Short and sweet this morning..  

Willard Garvey's Grain Company's crown jewel "back in the day" was their terminal elevator sited on the MOP.. (hand over heart..)  The Missouri Pacific Railroad.. (someday.. there's gonna be a railroad FROM Missouri TO the Pacific Ocean.. and we're gonna have access to the Asian Markets..  Yipper.. some day...  The MOP got merged into the UP.. They took UP's first name and the MOP's last name when they combined it..   So.. now there is a line from Mizzou to the Pacific.. but the MOP wasn't the one that did it.. but they tried.. anywho I digress.. "someday there's gonna be a railroad from Brazil to China.. or at Least Peru..  Yipper someday..;-)  btw.. that probably would be a good idea.. just like the Keystone Pipeline.. wonder if either one will ever get built?

Okay back to my original story.. The Garvey Terminal Elevator was sited at the terminus of a couple of feeder lines here in Kansas.. one of which went through my town.  Most locals do not know this but "back in the day" our coop would get rail cars sited.. every couple of days.. or everyday during wheat harvest.. which would get filled and pulled down to Wichita.. Garvey had a line of country.. ???  I hesitate to call them elevators.. glorified surge tank tin cans.. a dump pit.. a scale located along a rail siding to spot some cars...  Anywho.. these.. 15..20..30 or whatever the number was country feeders fed loaded railcars to Garvey's terminal elevator.. (probably patterned after Cargill's country line elevators west of Albert Lea Minnesota.. which started that company.. "back in the day..") and that is where our wheat went.. to be stored until shipped to the Gulf for export or a flour mill for processing.

Anywho.. The Garvey terminal was/is a half mile long.. head house in the middle with a 1/4 mile of tubes on either side.. one side has a lean to that runs the length.. the other has flat storage that runs perpendicular to the elevator.. at it's peak storage it could hold about 50 myn bushels..  This is a sad picture of when it exploded back in June of 1998.. unfortunately a couple of workers lost their lives.. However it has been rebuilt.. it's a better design now.. safer.. and I believe Gavilon has it now..  It's like half the rated storage or less as most of the flat storage has been renovated for other uses.. commercial warehouse storage for whatever.. etc..

http://www.kansas.com/news/article986253.html#/tabPane=tabs-b45a5e63-1-1

 

Anywho.. Last year's Oklahoma wheat crop was only about 48 myn bushels.. 18 bu to the acre.. and pick your elevator.. this one above would have held that "back in the day" or Enid Oklahoma probably has that much capacity.. or more etc.. Salina Ks.. Hutchinson.. Topeka.. Amarillo Tx other terminals in Wichita etc.. any of those probably would have been able or at least come close.

Today the MOP feeder rail lines have been pulled up.. I don't know how many of Garvey's country elevators are still in use.. I'm sure some are.. but this feeder to terminal system has largely gone the way of the dinosaurs..  We have more country storage.. which feed closer shuttle loaders that do not require beau coup flat storage.. we also do not have the government storage payments that built the large terminals.. Although the terminals are still used.. and in a pinch.. needed.

Will they be needed this year?

Another story from "back in the day" is one my brother told me from his marketing class at K-State where the prof stated..

"If I could control all the wheat Stored in terminal elevators in Hutchinson Kansas.. I could set the World Price for Wheat."  

Now that's an eyebrow raiser.. especially considering that only 2 companies are there now.. ADM and Cargill.. However.. "back in the day".. Continental, Bunge, Collingwood, Farmland plus a few others provided real competition for the grain.. and neither ADM nor Cargill had a presence.. however today.. like the MOP those days are gone.  I guess Long KC tried to corner the market there a few weeks ago.. but.. maybe that was just a trade gone bad..???  (see Long you should have just kept going.. "Give me some more!!")

Today you don't need to own terminal elevators.. Railroads.. or any of that.. you can just buy or sell a couple thousand contracts and basically do the same thing.. look at the funds in the wheat market.. They established an all time record short position.. and were able to push the market down.. until something came along.. was it this?



or this?



???

idk..

Will it continue.. or has it run it's course..??

idk..

All I know is that things are not like they used to be..

It's true that wheat exports have slowed from their expected pace..  are buyers taking a "time out?"   Are they waiting on a cheaper dollar..??  Going to other sources?

All possible.. as is the option of coming back to the US.  I can't find the info right now.. but all of our major buyers have taken a time out over the past couple of weeks.. waiting on lower prices no doubt.. how long will that continue?

Will a chart tell you when it does?

Before or after the fact?

Anywho.. need to go..  Yipper I still believe my weather guy.. we might be a little early.. No doubt he was right about the drought in Texas ending.. "boy howdie."  The El Nino has been stronger then expected.. but as you know.. El Nino can have negative impacts for other wheat producers.. Australia etc...

In 2011.. I thought the Northern Plains were getting our rains.. well we're getting it now.. and someone else is gonna miss out.., will it matter..??

???

later. 

edit add:  no big on the export sales again this week.. so the standoff continues.. however we are doing enough to come close to the WASDE.. 855 myn on the books.. lean but not zero.

Here's a good read on the Garvey Patriarch.. Interesting.

https://www.kshs.org/publicat/history/2000springsummer_miner.pdf&nbs...