For Sheridan Skala, Owatonna, Minnesota (Steele County, family farm heritage) Monday, October 5, 2026. Filed by The MI Farm AI Desk.
Weather, Steele County, MN
What this means for today: Sunny, with a high near 68. Wind 0 to 15 mph through the day (see the hour by hour table below). Source: NOAA National Weather Service via the MI Farm AI weather layer for Steele County, MN, pulled this morning. Hour by Hour, the day ahead
Source: NOAA National Weather Service hourly forecast and station observations, pulled this morning. Wind this morning at your nearest weather station was about 4 mph. Rain WindowWe could not get a reading right on your field this morning. The nearest weather station (Owatonna MN, about 4 miles northeast) recorded no rain in the past 24 hours. Your own ground may differ, so check your gauge. Futures board reference (not your cash)
The board is a labeled futures reference, not your cash bid. Your cash and net after haul are below. Corn Today (Dec 2026 board)
Cash bid, your nearby buyers, ranked by net after haul, best first
Cash bid is each buyer's own posted local price (the local cash plus basis). Ranked by net after haul, best first (ties break to the shorter haul, then higher cash). Net is the cash bid minus the cost to truck it there. Patronage is money a co-op pays back on the bushels you deliver, often a few cents a bushel.
Local cash bids, as of 2026-10-05.
Soybeans Today (Nov 2026 board)
Cash bid, your nearby buyers, ranked by net after haul, best first
Cash bid is each buyer's own posted local price (the local cash plus basis). Ranked by net after haul, best first (ties break to the shorter haul, then higher cash). Net is the cash bid minus the cost to truck it there. Patronage is money a co-op pays back on the bushels you deliver, often a few cents a bushel.
Local cash bids, as of 2026-10-05.
Grain and Livestock, corn, soybeans, wheat, cattleCal's Grain Call: Price a portion of 208,000 bu corn at $4.83/bu via Crystal Valley, Owatonna (a recommendation, see the factors).Corn: Your 2025 bin corn has rolled to the December board, now its nearby contract, in October. Soybeans: The growing 2026 crop is new crop soybean; it prices on the November board.
Source: CME livestock futures. Cal's Market ReadOvernight, corn slipped about 2 cents; and beans added about 6 cents. Recent trend, over the last 5 sessions, corn has chopped sideways and beans have eased. That is the backdrop your cash bid is moving against. Here is our read on why corn and beans split overnight, and honestly the headlines do not hand us one clean cause. Our best assessment points two ways. First, President Trump rejected a diesel export ban Friday while the G7 released reserves, per Agri-Pulse, which eases fuel cost worries that touch every acre. Second, lingering drought stress noted in the Tri-State Neighbor hay hauling story may be lending beans a little support. Stocks point higher into the open, S&P futures up about 0.7 percent. A firmer tape eases the borrowing and input-cost mood your lender watches, though it does not move your cash bid by itself. Cal Wall Street, Friday's close
WHY IT MATTERS FOR YOUR FIELDS Decision DeliveredYour decisions for today and the week ahead:
What to Watch Today
From Cal's News DeskThe 10 stories that moved across the wires since yesterday's Brief, sourced, dated, and verifiable. Each one carries Cal's review, the same one the news page shows, with a link to read it straight from the source. 1. Soybean buyers from Southeast Asia visit the Midwest
A trade team of Southeast Asian soybean buyers toured farms, labs, and crush plants across Minnesota and South Dakota in late September, visiting stops like the University of Minnesota research plots, the Ag Processing Inc. plant in Dawson, and Jeff Thompson's farm in Colton. Indonesian buyer Deny Mulyono, whose company imports soybean meal for shrimp aquaculture feed and exports that shrimp back to the U.S., praised the mutual trade and said he wanted to understand American farm costs since his firm compares prices against Argentina and Brazil. Thompson used the rainy weather to explain why U.S. farmers wait for perfect conditions to harvest while South American growers often dry beans harvested in wetter, less favorable conditions to rush their next planting. These face to face visits matter because South Dakota exports huge volumes of beans and meal worldwide, and keeping those customer relationships strong, before the group headed to West Coast export ports, helps shape next year's buying decisions.
Read the full article. AgWeek, Mon Oct 5, 2026 5:33 AM CT 2. We're on the road again hauling hay
Drought has forced the author and a partner named Lusk back onto the highways, running two semis more than 100 miles each way just to scrape together enough winter hay. They recall the brutal summer of 2021, when nearly a month of hauling still left them settling for low quality roughage like CRP stands and wheat straw dotted with green pigeon grass, grabbing whatever they could before the crowd beat them to it. This year feels like a hard repeat of that scramble, a reminder of how fast feed supplies tighten when the rain stops. The piece also turns to the family side of farming, asking how you can pass on an estate fairly among all your children, and it points out there are several ways to make that split equitable.
Read the full article. Tri-State Neighbor, Mon Oct 5, 2026 9:00 AM CT 3. The uses of the potato are endless
Potatoes, known scientifically as Solanum tuberosum, are grown just about everywhere on the planet and rank fifth among the world's crops, trailing only wheat, corn, rice and sugar cane. Back in 2023, growers worldwide harvested a staggering 383 million tons of this humble tuber. Whether raised on big commercial operations or in a backyard garden, the potato has earned its place as one of the most versatile and widely planted vegetables around. For a farmer who knows corn and beans, it is worth seeing how this crop stacks up against the ones you grow every season.
Read the full article. Tri-State Neighbor, Mon Oct 5, 2026 9:00 AM CT 4. Budding Food Scrap Pickup Services Across the US Want Your Coffee Grounds and Eggshells
A new wave of food scrap pickup services is spreading across the country, led by folks like Ricky Blanding, the 34 year old CEO of Scrap Soils in Detroit, who drives a 100 mile weekly route hauling coffee grounds, eggshells and carrot tops to a composting site. More than 70 Detroit homes and businesses now pay for the service, with home pickups starting at $15 a month and businesses paying $60 or more, keeping food out of landfills where it rots into methane, a greenhouse gas that experts like Emily Cassidy of Project Drawdown call the emergency brake on climate change. The scraps end up at Sanctuary Farms, where apple cores, corn husks and rotted pumpkins become a rich soil additive sold back to gardeners, so the waste that worsens the problem becomes part of the fix. Similar outfits are popping up in Denver, Nashville, Atlanta and North Carolina, and with only a few hundred towns offering compost pickup against thousands of regular trash programs, there is plenty of room for this idea to grow.
Read the full article. Morning Ag Clips, Mon Oct 5, 2026 8:46 AM CT 5. $150K Farm to School Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) Grant Opens
Vermont is putting up $150,000 through its Farm to School CSA Grant to buy local farm shares that feed fresh food to young kids in early childhood programs, with applications open now until November 12, 2026. Non-profits and licensed child care providers can apply, award amounts depend on each program's licensed capacity, and both partnering programs and farms must submit letters of commitment. Decisions come in February 2027 and projects start that spring, and the state is pushing providers to team up on group applications to stretch the dollars further. The effort traces back to Vermont's 2006 Rozo McLaughlin Farm-to-School Act, which has already poured $2.7 million into 359 grants reaching 163 schools and 166 child care programs since 2007.
Read the full article. Morning Ag Clips, Mon Oct 5, 2026 8:46 AM CT 6. Daybreak Oct. 5: Trump says no to diesel export ban
President Trump reversed course Friday, rejecting a U.S. ban on diesel exports just days after floating the idea, while the G7 moved to calm supply strain by releasing 100 million barrels of crude and diesel reserves over four months. Pump prices eased last week but remain the highest ever for this time of year, and both parties plus oil groups are weighing a national waiver that would let tax free, red dyed off road farm diesel onto highways, saving the federal 24.4 cent per gallon excise tax. On the crop side, USDA's surprise report showing bigger than expected corn supplies knocked corn lower and dragged soybeans down, with beans already hurting after the Trump and Xi meeting failed to firm up China's purchase commitments, so keep an eye on Friday's October WASDE. The bright spot is biofuel, with July marking a third straight record for soybean oil use, drawing from nearly 150 million bushels, up 52 percent from a year ago, even as the USMCA heads into an annual review process opened for public comment through January 2027.
Read the full article. Agri-Pulse, Mon Oct 5, 2026 8:07 AM CT 7. Opinion: Who wins when American farmers lose?
Washington just rolled out a new deal flooding the market with heavily subsidized foreign beef, and Congresswoman from Florida's 2nd District says her phone rang nonstop with furious ranchers the moment it was announced. The timing stings because American producers have been battling years of rising fertilizer, fuel, feed, and equipment costs, tariffs, no new farm bill since 2018, and a USDA gutted by thousands of lost workers, all of which pushed the national cattle herd to historic lows. She argues the promised 25% cut to grocery prices comes with no guarantee of where those savings actually land, and warns it will backfire into higher prices later as the domestic herd shrinks and the country leans harder on foreign agriculture. Her bottom line is that the real losers are grocery shoppers, family cattle operations weighing whether the next generation can hang on, and rural towns bleeding jobs, so Congress should be asking producers what they need instead of putting foreign competitors first.
Read the full article. Agri-Pulse, Mon Oct 5, 2026 6:51 AM CT 8. FlyDubai suspected attacker intended to crash into Tel Aviv airport, sources say
Investigators now believe Hamam Al-Hammani, a copilot for FlyDubai, intended to crash a plane into the Tel Aviv airport, according to two senior U.S. officials and an Israeli source who spoke with ABC News. The same reporting reveals that Al-Hammani had already been flagged as a security risk back in 2024, when he was suspended as a trainee copilot at Oman Air for possessing extremist materials. That troubling history is raising hard questions about how a man with such a record ended up in the cockpit at FlyDubai in the first place. For anyone who flies or follows aviation safety, this story underscores serious gaps in how airlines screen and hire the pilots trusted with passengers' lives.
Read the full article. ABC News, Mon Oct 5, 2026 8:41 AM CT 9. From farm to fall destination: Amazing Acres enters its second season
Carl and Lindsay Olson have turned their century old family farm near Argusville into Amazing Acres, a fall destination now in its second year that draws visitors with corn mazes, animals, food and hands on farm learning. New additions this season include Tiny Town for the littlest kids, a tractor pull using three sizes of John Deeres, a pumpkin tunnel, gem mining and a party shelter, while a vintage 1956 tractor that still feeds cattle daily pulls the hay bale rides. The first season brought in just over 5,000 visitors, with one day topping 580 people and a private event drawing more than 400, so the family shifted this year's opening closer to Labor Day to dodge the August heat and report they are already busier than last year. Beyond the games, the Olsons weave in real agriculture lessons, labeling crops like sugar beets, black turtle beans, millet, soybeans and barley and explaining North Dakota production rankings, all to teach families where their food comes from while adding income to the farm.
Read the full article. AgWeek, Mon Oct 5, 2026 8:34 AM CT 10. Disgraced ex-GOP Speaker Dennis Hastert dies at 84
Dennis Hastert, who led the US House as Speaker from 1999 to 2007 and was the longest serving Republican to hold that post, has died at 84 at his Illinois home of natural causes. He helped push President George W. Bush's two big rounds of tax cuts in 2001 and 2003 and was in charge during 9/11 and the start of the Afghanistan and Iraq wars, and his "Hastert rule" on needing majority Republican support still shapes the House today. His career crashed when it came out he had paid hush money over claims he sexually abused boys as a high school wrestling coach, leading a judge to call him a "serial child molester," though the statute of limitations had run out on the abuse itself. He pleaded guilty in 2015 to related financial crimes, served 13 months in prison, and had his portrait pulled from the Capitol's Speaker's lobby by Paul Ryan.
Read the full article. The Hill, Mon Oct 5, 2026 7:49 AM CT Around the WorldThe world news moving your markets this morning, the same read from Cal's desk that runs on your dashboard. Russia is seeking new routes for grain exports after a sharp collapse via the Black Sea intelligenceRussia's wheat exports through the Black Sea have crashed, with September shipments dropping to just 347,000 tonnes versus 1.3 million tonnes a year earlier, according to Ukraine's Foreign Intelligence Service. The key port of Novorossiysk collapsed from 696,000 tonnes down to only 72,500 tonnes. To make up the loss, Moscow is pushing grain north to the Baltic and Murmansk, but the new Ust-Luga terminal can handle only about 500,000 tonnes a month, while the southern ports it is replacing move more than 60 million tonnes a year. The Murmansk route is so far from Russia's farm country that it adds roughly $18 to $25 per tonne, meaning up to $1 million extra on a single 40,000 tonne cargo. Russia's eastern "New Overland Grain Corridor" into China is growing fast, from 2.3 million tonnes in 2024 to a projected 9 million tonnes in 2026, yet it is choked by rail limits, Chinese quotas, and missing phytosanitary approvals for Russian winter wheat. This matters because a weakened Russian export machine, with Estonia now banning Russian grain transit too, could shift world wheat supply and prices in ways that ripple back to American grain markets. () (via world wire). Read the full story.Local ObituariesNo local obituaries for your area in today's papers. Cal's ReceiptCal's Receipt is the running ledger of every call this desk made for your farm, what was at stake, whether you followed it, and what it actually saved (or cost). Append-only, and every dollar cites its source. You will find it on your farm Dashboard, on the Farm Services desk. Open the Dashboard from the button at the bottom of this Brief. Today in Farm SafetyMake your equipment seen on the road. A clean slow-moving-vehicle (SMV) emblem, working flashers, and reflective tape cut rear-end collisions. Most farm road crashes are a car hitting equipment from behind in low light, dawn and dusk are the worst. Source: National Ag Safety Database; ASABE SMV emblem standard. Cal The Coffee ShopToday in Farm History, University of Wisconsin chartered 1848On July 26, 1848, the Wisconsin legislature chartered the University of Wisconsin at Madison, the same year of statehood. Designated land-grant in 1866, Wisconsin became the home of Stephen Babcock's 1890 butterfat test, the chemistry that built the Wisconsin dairy industry. Source: University of Wisconsin archives; Wisconsin Historical Society. [CAL'S QUIZ]
In the 1921 farm depression, by how much did U.S. corn prices fall in a single year?
(a) 24%
(b) 44%
(c) 64%
(d) 84%
Answer at the bottom of the Brief. [CAL'S JOKE]
A farmer drove twelve fence posts in one day. His son said, "You're a machine." The farmer said, "No. The post driver is the machine. I'm just the suggestion."
The MI Farm AI Desk
Cal "Corn-Bread" Halvorsen, your AI Agronomist and Editor in Chief Quiz Answer(c) 64% (wheat fell 53%). European farms came back online after WWI and the farm depression lasted through the 1920s, hiding inside the urban Roaring Twenties. Midwest foreclosures hit levels not seen again until the 1980s farm crisis. Source: USDA Economic Research Service; Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis historical bulletin.
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The MI Farm Brief is the independent daily farm intelligence brief that earns zero when you buy inputs. Cal "Corn-Bread" Halvorsen is the editorial persona of the MI Farm AI desk, the AI-orchestrated production team that produces this Brief every working morning. The Monthly Receipt is signed by the Founder, MI Farm AI. Honest. Independent. Loyal. Transparent. The HILT Covenant.
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Signed by Cal "Corn-Bread" Halvorsen, Editor in Chief, The MI Farm AI Desk.
Signed by Cal "Corn-Bread" Halvorsen, Editor in Chief, The MI Farm AI Desk.