As farmers are scouting, spraying fungicides and preparing for harvest, Ag View Solutions consultant Shay Foulk says now is a great time to run through a fall management checklist.
1. It all starts with production.
“As you get into early to late August and then into September, do your final scouting and put together what you think your yields are going to be,” he says.
From the lower yielding to the higher yielding ends of the spectrum, Foulk says it’s foundational to know if you have excess bushels or if you have a downfall of bushels to nail down the moving target of cost of production. With a defined cost of production, Foulk says you can hit the target easier with your marketing.
2. Develop your marketing strategy
The second step is evaluating current fall sales and any over run bushels. Bushels grown above your historic averages open windows for marketing opportunities.
“Some quote cost of production of $4.18 to $4.25, and some of our clients are somewhere around $4.65 to $4.68,” Foulk says. “If you have a yield history of 220 bushels, but this year you have 250 bushels, your cost of production decreases to down around $4.10.”
The additional bushels give the opportunity to market with improved profitability.
“If you got good bushels you might have an opportunity to be marketing at a profit right now. You got to pull the trigger on some of that,” he says.
You can learn more from Foulk at the first-ever Farm Journal Yield Academy
3. Basis levels and harvest timing.
“In middle of July—two things that you have at play that we know historically happen every year, is you have a move in basis, typically as you head into harvest, particularly with a big crop that’s sitting out there. So, with that big move in basis are you capitalizing on that right now,” Foulk says.
4. Assess your storage and logistics.
From a recent poll on X and conversations with farmer clients, Foulk says he estimates about 75% of people are less than 25% sold on 2025 crop.
“There’s a lot of bushels out there that need to move,” he says. “The reality of the situation is if you got bushels, you’ve got to deal with them. If you have excess bushels coming in, you’ve got to deal with them. So make a decision, because no decision is still a decision and you’re probably not going to like outcome.”
He advocates farmers know the real cost of money and acknowledge there is still a cost associated to put and keep the crop in the bin.
“Bins are a harvest tool. Not a marketing tool,” Foulk says. “A farm operation with 500 acres of corn, 500 acres of beans, the cost of holding that at today’s levels on corn is $4,000 a month, if you store your entire crop for five months. And it’s $2,600 a month on soybeans. So if you think you’re going to hold those crops for a year that’s going to cost you $50,000 to $70,000. Do you think that you’re going to capture enough carry?”
5. Think about cash flow needs
He points to the excess priority bushels—which some call gambling bushels—and pairing those with your cash flow.
“There’s some opportunities as we head into the next month, looking at prepay. So as you start thinking about purchasing fuel, purchasing nitrogen, looking ahead to the 2026 crop, there’s considerations there,” he says.
6. Insurance and government payments should be applied to your cost of production thought process
Foulk advises farmers to apply any indemnity payments or program payments back to the cost of production per bushel.
“You might be looking at a crop that is costing you $4.58 a bushel, but you’re getting 30 cents or 40 cents per bushel as a result of crop insurance indemnity payments or any of these other government programs,” he says. “You need to tie that back into your marketing. That’s what the programs are designed for. And sometimes we’re guilty of just saying, hey great there’s a check, let’s use it to prepay,’ but you’re not tying back to your marketing.”
7. Look at the world as it is.
Foulk says it’s important to apply a realistic view on every step of the checklist. And he advises to be on top of how to apply crop insurance.
“The 220-bushel average production history for a farm operation in Iowa or Illinois has a cost of production maybe around $4.51. If you drop that to the 85% insurance level on yield that’s 187 bushels an acre, their cost of production goes up to $5.26. That’s a big stretch, that’s 75 cents that needs to be made up in indemnity payments in order to protect that at 85% level of coverage,” he says. “The opposite end is when you have a farmer that has fantastic yields out there, and they’re looking at, 250 or 253 as their farm production history, your cost of production plummets down to $4.08. Now, you’re profitable at today’s levels.”
Foulks says there are three related and free tools from Ag View Solutions:
- crop indemnity calculator
- excess bushel calculator
- cash flow marketing tool
If you are falling short on bushels, Foulk says there are necessary conversations to have right now. Along with those options, he also gives insights on how to account for forecasted 2026 production costs in this episode of AgriTalk:
