Page 4 2024 Logan County Spring Farm Magazine LINCOLN DAILY NEWS March 2024 Continued -- A new day, a new season... What lies ahead for Logan County farms As the 2024 planting season approaches, things look drastically different than they have in the past few years. Dry fertilizer prices have declined further and are at times approaching half of what they were at their pinnacle. Anhydrous prices were decreased, then increased again as the spring season loomed. Farm equipment became a bit easier to acquire, just like cars and trucks. Also, commodity prices are reduced from what we have seen at the high years of the current cycle. Weather will once again be one of the top stories for the season. We continue with the overall warming pattern, and moisture availability will be crucial to raising a good crop. We are entering spring with relatively dry conditions. Some areas received substantial rains during the mid to late winter months which helped alleviate extremely dry conditions. Relatively dry fall conditions allowed for fall field work to be done where desired. Weather conditions will be the overriding factor in markets as we get into the summer, and many are hoping for a weather rebound for markets in the early summer to price some grain. Logan County producers continue to look for alternative crops to increase income on available acres. Most of these crops such as canning pumpkins or popcorn are contracted with companies or processors. Acreage has increased for these two crops, and a few others such as white corn and specialty soybeans. Producing seed for next year’s crop is also an important crop grown in the county. Crop yields from the fall of 2023 harvest dropped slightly from the prior year, according to numbers from the Agriculture Statistics Service. The 2022 corn and soybean yields were 229.1 for corn and 71.8 bushels per acre for soybeans. The 2023 corn yield was pegged at 211.1 and soybeans were at 68.4. That placed corn yields slightly less than their 10 year average, and soybean yields 2.4 bushels per acre over the average from the eight reported yields from the last 10 years for Logan County. With some county level 2022 ag census data available, it is interesting to look at the size of farms and the number of farms in Logan County. Farm numbers continue to decrease. The 2022 number is 623 while the 2017
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