Week17

Corn yield includes the trade estimates for the last few weeks as green dots. I'm in the middle of the trades range. One way to look at is I'm going to be closer than at least half of them.

Last week somebody picked up this blog and reported that last week despite US conditions falling, my results showed and increase in yields. I found this curious so lets take a look.

At the national level, these were the results (comparing July 18 to July 11). So very modest declines, but declines none the less.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
State      : Very poor :   Poor    :   Fair    :   Good    : Excellent
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

18 States .......:     2           7          19          51          21                                                        
Previous week ...:     2           7          18          52          21

The model is a state level model, however, so lets look at the key state breakouts.
First July 11th.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
State      : Very poor :   Poor    :   Fair    :   Good    : Excellent
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Illinois ........:     3           9          23          47          18
Indiana .........:     3           9          26          46          16
Iowa ............:     3           7          19          51          20
Minnesota .......:     -           3           9          57          31
Missouri ........:     6          16          28          36          14
Nebraska ........:     1           3          10          64          22
Ohio ............:     2           9          25          47          17

Now July 18th.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
State      : Very poor :   Poor    :   Fair    :   Good    : Excellent
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Illinois ........:     2           8          23          49          18
Indiana .........:     4           9          25          45          17
Iowa ............:     3           8          20          48          21
Minnesota .......:     -           2           8          55          35
Missouri ........:     5          16          31          40           8
Nebraska ........:     1           3          12          63          21
Ohio ............:     2           9          25          48          16

When comparing them by state it is a bit of a mixed bag. The US total condition numbers are weighted by acreage but an extra acre in excellent condition in Iowa probably more than makes up for an acre falling to good condition in most other states. But even in Iowa it is a mixed bag. The difference between fair and good is not the same number of bushels improvement as between good and excellent.

This is true for all states so while the average acre may have seen a very slight decline in the US condition numbers, the state specific changes matter. If this was a single equation national level model, then I might have expected yields to change, but I do each state individually so exactly where conditions change matters.

Week 17 Spreadsheet (3mb)