In a good or bad year, flexibility at harvest is a must for Texas grain farmers. And on-farm storage bins offer that.
“Grain storage will make money,” Texas farmer Chad Wetzel told Southwest Farm Press. “I think we can make money storing corn and wheat into the winter.”
Wetzel farms with his father, Bruce, in Grayson County. Their bins represent 300,000 bushels of storage capacity, with an additional 50,000 bushels of capacity on another farm.
“It gives us flexibility for one thing,” he says. “At harvest, we can avoid the long lines at the elevator, and by saving around 30 cents per bushel storage cost at the elevator, we can make a bin payment.”
They watch the basis closely, looking at market options.
“If we get a bump in the basis, we might sell some wheat in October or November and look for opportunities from December into March,” he said. “If it’s a short crop year, we may sell out of the field.”
And poor market choices can offset good crop yields. That’s why on-farm storage is an essential part of a Texas grain farm.
Prices aren’t promising heading into fall wheat planting season—not as good as corn or soybeans, Wetzel noted.
“But wheat yields are more consistent. We’ll plant as much as we can harvest without having to hire custom harvesters,” he said. “Custom harvest takes a lot of profit out of wheat.”