00:00 So I'm here today in Houston, Texas at the 24 Commodity. Classic hot topic this year is gonna be how ma 00:05 how many inputs can we afford to put on a $4 25 cent corn crop? Yeah. We don't have the benefit 00:11 of the last couple of years. And, uh, you know, as a fertilizer company, we're feeling the effects that a little bit in that, uh, 00:17 the decisions are probably coming but late Mm-Hmm. And we could see a potential bottleneck. I think one thing I think about a little bit, 00:25 or maybe even fear a little bit is we have a lot of products that can be applied as a foliar. 00:30 They could go down in a wide drop, and I feel like some growers are gonna be thinking, Hey, I might just kick these fertilizer 00:38 decisions down the road to end season. How are you feeling about that? You know, I'm, I'm, I've kind 00:43 of got mixed emotions on that. We really look at the data and see what ROIs and what don't and, and just take in furrow in in particular, 00:51 we know there's certain things we put in that in furrow that'll make an ROI. So those are gonna stay in there for sure. 00:57 But in on the same sense, they've got ROI 4 25, so there's some of those guys that are coming out. Same thing with the, with the foyers or the Y drops. 01:05 You know, if we start seeing, we're getting late and we need something, or through a tissue sample, maybe we need a little more in or a little more phosphorous 01:12 or whatever, we can go back and add it. Then kicking the can down the roads a is a, is a perfect example that's gonna happen. 01:18 Yeah. Do you think, uh, I mean one thing that happens if you do kick the can down the road, so to speak, you do gather information like you do see, 01:26 is this crap worth continuing to invest in? We always are optimistic and hope that it is, but once in a while, mother nature throws this curve ball 01:33 of a hailstorm or a windstorm or something like that. So it can delay that. Do you think, uh, uh, you know, 01:40 gathering more information is good. Do you think interest rates are on people's mind too, on shortening that time that their money's out? 01:48 You know, I hadn't really thought about it that way, but that is an additional cost. If you put that product out in April 01:53 that the same product you could put out maybe in May or June or July, depending on when the corn needs it. 01:59 Yeah. You're gonna save some interest on it too. So that's a great point that I hadn't even, I hadn't even factored into 02:04 that is what's the interest cost? You know, we do that. We'll look at a product and say, okay, if we buy it today and we didn't use it, 02:11 what's it gonna cost us to hold it to next year? Yeah. So yes, that would factor in. That's a very smart way to look at it too. Yeah. 02:17 So you're gathering information and you're also shortening your cash cycle, so to speak, uh, from when your cash leaves and comes back in. 02:25 I will say that as a grower, uh, I always had, uh, I always bit off more than I could chew probably. I always thought, oh, I'll get over this 02:33 field five or six times. Yeah. During the season. Is it, do you see risks there? Like if you think, oh, I'm gonna plan three foliar 02:39 and a wide drop application? Oh yeah. There's risks there because the, the environmental concerns, you know, 02:45 you get into a real rainy period, corn's gonna grow fast in my area, so it's gonna go from Kneehigh to head high, you know, 02:51 within a matter of seven to 10 days with some of the heat. But it, but you know, the foyers, I guess you, you know, 02:57 you could put those on as long as you got an airplane, you know? Yeah. Right. You can put those on when you wanted to. 03:02 You did bring up a good point though. Some risk mitigation would be okay if I can use a different product Yeah. 03:08 And get the same results at a different time. Maybe I, I I reduce that risk if you did get a health storm or something. 03:14 Right. We see those a lot. Yeah, I, I would agree with that. So I think it's just gonna be a 03:19 balance for that grower, right. That tendency to delay that decision, but also be realistic about 03:25 what your time management is in the season. Well, yeah. And you can't, my dad always said, don't cut your nose off spite your face. 03:31 So, you know, be careful about cutting things that are important things. Yeah. A lot of the little things. 03:37 Do you think, well, I can cut that. You know, if you've done a research on it and it's an ROI that's something you probably need worse, 03:43 you need to cut that maybe in a $7 year more than you would a 4 25. So keep those things in there that consistently provide 03:51 that, that return that if proven themselves on your farm year after year. A hundred percent. And, and you know, 03:56 when we get on Lake Fertility, temple and Chad talk a lot about that late application, it, it depends on me what the heat's gonna be. 04:04 If the heat's really extreme, that plant's basically just trying to stay alive. Yeah. You know, so you, you bring a lot of stuff in there, 04:09 it's just gonna put it to the side and just try to stay alive. So some of those products on, on, 04:15 on our farm would be dependent on weather, you know, on temperatures. Yeah. Matt, I, I don't envy, you know, a lot 04:21 of the situations guys are in this year, it's gonna be a balance and these are all, all of the variables we talked about, 04:27 the answer's gonna be different for everyone. That's right. I, and I heard a guy today make a comment that we're going, you know, we're get, 04:33 we're gonna see the eighties again. You know, how depressed and everything was. We're not just going to, if we we're not just gonna see the 04:40 eighties, our inputs, I mean, you look at inputs today versus eighties, the prices are about the same, but the inputs are four 04:46 or five times more than they were. So this is gonna be, you know, I've, I've, I've had several crops 04:50 and this is gonna be one of the most challenging that I've had. But again, there's certain things you gotta eat 04:57 that plant's gotta eat. Yep. And, and, and y'all provide food for it to eat, and it's gotta have that one way or another. 05:03 Absolutely. Well, hopefully some of the points we've made will resonate with someone out there. 05:08 It's just there's no easy answers. Yep, that's exactly right.