With Corn Prices Low Seed Corn Harvest a Boost for Some Farmers


After years of record prices, farmers simply hope to break even in 2014. Corn prices are half what they were, but some are finding other ways to make money.

Taxes, equipment, and land are still expensive. Some farmers have tried to diversify, growing things like seed corn that pays better.

Seed corn has generally been grown in places like Illinois, but that's changing.

Shane Greving, a Chapman farmer said, "Over time it's slowly working its way out here from the East with the irrigation, kind of guaranteed a crop every year unless mother nature throws hail in there that messes with them."

Companies like Pioneer have expanded the acres of seed corn grown in Nebraska. Unless it hails like it did this year, irrigation ensures a consistent crop.

NTV spoke with Alejandro Munoz, a global vice president of DuPont Pioneer last year. He said, "Nebraska is a great place where you can see productivity at its best. Actually, we use Nebraska as a place to bring farmers from other parts of the U.S. and from the world."

The Grevings are ahead of the curve. They've grown seed corn for 25 years.

This crew normally starts harvest just before Labor Day and tries to finish in just over a month. But this isn't a normal year.

"This year with the wetter weather has slowed things down a little bit," Shane Greving said.

For the farmers who grow it, there's a bigger paycheck with a bump of 30 to 50 cents a bushel these farmers say.

Greving said, "Little different enterprise in your portfolio, has some extra incentive to it. With that incentive comes extra work too. There's specialized equipment you have to have to raise it and harvest it."

They have to use a special seed harvester and bought theirs from New York. Shane Greving says each one costs as much as a normal combine. He was hired to harvest several fields, adding to his bottom line.

"Any extra price is worth the effort," he explained.

Corn prices have been as high as $7 in the last year or two, but are closer to $3.50 now. Farmers say they'll put up with the extra hassle of growing seed corn because it pays a premium.