottlenecks at harvest. This increased efficiency helps reduce potential yield losses and saves time and money during one of the most critical periods of the year.
Dr. Charles Hurburgh is a professor of Agricultural and Biosystems Engineering at Iowa State University in charge of the Iowa Grain Quality Initiative.
Protecting “shelf life” of your grain.
“What you do at harvest has everything to do with the success you have later on,” continued Hurburgh. “If you don’t cool the grain right away or it isn’t well-mixed at harvest, then you are setting yourself up for problems. Think of the label on a carton of milk. It has a use-by date on there. But if you let that gallon of milk sit in the room for half a day and warm up, then you’ve used up a good share of that storage life by leaving it out. Well, it’s the same concept with grain if you don’t manage it carefully. If you use a greater percentage of your corn storage time right at harvest, guess when it’s going to bite you. It’s going to bite you when you’re storing it into warmer temperatures and more humid moisture levels. You could end up with hot spots because you have used a share of the shelf life of your corn. And once you have a hot spot, you may get it cool by turning the fans on, but it will be more susceptible to come back.
“That’s why you want to get corn dry quickly and you want to draw out enough grain from full bins so you can see the reversed cone reach the wall. That means you’ve gotten the center plug out of there which typically contains more fines and trash that make it harder for air to move around.”
Drying to proper moisture percentage.
Having adequate grain drying capacity is an important step in protecting grain quality. Some people may hold wet grain and let their dryer catch up in a few days or a week. When they do that, they are using up storage time.
“You want to get your corn to about 15% moisture for long-term storage,” said Hurburgh. “Some farmers take it down to 12% just to be sure, but when doing that they lose a lot of weight, incur additional drying costs, and reduce their dryer’s capacity. So, I never advocate for overdrying grain. The market standard is 15% moisture and that’s good for storage into the summer.”
Choosing when and where to sell grain.
According to Hurburgh, storing grain on the farm gives operators more control to take advantage of marketing opportunities throughout the year. “Higher grain prices alone in spring and summer markets typically pay for storage costs. But local processing of grain for ethanol and other biofuels also increases the value of on-farm storage. It has shuffled the deck in terms of what times of the year marketing is better and worse. An ethanol plant needs grain year-round, so if it starts to run low in May or June, you’re likely to have some favorable marketing prices for farmers who can deliver bushels with a short turnaround. When an ethanol plant pushes a bid a little higher, and your grain is in the elevator, who gets that bonus? The elevator gets a lion’s share of the benefit. That’s when having physical control of your grain is important.”
Sustainable aviation fuel is another product that promises to make a big impact on grain marketing. “If policies line up and we get tax incentives to make grain-based aviation fuel, the impact on farming may be of the same magnitude as the ethanol boom was in 2006 and 2007,” said Hurburgh. “As we move into more grain processing, the economics are going to be more and more in favor of farmers being able to control their own grain storage and marketing.”
Getting ready for earlier planting.
Being able to complete harvest sooner in the fall also creates a domino effect that pays off in the spring. “Having on-farm storage and conditioning certainly gives you more control over the preparation of your planting,” said Hurburgh. “You can apply fertilizer and complete fall tillage in a timelier way. And when you’re more prepared to get corn planted at the optimal time, it is going to generate more yield. There’s an ideal window for planting where you don’t have to worry about mud, and you get row compaction right and seed spacing right. The more you can plant during that window, the better off you are.”
“When you have enough drying capacity, you can also choose later maturing hybrids that tend to yield higher,” continued Hurburgh. “You might end up with some wet grain later in the season, but remember corn is more valuable than propane gas. You can afford to dry it when the whole system works together.”
Key takeaways for handling grain at harvest.
On-farm grain systems provide greater control over harvest timing, grain quality preservation, and marketing opportunities. Here’s a summary of Charles Hurburgh’s recommendations for storing and managing grain.
- Cool grain immediately after harvest to lower than 80°F if possible. Air dewpoint provides an estimate of how quickly you can cool grain.
- Dry corn to 15% moisture quickly for long-term storage.
- Remove center cores of fines and foreign material from bins to avoid hotspots.
- Use gentler handling equipment (e.g. drag conveyors) to reduce kernel breakage.
