00:00 The analytics behind a successful cropping mix. That's what we're talking about in this edition of Cutting the Curve. Welcome to Extreme Acts Cutting the Curve podcast, 00:10 where we cut your learning curve with insights you can apply immediately to your farming operation. This episode is presented by Loveland products. 00:18 When it comes to crop inputs, you need products that are field proven to deliver both results and value. For more than 50 years, 00:26 Loveland products has been providing farmers with high performance value-driven product solutions designed to maximize productivity on every acre. 00:34 Visit loveland products.com to see how their innovative products can help you farm more profitably. And now here's your host, Damien Mason. 00:43 Hey there. Welcome to another fantastic episode of extreme Ag cutting the curve. We're talking with Matt Miles, 00:48 one of the founding fathers of extreme ag about something that came up just the other day. 00:53 He was going through the numbers of how he's gonna change his cropping mix. He's going to not plant wheat in 2024 or in 20 23, 4, 20 24 01:03 because of the number. And I said, is it just about the money or is there some other stuff? And he came through, he said, no, 01:08 there's all kinds of different things to be considered on how I'm gonna set up my cropping mix. Some farmers might just do the same thing year in and year out. 01:16 And did they really actually put the pencil to it? Should you put the pencil to it? Absolutely. That's what Matt Miles here to talk about. 01:22 So it came up because you were looking at your own situation, and then you also were, uh, giving some advice to our friend Chad Henderson, 01:30 about maybe he should alter his cropping mix. So let's talk about your decision. You're not doing wheat, it's not just about the bushel price for wheat. 01:39 It is about a couple other things, right? Yeah. And what Chad and I were talking about that day was on specifically irrigated ground, you know, and that, and I'm a hundred percent irrigated. 01:48 I'm fortunate to be that, and Chad's got probably 35% irrigation. So our, our situations are totally different. Uh, 01:57 along with our, believe it or not, our, our weather's totally different. So, you know, just because I can do something one way don't mean someone else. 02:06 You know, we're kind of seem like an anomaly a lot of times where we're located, you know, we've got the heat, we've got the, but we do have the irrigation, 02:13 you know, so some things work really well, some things don't. And you know, wheat is just one of those things that when the price is a certain level, 02:22 then it makes sense to grow it. But when it falls below that level, I can do a little better job just with full season beans because of the 02:29 irrigation. Yeah. So your decision was, it's not just that wheat prices are down a little bit, but you said No, wait a minute. I can also, 02:38 because you're a double crop situation or you call 'em wheat beans, but you a lot of times have your wheat come off in what June and then you put in 02:46 your soybeans sucking crop soybeans. People up here in my part of the world don't really do that. There's a, it's happened sometimes you usually don't make out. 02:54 So you've got a different set of circumstances there. And the average person would say, if you can double crop, I don't know how, it still doesn't make you more money. In other words, if you can grow wheat, 03:03 take it off in June, put in soybeans, take them off in October, I don't know how that doesn't make you more money. And you're saying, well, 03:11 a so a full season soybean that goes in the ground in February or March 1st might make me 10 more bushels. 03:19 And that alone doesn't seem to be enough though. That's 120 more bucks, uh, at, at, uh, $12 bushels. That doesn't seem enough to justify not also getting the wheat crop. Well, 03:30 when you get to the, so it's, it, it's a 90% guarantee that we're gonna make 15 bushels more on our full season beans than we are double crop beans. It's, it's, I mean, 03:42 I've proven that year after year that I've grown wheat. So at, at, so it's not 10 bushels, it's 15 bushels first off. So there's, you know, 03:49 now you're, now you're talking, uh, uh, 180 bucks instead of 120 bucks. So that, that starts to add to it. Yes. Right. It does. And and, 03:58 and then it depends on what the wheat numbers are. So if we're looking at, uh, you know, like last year I had wheat that I contracted from the previous year. 04:06 I sold it for 10 bucks. You know, this year looking at the wheat price today it's gonna be somewhere around six 50. So it's all, it's 40% less revenue on the wheat. 04:16 So if I can make 15 bushel better beans and, and then there's the aggravation part of the wheat beans for me. So with furrow irrigation, you know, we've got 180 wells. It takes two men, 04:27 you know, ever 15, 20 wells to, to monitor those during the year. So you're trying to do that at the same time. You're trying to harvest wheat, 04:36 get the ground prepared and plant beans behind it. So it's, it's a very limiting factor for me outside of just the difference in the revenue 04:46 as to, you know, what we're doing at that time of year when that has to happen. And there's about a 90% chance, 04:52 I'd say 80% chance that we're gonna have to irrigate those soybeans up when we're planting beans in June. If we're fur irrigating other crops, 05:00 we're too dry to plant beans. So the only way to get moisture to that bean is to either water the bed before you plant it or plant 'em and then water it, 05:08 which is about a 80% success rate on that also. Okay. So the early beans, so there's a bunch of things, again, I like this. It's the, 05:16 it's the analytics that behind the cropping makes decision. You're gonna get 15 more bushels if a, do a full season bean by planting it. 05:24 'cause wasn't it last year you did, you did something crazy, you planted in February. Granted you're in the delta. If you're just tuning in, 05:30 you've never tuned in Matt's in the delta region of southeast Arkansas, it's flat as a pancake. Everything's irrigated. Uh, 05:38 and also you can start farming earlier down there than let's say if you're in Nebraska. So anyway, you, you're capitalizing on winter moisture. 05:46 So that's what you're saying there is the aggravation, 180 wells across all your farm ground to be monitored. You don't have to be turning on the spigot in March because you've 05:57 got winter moisture. So you're, you're getting, as opposed to planting out there in June, you've gotta do it immediately because there's no moisture to be had. Yeah, 06:05 we get actually probably, I mean, we get about 56 inches of annual rainfall and uh, the majority of that's in the spring in a winter. So when, you know, 06:14 it looks like we get a lot of rainfall, which we do, but a lot of times we'll get four or five inches in the spring and zero in June, July, and August. So that's, that's kind of the caveat with us on, 06:24 on how the moisture comes. And, and we can, there's v there's never been a time in my career that I didn't have enough moisture to plant my spring crop. 06:33 There's been very few times in my career that I had enough moisture to plant my double crop. So there we go. Having to irrigate that up and, 06:42 and that's, you know, they used to say you couldn't irrigate beans up, flood irrigate beans up. We've learned how to do that, 06:48 but it's still about a 80, 85% success rate of getting the stand that you desire. Well, yeah. What's interesting is, uh, the, the, 06:56 the water's down in the furrow and the seed is up on the top of the thing. So it's got a long way to go to get to the water in June. Yeah. 07:04 You've gotta wick it up. So, you know, that's a whole nother process. And if you let it stay on the, on the, on the, you know, 07:11 non germinated seed too long with the 95 degree temperatures, it'll, it'll ero it. Right. You know, 07:17 and that's one thing that we've seen is if you're gonna irrigate beans up, so our soil temperature will be somewhere between 90 and 95 that time of year, 07:25 soil temperature. So you're putting a bean, just like if you cover yourself up with 95 degrees sand, you can imagine what it's gonna do to you till you get your, 07:35 your head out out of the sand. Yeah. Same thing with soybeans. So it's laying there in a, in an extremely hot situation, 07:42 then you put the water on it. Well, as you're irrigating those beans up, if you get any kind rain from above Yep. It's gonna rot 'em. I mean, 07:49 I did it this year. Right. Okay. So the analytics there are that, because now the person listen to this says, well, 07:56 maybe you just shouldn't do double crop beads. That's not what you're saying at all. Let's go back to the money. 'cause you analyzed it from the money and from the manpower and from the 08:03 management standpoint. Uh, if be, if wheat, if wheat were a dollar more a bushel, you would probably say, I'm gonna still do some double crop. Right? Yeah. A certain portion of it, 08:16 a dollar to maybe $2, it's gonna, you know, of course I'm lazy. So you know, I'm, I'm it, 08:22 wheat looks really cool in the winter when you're through with your other crop, you've got these big wide drills and you go out there and you, 08:28 you drill you about 800 to a thousand acres of it. And then you're like, oh s**t. Now I've gotta plant beans behind this. 08:35 When I'm trying to do all these other things, the money will vary, but we have more money in a double crop bean than we do in a full season bean, 08:45 you know, down here we've got more insects and the insects come in later. That's the advantages of early planted soybean. We don't spray for worms any, 08:54 I say any 95% of the time we don't spray for worms on our full season beans because worm likes to land and lay its eggs in a non 09:02 canopy situation. Well, by the time the worm flight gets here, we're canopy on our early beans. So they, where they're gonna go, 09:09 they're gonna go the double crop beans and the late planted beans. That's where you're gonna have your worm sprays irrigation. You know, 09:16 I was looking at this with Chad earlier and, and like I said, we probably need to talk about Chad's situation because it's totally different, 09:21 even though we're fairly close, we're both in the south, but you know, I'll at least have one more irrigation in those soybeans. 'cause if I'm, 09:29 if I'm not irrigating 'em up the minute I get 'em up, I've gotta irrigate 'em. Yeah. Right. So, so the thing is, and and you talk about the money, there's not really your water. 09:40 You're not paying for water, but you're paying to run the pumps and you're paying to have the people monitor and manage it. So it's not like the water has a cost, 09:49 but the the getting the water, getting the water and and managing it has a, has a cost. All right. So Chad's dry land, except he's about two third of dry land, 10:02 one third irrigated. And you were, uh, he was doing what, what we're all about extreme ag. You were comparing information and, 10:12 and, and, and opinions on how to do something. And you said, I think you should just probably go with full season beans and not do the wheat. 10:20 And he said, well, and irrigation, you know, but we started talking about non irrigation. If he went with full season beans and no wheat, so in, 10:31 you're pretty much guaranteed a wheat crop. You know, you plant it in the winter. Yeah. You're gonna get moisture. You're gonna get, normally get the weather that you need to make wheat. 10:38 So you're pretty much guaranteed a wheat crop 'cause of when you plant it down here. Yep. You're not guaranteed a soybean crop on dry land. I mean, 10:46 I've literally had my yield monitor say yield is too low to read on dry soybeans. You know, we've made anywhere from like this year specifically, 10:56 we would've probably made five to 15 bushel acre, probably more in the five range with the, because of the late weather we had. Mm-Hmm. Dad made 50 plus. Yeah. 11:09 And so he's able to do that. His weather's a little bit different and he is got the, and he is got the wheat crop. If I was dry land, 11:17 I would ha I would have to plant wheat. There would be no choice. Well, that's 'cause you're gonna give because you guarantee revenue. But yeah. 11:23 The idea you're saying in your part of the world, if you're not irrigated, if it's dry land, 11:29 is that a full season bean that still only gets you five bushels? Oh yeah. Yeah. Anytime you plant 'em, depending on the weather. Now I have made the, 11:37 the highest I've ever made on a dry land bean in my life in my career is 50 bushel. And I thought I'd set the world on fire. You know, making our, 11:46 our weather patterns changed some, uh, if you got a dry land bean in, when I plant my full season beans, 11:53 you're probably looking at 20 to 25 bushel this year. Wouldn't have been that, you know, I mean, so it's very risky on what you're gonna get. Well, 12:01 Chad's gonna get that wheat crop no matter what, and then he is gonna come back and get a bean crop if he plants his beans and he, they just completely burn up. Well then he, 12:10 he can stop at some point in time, say, this is all the money I'm gonna spend on him. Right. You know, so, and, and another thing too is we're 95% share of rent. 12:21 So, so the landowner's gonna get 25% of the beans and 25% of the wheat. So if, and they're gonna get 25% of the full season beans. 12:31 If you're cash rent, you're paying X amount of dollars an acre that's fixed. Yeah. No matter what you plant. So that's another place where I, I lose money, 12:40 you know, when I'm doing wheat and beans is there's a share rent on both crops. Yeah. Right. So the person that's paying cash rent, uh, if you get two crops or, 12:48 or Chad likes to talk about getting three crops in two years. And That's right. You get three crops in two years and you only paid cash rent twice. 12:56 So basically one of those crops you didn't have to pay cash rent for it. So there's, there's an absolute analytics on that. 13:03 Tell me about other ways you look at your analytics behind a successful cropping migs. Um, because this is just something about wheat and and beans. 13:14 I wanna know if there's other stuff before you do tell me that. I want to remind the listeners about money and fertility. 13:21 You wanna save money on fertility without sacrificing yield? Why don't you harvest last seasons nutrients for next seasons crops using 13:28 extract from Loveland products? Go to loveland products.com to learn more Loveland products, great products like extract Titan Terramar, which is helping you with stress. 13:40 Go check out loveland products.com. Anyway, so this is the, the equation you keep using on the wheat and the soybeans. And so you've, 13:46 you've already made your decision. You just told the guys, I've got wheat treat, I've got seed treatment for wheat. I'll, I'll send it to you. 13:53 I'm not doing any wheat next year. You made the decision. Is there anything that would happen here? 13:58 We're recording this the third week of October. Is there anything that would happen between now and Thanksgiving now and Thanksgiving where you say, you know what, I changed my mind, 14:07 I'm gonna go and put, if wheat ran up two bucks somehow crazy, I don't know, war in Russia, would you say? Uh, oh, I'm changing and could you still do it? 14:17 Yeah, I could probably would be a little late. Uh, I would like to make that decision by November the 15th. We have to plant later anyway because of what they call barley yellow dwarf, 14:27 which is aphids basically getting on the wheat in the early stages of the year when it's still warm and then it just, it, it puts a virus in that plant. 14:35 I know you've talked to Johnny Rell about that, you know, before. So, uh, you know, we have, we have to be later anyway, now you get past November 15th, 14:45 that price would have to be, you know, pretty good. Probably at least $2 for me to do that. Now. I, and I'm very, I don't know what word to use. I, I want not, 14:55 I'm not gonna use the word I want to use, I'm very specific about my rotation. We're, we're blessed to have, you know, 15:03 multiple crops we can grow and we've got yield robbers and we've got yield enhances corn, for instance, you know, gives back to the soil. 15:11 Cotton takes away from the soil and beans kind of sits there and just depends on what temperament it, it's in at the time. 15:18 So I like to rotate those three crops when I can, you know, and, and price dictates that some I'm gonna, I'm never, I'm not gonna say never. 15:27 I try not to ever put the same crop in the same field again where there's a lot of corn on corn in the Midwest and beans on beans down here. You know, 15:36 I've got certain soil types that I've got beans on beans, but for the most part, 95% of my farm's gonna be rotated of those three crops, 15:44 at least corn and beans. And then when cotton's advantageous, I pull that in also. Well, from a fertility standpoint, 15:50 it makes sense from a parasite and disease, uh, tolerance or management standpoint, it makes sense. And if from a manage, from just a management stance, it might make it a little bit harder. By the way, 16:03 your rice, you don't do rice on rice, do you? Yes, I do. My, my, my main rice farm is continuous rice. 16:11 It's been continuous rice for 25 years. I haven't had that. And that doesn't present a disease or parasite issue? No, 16:18 it presents a huge weed problem. But this lamb was leveled into zero grade Yeah. Years ago, because that looked like the thing to do. Yeah. And today, 16:28 I think some of these guys that leveled that land, wish they had a little bit of fall in it where they could rotate it to other crops. So couldn't you, 16:35 you still couldn't just go in there and stick it in soybeans one year. It's about, I grown it in a pond. So I mean, you know, 16:42 crop don't like feet. So, I mean, and they're bigger fields. You can do it on small fields. If you got 20, 30 acres, zero grade fields, 16:50 we rotate those in the grain into other grains. Yeah. But if you've got big fields like this far, this farm's a mile by two miles wide. Awesome. And they're, 16:58 they're 80 acre fields, so it, it just don't work well. Yeah. Right. So the analytics behind success, you said you're very, uh, 17:05 specific or even particular might be, uh, the, the word you were looking for about how you go about doing this. You wanna make sure there's rotation. Um, 17:13 what are the other factors when you look at analyzing what your cropping mix is gonna be? Absolutely. Price. I mean, you know, we know what our, 17:21 we know what our breakeven points are on each crop, for instance, last year, and it'll bite you in the butt sometimes. 17:27 Last year I reduced my cotton acres by about 800 acres, right at the last, like two weeks before planting time. Boom, I took 800 acres out and put it in soybeans because the ROI was better than 17:40 soybeans. It still today was better than soybeans. I mean, it was still soybeans were better, but not enough. 17:47 If I had to go back again and I could do it again with the yields on the cotton we had and the way the PR price ended up, 17:54 I probably would've left that in there just for rotation purposes. It would've been a slight, slightly less ROI. Yep. 18:00 That keeps my rotation going where I need it to be. Okay. So prices obviously the most important thing, uh, location. 18:07 Does location matter? I mean, you, you, you're spread out a little bit. Chad's way spread out. Johnny Verell spread. My God, look at his map. 18:14 He's all over the place. Does location then determine anything about cropping mix? Not, so what we try to do is we try to group our, whatever we're growing in, in, 18:26 in two spots. So we've got two main spots, 20 miles from each other. So I'm gonna have some just say, let's use cotton this year. 18:34 I only grew cotton down south, you know, simply because I didn't grow enough acres. And, and we try to lump those acres in a certain area. 18:44 It may be in two areas, 20 miles apart, but we try to adjoin do the adjoining fields. It makes it way more efficient rather than you've got a 40 over here and 200 18:54 over here, you drive six miles too and then nine miles over here to do another 220. You know, we try to keep those in blocks and our landowners work with us. 19:02 Really good to do that. Speaking of your landowners, you told me once that because you do stuff on shares, uh, with the, the land that you don't own yourself, 19:11 that they always wanted cotton because cotton was king, cotton was the cash king. Cotton made more money. How do you manage that? The analytics of cropping mix? 19:21 It seems to me that every one of your landlords would be saying, Matt, you can do whatever you want as long as you plant cotton. That was, 19:28 that's not what happens now. That was the case up until we started getting $4 when we, in 2007, I think it was, 19:36 we started getting $4 corn and, and $10 beans. Mm-Hmm. You know, prior to that we were $5 beans and I don't even know what corn was. 19:47 I didn't even grow it. I didn't keep up with it. Yeah. Well, there's a long time, 19:50 there's a long time where there's a long time where corn was in the low twos, uh, and everybody just thought that was where it was gonna stay. But then, uh, 19:57 obviously the ethanol situation helped out quite a bit. Yeah. You planted your corn for the first time in oh seven, you told me. Yep, 20:03 that's right. So we're relatively, you know, early corn growing people, but yeah, you know, 20:08 back then the grain prices were so low on the good high productive ground, there wasn't a lot of choice. 20:14 So a lot of these landowners either owned gins or on portions of gins or, you know, I had one landowner pass away and left the, 20:23 the ground to his si to his, uh, children. And before he passed, and this was back when his statement was true, then whatever you do, 20:31 make sure we plant cotton on that good ground. That was on his deathbed. Okay. Fast forward that 10 years, 20:38 cotton's not profitable to talk those siblings out of cotton when their dad was on deathbed. I mean, it's a, 20:45 it's almost a political type deal in agriculture. Right, right, right. Well, we don't, we don't manage, we don't manage that up here, thank goodness. Um, 20:53 the analytics behind a successful cropping mix. So you, you went with Chad, you ran his numbers. What's your advice to somebody when they say, 21:01 I'm not sure I'm doing as good job? I think it would be reluctant, just like those siblings that wouldn't, 21:07 didn't even wanna think about going against what, what daddy told 'em to do. I think that a lot of farmers are gonna be reluctant to even question their 21:13 cropping mix because they're convinced, you know, they, it is like, oh, I'm sure I must be doing it right. This is what I've always done, 21:20 but there probably is money they might be leaving on the table. So what's your advice on how to go about doing that? Just, just run the numbers. 21:28 I mean, run the numbers. You always, it's all a mathematical equation in, in agriculture. You think that, okay, lemme ask you this about the numbers. 21:36 Do you think that most guys really do know their cost of production? Because I hear that ag means all the time, know your cost of production, 21:43 know your cost of production. You say, well, my cost of production is gonna vary with yield. You know, that's the first excuse. My cost of production on, uh, on a, 21:50 on a 80 bushel soybean crop is a hell of a lot less than, uh, my cost of production on a 60 bushel yield of, uh, soybeans. Yeah. Well, 21:59 I mean it, and, and in all honesty, your cost of production, you're gonna have a yield goal. And so you're gonna have that number in there. 22:06 You're gonna have that number plugged in there for that yield goal. And, and you gotta look at the numbers, you know, 10 year, I would say this, 22:14 10 years ago, farmers probably all, most farmers didn't know their total cost of production. And it's a moving target. I'm, 22:21 that's why I got on the phone with Chad bef prior to this podcast Yeah. To just make sure my numbers are right, you know, because I've got 'em. 22:29 Sherry gives 'em to me. But there's so many things you can tweak on those, especially when you're looking at a double crop situation. 22:37 Do you charge the labor to the wheat? Do you charge the labor to the, to the beans? You know, do you charge your fertility of the wheat? 22:42 Do you charge it to the beans? Do you split it up? Right? Do you, do you use your fixed cost for both crops or one crop? Right. 22:49 So it depends on how you're looking at that, but specifically where I'm going with that, 10 years ago, I knew my cost production less than I do today. 22:58 If you're in agriculture today and you're a successful farmer, either you or someone in your operation or your accountant knows 23:06 your cost of production to a certain degree, or you wouldn't still be here today, right now, is it perfect? No. Is mine perfect? Absolutely not. Right. I'll be like, oh, yeah, I didn't, 23:15 maybe I, I spent 20 more dollars or 40 more dollars than I thought. Mm-Hmm. It depends. And, and some farmers, you know, and, and I do this all the time, 23:24 you justify what you want to do. You know, corn, corn, for instance, next year, don't look that good. You know, at the prices it is today. 23:32 Course we can get five, five and a quarter for next year's crop right now, but two a month ago, you know, we're looking in the mid fours, right. 23:41 So you say, okay, there's no way I can grow corn at these prices. Right. Corn will absolutely give me a guaranteed five bushel acre increase 23:50 on my soybeans the following year. Mm-Hmm. Probably gonna be more like the seven to eight range. Mm-Hmm. You've gotta take that number. It's kinda like growing catfish down here. 23:59 You're not gonna get all your money that year. You may get some of it the next year. Yeah. And you've gotta, when I'm figuring corn, I add bushels to my beans. I add, 24:08 I add money there that I'm going to, that I'm gonna make the next year off my beans if I'm still farming. Mm-Hmm. Yeah. There's, I like that. It, it is attributing, 24:18 it's neat to say, know your cost of production down to the penny. Well, sometimes where do you attribute, like you said, 24:25 where do you attribute some of these fixed costs? Uh, and especially when you had double crop situation. All right. So obviously know your numbers as best you can, 24:32 analytics behind a successful cropping mix. What about selling? Do you say, well, you know what, 24:37 the reason I'm making this cropping mix is because I sold for, I've got self sold for 2025. Do you, do you, does that part of the equation? 24:44 Oh yeah. I grew wheat this year because I had it booked for $10. Yeah. Had I had the wheat already booked from the previous year for $10, 24:53 I wouldn't have grown it. I mean, this past wheat crop that I harvested and I just harvested my double crop beans on, that wouldn't have been weed had I not already had it booked. 25:01 So that's another place. You gotta be careful. Yeah. You know, book into the, when you book into the next year, 25:07 you've gotta be prepared to plant that much crop. Yeah. Or write a check for the difference in the market if it's, if it's lower than it was when you, when you, when you made it. 25:15 Another thing too, going into that crop mix and what you're gonna do you in your analytics, it's like I said, it's 80% ROI, 25:24 but there's also an equipment efficiency factor. You know, you take a picker for instance, you're gonna use it on one crop. Yeah. You know, 25:31 you take a, combine multiple crops. So by the way, by the way, for you non-con people, he's talking about a cotton picker. 25:37 I was just down there at the beginning of this month. I saw a cotton picker for the first time, uh, and uh, the most expensive piece of equipment on miles farm, 25:44 and it's only capable of doing one thing picking cotton. Yeah. So all of your equipment efficiency, you can make money or lose money there. 25:52 Also, when you're looking at a rotation, you know, your planters is the same planter that plant your corn gonna plant your beans. You know, in the Midwest, everybody basically uses the same planter for both. 26:03 We've got a twin row planter for a grain, and we've got a single row planter for, for cotton. So, you know, some of that you gotta be able to justify. I'll give you a prime example. 26:11 You know, we run at least one round bell picker, and theoretically we need 1500 acres to service that $900,000 picker. 26:22 So if I purchase that picker, I'm committed to the 1500 acres of cotton. Now this year I did the math on it versus the beans. 26:31 I could make the additional cotton picker payment and still make more money and have less troubles by going with the soybeans. So it all goes back to the math, 26:40 but it's not just yield and price you sell it for. It's all your other efficiencies on your farm. Well, I usually maximizing the usage of a piece of equipment, 26:48 but you're saying that this year you didn't even do 1500 acres of cotton, which you normally would because you determined that your, 26:58 um, your still money ahead to not fully utilize the cotton picker because soybeans made you better money because of the price of soybeans at the time of 27:09 planting. Now that backfired a little bit on me. You know, I probably time by time, I, 27:15 I actually worked a deal out with a picker where it worked for me. But in a normal situation, if you didn't ha, if you didn't have that option, 27:21 you've gotta make sure you cover the cost of that machine sitting there because you got insurance on it. And, and, uh, hey and, and, uh, 27:28 equipment payment on it and interest on it no matter if you run it or not. I don't know if a lot of farmers, uh, 27:34 really look at fully maximizing their equipment. 'cause they love machinery. You know what I mean? Uh, we, we love, we love the, the shiny machinery. But, 27:44 uh, that's, that's one that maybe there's probably some efficiencies to be gained on that one. So, all right. We talked about location. 27:51 We talked about maximizing your manpower, whether it's just you or you got hired hands talked about, uh, then the resources, the water, if you're a double crop thing, that's a, 28:00 that's a big situation right there on double crop, which is gonna definitely, uh, appeal more to people that are, uh, right south of the Ohio River. Um, 28:09 anything else on the analytics behind a successful cropping mix? That pretty much wraps it up, I think. I think that's good. So, uh, 28:16 if you have a question about this, the thing that you can do, if you are a extreme Ag member, you can reach out to Matt. You know, 28:23 you pay seven $50 a year to become a member. Seven 50 bucks, that's it. Seven 50 bucks if you're a, if you're a, if you're a seven 50 acre farm, 28:30 that's a dollar an acre. And what you get from your membership is direct access. You could actually get on the horn and call up Matt and say, Hey, you know what? 28:37 I have a question and I wanna make sure I'm running these numbers right. It's just a sounding board. Seven 50 bucks a year if you wanna be a member, 28:42 you know what, you don't have to be a member. You can watch hundreds of videos just like this. I have literally recorded hundreds of these Cutting the curve podcasts and also 28:49 the filming of videos that we do out in the field. I was now in Arkansas. We filmed dozens of videos that you can go and see at Extreme Ag Farm. 28:56 I encourage you to do that. His name's Matt Miles wearing his hat farming clock in at age five and never clock out. It's one of my favorites. I'm Damian Mason. Thanks for being here. 29:05 Until next time, share this with somebody that can use it. It's extreme ag cutting the curve. Thank you. 29:10 That's a wrap for this episode of extreme Ag cutting the curve. But there is plenty more available by visiting Extreme Ag Farm. 29:18 For over 50 years, farmers have turned to the proven lineup of crop inputs offered by Loveland products, from seed treatments, plant nutrition, adjuvant, 29:27 and crop protection products. Loveland has the complete lineup to keep your farming operation productive, and most importantly, profitable. Check out loveland products.com to learn more.