Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Well, I think the most unpopular thing I could say today is that you should be considering a fertilizer purchase for your farm. It's that time of year, folks. Planning for 2026 is here. We bring in James Mitchell from Crop Management Network to cover all things fertilizer. Give us the latest and help us decide. Is this a time to purchase? We also bring in Tyler Uramchuk from the Nation Network. Not about crop marketing, folks, but about NHL hockey and honestly, all things sports moving forward. He'll come in once a month. All right, folks, let's get into it. Episod 96 of the what the Futures Podcast is right now.
Hey, folks, welcome to the what the Futures Podcast, your quick guide to better farming decisions.
Alrighty, folks, welcome into episode 96 of the what the Futures podcast. Of course, recorded in the UPL studio each and every week. You know, when I think about UPL here in the month of October, I start to think about planning for 2026. I start to think about cleaning seed, figuring out my rotation. Well, as you're thinking about that for your cereals and pulses, don't forget about Ran Kona Trio, all right? Three powerful fungicides in one amazing seed treatment. Talk to your local retailer. They'll get you hooked up with the details here on Rand kona trio from UPL. All right, folks, I gotta, hey, McDavid signed with the Oilers earlier this week. I gotta represent here a little bit in this episode. So I'm in bright orange, the orange and blue here for the start of episode 96. Of course, we'll see how our results are, you know, recording this Wednesday, we play Wednesday night, open the season against Calgary. Now I've got Tyler, your Remchuk joining me this week. Tyler, we joked about talking about Trump and Carney's meeting and talking about commodities, but that's not Tyler's thing. He is all sports all the time. He works with the Nation Network and we thought, hey, why not get somebody on the show here every once in a while to talk about something a little different. So Tyler's going to join us on a monthly basis to talk about the NHL hockey season and kind of keep us in the loop on what's going on in the sports world. So that's new. That's going to be new here. Season three just around the corner, but we got him on a little early this this year. I've also got James Mitchell to talk about fertilizer because why not, you know, it's planning time. Lots of decisions to be made and I know, you wrap up harvest and you say, well, Ryan, I don't want to do any thinking about next year. I'm sorry, but you have to or you should be okay. You need your rest, you need your relaxation. But maybe you find a little excitement and joy in figuring out your plan for next year. Hey, maybe you do. Hopefully you do, because it is that time. All right, and then Kyle Gibson with AG i3 joins me. They're going to do a little hotel airport transfer. They're going to do a little transportation for us at the, at the curling Olympic curling trials down in Halifax. Facts. And so he's on the show this week as well. So a triple threat when it comes to. Comes to guests here. All right, so we got some housekeeping to get out of the way before I chat. Crop markets for housekeeping. Of course. Well, conference wise, the agenda is, has hit your inbox. If you are listening to this show and you are subscribed to our email list, you already got it. You know the agenda. You don't get, you don't have to find details yet. We're going to drill down over the next couple of weeks and get those fine details and send that to the registered conference attendees. But you get the gist of it. All right. You kind of see the layout. When do we expect you to roll into town? When are we wrapping this thing up? And what do we have planned? All right, and so that, that's in your inbox. So there we go. As of recording, you know, there's about 25 tickets left. It's actually been quiet the last couple days here, but 25 tickets to go. That is, that is it. All right. And so registration for the conference closes October 17th. I missed. Said that last week, but it's October 17th. That's when registration closes. Pardon me, application closes. And then from there it's just a matter of time before we, we sell out. Right.
So we have again, folks, four breakout sessions. Within those four, we have many different speakers. And you pick, you know, which session you want to see. You'll pick from three. Okay. Don't worry, most people are going twice. Five keynote speakers, not including myself. I guess I'd be the sixth if you want to put me in that spot. I'd say I'm the, I'm the sixth keynote. And we even have like bonus sessions as well. We have bonus sessions bright and early in the morning for the keeners out there. Those that want to come and get after it, get the.
I was saying earlier this week, kind of the hair of the Dog. Right. You just dive into it right away and get going. So. So there. There we go. Lots of fun stuff planned. Everything's coming together quite nicely. Still haven't figured out how to raise capacity, but hey, I'll appreciate the sellout when, when we get to that point. Okay, so you gotta get on it though, folks. Even, you know, email me if it's. If that's as easy as I need to make it. Ryan@whatthefuturespodcast ca and say, Ryan, how do I do this? I want to get to Mooseja. I will send you the application link. Okay, so we're here.
[00:05:24] Speaker B: We're.
[00:05:24] Speaker A: You're on watch. You're on notice. The countdown is on. I don't know if you have a week, two, three. I don't know where we sit in a couple weeks here, but it is getting very, very close. Yeah, looking forward to it, honestly. We've got. We got swag showing up every day. That's off to get.
Get its, you know, branding done on it. We got all these orders out there. We're meeting with some of our vendors, making our final decisions. Also, you know, meeting with, with sponsors and appreciate a couple new sponsors jumping on board here for this year. Brett Young being, being one of them. They stepped up here for that Wednesday evening Prohibition tunnel tour and dinner with Brett Young. So thank you very much. And Scotiabank also joining as a sponsor for 2025 as well. So. So, yeah, very, very cool to see all this, all this coming together. All right, so that's deadline number one. October 17th, application deadline for the conference deadline number two. October 20th, 11:59pm the Harvest Hustle photo contest. That is the last day to get your pictures in. You guys are kicking butt. You're doing a phenomenal job getting some great entries here. We're going to pick the winner sometime later that week. I haven't decided if we're doing a live thing yet or if we're just going to announce it on the Friday episode. Still trying to make that decision here over the next couple days. But all you have to do if you want to potentially win two tickets to go to Halifax to watch the Olympic curling trials. A little Canadian. Canadian.
Canadiana. Is that even a word? Let's go with that. Yeah. Go check out some curling. Go check out the city of Halifax, the East coast. You'd have time to go for a drive, maybe check out New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island. Sky's the limit once you're there. We've got curling tickets for every draw, two seats for you, VIP Meals in the VIP lounge three times a day, your hotel's covered, your flights covered. What a nice, nice little way to kick off your winter. A month before Christmas, you come to Halifax. Then we're going to see you down in Musha at the conference.
Then all of a sudden, you're going to do a little Christmas shopping and you're going to get to Christmas. All right, I shouldn't joke about Christmas in October. Some of you are shaking your head, saying, what is this guy doing?
And I'll say this week, we're at the point now in our society where the, and I learned this over a couple days ago, the Halloween stuff. It's October 8th. The Halloween stuff, there's like a little bit left and then right beside it, Christmas. And there's like, for every one Halloween piece, there's 10 things for Christmas. And I'm just, it's too soon.
Like, can we not celebrate a holiday first? Let's celebrate a day, live in that for a moment and then focus on the next thing. So, yeah, in fact, Chantal was telling me that she was at Canadian Tire this week in Shore park and customer service was getting completely reamed out, I guess, very, very vivid or livid actions and words being said. And she happened to catch, as she was paying, she kind of caught why they were upset. And yeah, you guessed it, it was because of all the Christmas decor that was out there. I'm sure, I'm sure that customer service rep had nothing to do with that decision. You might want to go up, up the chain a little further on that one. Anyway. All right, folks, let's get back to business here. All right, so the harvest hustle. October 20th, 11:59pm okay, all right. From there, let's get into some, some market stuff here for just a moment. Now, the most important thing that you can do right now, in my opinion, is that taking the time to figure out your plan moving forward, your crop marketing plan moving forward. And to me, it could start in two different ways. It can start with, with logistics, as you'll hear later in this episode. You know, James Mitchell talks about, I think he said this in the episode now, or maybe that was before we started recording, but he took a drive across Saskatchewan and there's lots of grain bags out there. I don't think James is the first one to notice that and, or highlight that, but there's a crop out there, folks, so in 2025, in the winter of 25, 2026, logistics is a big part of the conversation because you may want to physically move something.
And you may not be able to, you know, you may be told that you're not able to.
Hey, Willa, how's it going? I just came to say you want.
[00:09:59] Speaker B: To come for a bike ride?
[00:10:01] Speaker A: I would love to come for a bike ride. Should I just hit pause on the show?
Okay, I'll hit pause on the show, folks. I'm going to go for a bike ride and I'll be right back. And we'll keep talking about our crop marketing plans. I'll be right back.
All right, folks, heck of a bike ride there. You gotta, you gotta try to get that stuff fit in here before the white stuff flies. So.
All right, so I think what I was talking about was this winter with your crop marketing, you may, you may not necessarily get a chance or have the opportunity to move the grain, move your, your commodity when, when you want to. Right. It could be a case where things get backed up with a bigger crop, so on and so forth. Maybe some slower demand on the canola export seed. Anyways, all I'm saying is you got to sit down and figure out that roadmap here for the winter months. All right, we've seen this kind of, we've seen this before.
We've had these types of crops in the past and yeah, you know how it goes. All right, folks, let's get into it here with James Mitchell from Crop Management Network. Then I'm going to come back to you with some positive moments, some crop marketing stuff. We got Tyler Yoremchuk and of course, Kyle Gibson as well with that guy. Three.
Alrighty, folks. Well, you guys have lots of questions when it comes to fertilizer, so why not go to the source that gets us the best information I've got. James Mitchell from the Crop Management Network joining us here once again.
James, welcome back to the show.
[00:11:37] Speaker C: Yeah. Hi, Ryan. Thanks for having me back.
[00:11:40] Speaker A: So there's a lot of, you know, harvest is, is on the tail end. There's still a few areas that have some acres to take off, but it is on the tail end. We're getting into that. You know, fall application time frame, it was 23 degrees Celsius at our place here yesterday. Warm and toasty, but a little bit of fall field work. And I'm just getting bombarded here with fertilizer questions. The urea market seems to have softened a bit. Farmers wondering, you know, what they should be looking at, what they should be doing here with that, you know, entering that planting stage for the 20, 26 crop. Are you guys kind of seeing Lots of action in the, on the retail side. Is it quite, quite busy picking up every day right now? What's that like?
[00:12:26] Speaker C: No, I would say it's definitely quiet right now. We've seen, we've seen a lot of disinterest from the growers and, you know, that's translated to, I think the retails having a level of disinterest in owning a pile of inventory. So I would say when I look back at other years, we're definitely behind in our buying habit compared to traditional.
[00:12:50] Speaker A: Okay, all right, well, let's talk globally here first. You know, when I messaged you the other day, you know, what threw me, caught me by surprise, was the latest out of China and urea exports. So why don't you tell us a little bit about what's going on with China right now?
[00:13:04] Speaker C: Yeah, China is. Well, I think they're a wrecking ball right now. They're, they're throwing a lot of curveballs at the industry, whether it's their absence of buying soybeans from the within the Americas or, or what they're doing in urea. You know, a year ago they were totally absent from the urea market. They were producing about 195,000 ton a day and exporting, you know, less than half a million tons for the year.
Now this year comes around, they're going to export 2 million tons. But now they've extended their export permits a couple of times and they could export up to 4 million tons this year. So that's thrown the industry for a loop.
So if you couple that with India's buying habit this year, they've recently announced their final urea tender for 2025. They're looking for approximately 2 million tons. And I think the world's just waiting to see whether China will abide by their October 15th export permit license or if they're going to extend it and participate in the final tender of the year.
[00:14:07] Speaker A: So from China, from the export side, you said upwards of potentially 4 million ton here of exports this year. What is it like normally in normal times, if we can even say that, is it 4, 5, 6 million tons normally or what? What's the benchmark here?
[00:14:22] Speaker C: I don't think you can use the word normal when you talk about China. You know, they've exported up to 10 million tons historically and a low of 500,000. So, you know, it's, it's kind of like spin the wheel and try to figure out what they're going to do. They're definitely focused on food security for their People and they want to have affordable fertilizer.
And they've been able to keep their fertilizer prices down with exporting this year.
So that's why they've continued to exceed their initial 2 million ton target.
[00:14:54] Speaker A: Okay, all right. And out of India from a buying habit. Has there been a change recently out of India or is this kind of standard business that they're doing right now?
[00:15:05] Speaker C: You know, a few years ago, India invested a lot into urea infrastructure and they were going to be self sufficient on urea is what they told the market.
While they've had seven tenders, I believe this year they've had a voracious appetite for urea right now, partly because phosphate is so expensive and they've been kind of encouraging growers just to apply nitrogen or more nitrogen than phosphate.
But they're definitely not self sufficient and they've bought a lot of urea this year. I think, you know, It'll be over 7 million tons by the end of this tender. Earlier on in the year, they had a heck of a time supplying.
They're securing any urea that was mostly due to the Israeli Iran conflict where we saw prices spike up and they'd be getting more urea as the year progresses. So they should, they should subscribe to 2 million tons this year, which, you know, the market, if you're a seller, you're looking for that outlet to soak up a little bit of global excess at the moment.
[00:16:06] Speaker A: So, okay, so globally, I didn't look at the chart, but just reading that globally, urea value is kind of softening here the last month or so. Is that an accurate statement?
[00:16:17] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, I think if you want to relate it to NOLA urea barges. We saw NOLA urea barges test 450. You know, I would say, you know, you could call a range of 375 to 390 for Nola Urea barges. Today we're getting a little bit of pressure on prompt urea barges as river close approaches. So that means that by October 6th they should have all their barges heading north of St. Louis.
And by the end of October, urea barges aren't permitted north of St. Louis, which obviously adds a bit of a premium to handling urea because then you're relying on rail and truck to distribute that product versus the barge system, which is by far the most cost effective logistical means of moving product, any product.
[00:17:01] Speaker A: Okay. All right, so let's turn our attention here to, you know, western Canada to the prairies.
You know, what are we seeing from a capacity Production standpoint, is everything firing on all cylinders right now when it comes to producing nitrogen in Western Canada?
[00:17:20] Speaker C: Oh, definitely not. We have Redwater, which is Nutrien's flagship facility, has been down for planned maintenance for, for several months now.
They're looking at restarting at the end of the year. Sorry, at the end of the year? At the end of October.
[00:17:35] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:17:36] Speaker C: We also have Coke brand and which has been down for planned maintenance for several months as well. And they're just coming back up now where. And Coke Brandon's a monster when it comes to liquid fertilizer production.
So with Brandon being down as long as they have been, that's going to put a lot of pressure on, on liquid product availability from now through spring.
Economically, we just can't bring UAN out of the U.S. it's not concentrated. It's 32%. We got to bring it up here, we got to cut it down to 28 so that it stores over the winter.
And then we just look at the freight costs of bringing it up. You just can't do it.
So we're kind of at the mercy of Western Canadian production on uan.
That product's just going to be just tight snug for now till the end of seeding, just due to that turnaround.
[00:18:26] Speaker A: At branded and I think globally uan, they talked about being fairly tight as well. So that's just not a Western Canadian issue.
[00:18:36] Speaker C: No, the U.S.
you know, they were empty at the end of seeding last year.
As little inventory as they ever had. And then, you know, we're still having effects of Europe being shut off of production due to high gas costs to the Russia Ukraine conflict.
[00:18:52] Speaker A: So.
[00:18:55] Speaker C: Europe's created a bit of a void there as well. So I just see uan, well, all liquids being snug from now till spring.
[00:19:05] Speaker A: Okay. All right. Now what about NH3? What about putting down some juice this fall?
It's a little like it's very dry in my neck of the, of the prairies here. I don't know, I haven't seen any action. I haven't driven that much, but I haven't seen any action out there the last couple of days. You thinking there's going to be a pretty heavy application fall here or is it a little too dry out there?
[00:19:31] Speaker C: You know, I, I think if you looked in central Alberta, you would say it's a little bit dry.
But it's such a small segment of the fall application market.
I had the privilege of driving out to Archewell, Saskatchewan last weekend. And as you go east, moisture Conditions get better and crops look big. I mean, I have never seen so many grain bags in fields as I did on that trip. So it looks like most of the prairies are probably teed up for a fairly normal fall application of ammonia. And I would say ammonia is going to be. Is going to be snug this fall, you know, due to nutrients outage at Redwater. They've got. They've got to get that plant up and firing and producing ammonia to fulfill some of their obligations this fall, so.
[00:20:17] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:20:18] Speaker A: All right.
Okay. So we've seen a little bit of a softening in urea values here.
You know, I was. I would call it at one point, it was about a 5% reduction from. From the high that I had seen. It's a little bit more of a reduction from that. I see it being cool. A little quieter on the planning side today, but is there kind of an opportunity here, like, if the retail side's quiet values have pulled back here, Is this not an opportunity to at least consider getting some business done, in your opinion?
[00:20:54] Speaker C: I do. I think in the next 30 days, it's a good opportunity to take a layer.
It's uncertain times globally. Right.
Low grain prices, high fertilizer prices.
Guys are mining their pennies and they should be, I would say.
When I look at last year, we got into a logistical pinch because of grower deferral, retail deferral.
We saw urea prices spike to $1,100 by spring.
If this deferral continues from the retailers and the growers, things will flip. As far as now we're into a logistical market and we're going to see a price run up again by spring because there's just a massive amount of product that has to move within a finite period of time.
So I look at it this way.
If you miss the absolute bottom of the urea market by $30 a ton, that's going to cost you $3 an acre.
If you miss the urea market by $200 a ton, it's going to cost you $25 an acre.
[00:22:06] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah.
[00:22:08] Speaker C: So I. If I'm a farmer, I'm stepping in now and I'm taking a layer. I'm taking a 30 to 50% layer on my urea and possibly, depending on cash flow, looking at snugging that up before my year end, if that's what I need to do, or waiting maybe into the new year. But after that, I just see this market being extremely tight because of lower production in Western Canada than we had a year ago. And Western Canada was a net importer of urea a year ago, where we used to be an exporter of a million tons a year. That's just kind of the shift on run rates, grower demand, preference of product. As we get guys switching out of ammonia into urea, we see more demand there.
I think at the end of the day, by spring, we see higher urea prices than we do today and likely significantly higher.
[00:23:00] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, I get it right. At some point, not buying retail, not buying farmers, not buying. It does flip when you say, well, I'm going to farm next year, I'm going to put in all these different acres and I need this product. It just.
You have to get it. So there's only so much time.
[00:23:19] Speaker C: We're being punished in Canada a couple of ways. We have. We have still a 35% tariff on Russian fertilizer coming into Canada, and Russia is one of the only countries not tariffed by the US Right now, whether it's a reciprocal duty or a countervailing duty or so forth. So 60% of the urea available on the river in the US is Russian origin, which disqualifies it from coming to Western Canada.
So when you see a price on nola, you're not sure of the origin. And right now it seems like some of our traders that are quoting us on import tons are charging a premium for non Russian tons.
[00:23:58] Speaker A: All right. Yep. I was going to ask this, James, and I don't know if this is appropriate or not, but I wanted to bring up the carbon tax, and this is just kind of coming off the dome here, off the cuff, but I was chatting with a gentleman and they just like fertilizer. When we get our bill for fertilizer, there's no carbon tax on that. Right. From a.
But is there something in the. In the. Like the carbon tax being applied somewhere else like, that is trickling down to the farmer, like, obviously in freight and stuff like that, but is there somewhere else that it's coming through?
[00:24:42] Speaker C: I don't think so. I mean, Western Canadian producers typically only can charge whatever the import number is they're competing against.
So. Okay, you know, the Western Canadian producer is.
They're eating the carbon tax because they can't pass it along because they're, you know, a dealer's not going to pay more for a carbon tax product than they can import it for.
So the Western Canadian producer has to be competitive against imports whether that country has a carbon tax or not.
[00:25:16] Speaker A: So. Okay, all right. Okay, appreciate that. All right, let's talk about Some other products. Now let's talk about Foss.
That's been an ugly one from the buy side for the farmers for the number of years now. But what are you seeing on the phos side?
Any reprieve coming? Any change in those price dynamics?
[00:25:39] Speaker C: It sure doesn't feel like it. I mean, phosphate is, is a product that's just tight globally.
You go back to China. China used to be the world's largest fossil exporter. They've cut 5 to 6 million tonnes of FOSS exports out of their book. They're really focused on conserving their phosphate rock reserves for the future. And then there's additional demand in China for phosphates in battery production.
So that's a real reason why the world is so snug on phosphates. You couple that with India falling behind on their purchasing of phosphates for a number of years and really having to play catch up now trying to rebuild those stocks because farmers can't just keep applying nitrogen based products to grow crops. They're mining their soils obviously and they're going to run into a deficiency there. So we've seen an urgency from India to be purchasing, you know, that's, you know, two strikes there. Third strike seems to be that North American phosphate production, which is amazingly based in Florida and the Carolinas with Simplot having a bit of production in Idaho. North American phosphate run rates are below 60% for the first quarter of the fertilizer year and that's really snug things up.
Then you also have countervailing duties and reciprocal tariffs on phosphates coming into the us.
It's really just a recipe for high prices, unfortunately.
[00:27:03] Speaker A: Yeah. All right, well, if you see some positivity in that one, let us know. All right, let us know because I think I was doing crop rankings for 2026 and yeah, of course this year didn't look good either. And many got the yield to change their financial picture for 2025. Maybe we'll see that in 2026 as well, but it's certainly tough out there. All right. Yeah. What about, what about sulfur? Any, any changes in that market lately?
[00:27:32] Speaker C: Yeah, we've seen raw sulfur prices unfortunately increase globally as well. So, you know, double whammy here.
Ammonium sulfate prices are likely firming to going higher. And also sulfur is an input product for phosphate production.
So as far as phosphate production goes, raw sulfur to build sulfuric acid and ammonia are two key components to building phosphate. Both of those have seen increases over the last month. You know, phosphate producers have realized, you know, 30 to $40 increase in production costs because of those two inputs that will translate to ammonium sulfate staying where it's at, if not heading higher.
So.
[00:28:15] Speaker A: Okay.
Okay. All right. And my last one here, just Potash. That old reliable, right? Potash is fine.
[00:28:23] Speaker C: Yeah, potash is fine. I mean, I guess you could view it as probably the best priced nutrient available to farmers right now, Western Canada. It's not a major nutrient for us like it is in the US but they definitely see phosphate application rates getting cut in the US to the 10 to 15% rate. That'll probably translate to potash as well. You know, we're not going to see any collapse in any of the products, but potash is very well priced today.
Likely seeing not a lot of price change in, in the near future on potash.
[00:28:56] Speaker A: All right, so my last one for you today, James, is just, you know, over at Crop Management Network. Have you guys done any, any research or, or spent any time just looking at, you know, correlation between the grain pricing environment and the fertilizer pricing environment? Like when you get to a level of low prices like we're experiencing here on the grain side, do you guys have any research or anything you've looked at that says, hey, in 12, 18, 24, 36 months, that has an impact and lowers fertilizer prices? Is there anything out there like that?
[00:29:31] Speaker C: I could say in the past, you could correlate the price of nitrogen to a bushel of corn and you could correlate a ton of phosphate fertilizer to a bushel of corn. Those have really seemed to decoupled right now based upon demand, and eventually low grain prices will curb demand in some areas.
But, you know, if I could kind of take a bit of a left hand turn, you know, growers are going to get in the US Are going to get a substantial subsidy here. And now it's likely this week to the tune of 10 to 14 billion dollars. Right. Mostly directed at soybean farmers. That likely will go towards, you know, whether it's machinery, input, something. Right. The growers are going to put that money to work.
[00:30:19] Speaker A: Mm.
[00:30:20] Speaker C: And that's probably going to artificially keep fertilizer prices high.
I heard a number of the total farm bill to U.S. growers this year, close to $40 billion from the U.S. government.
[00:30:32] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:30:32] Speaker C: Crazy number.
[00:30:34] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:30:35] Speaker C: You know, so as long as you have those type of things happening place other places in the world, like India heavily subsidizes their growers on fertilizer prices as well. Right. China, they control fertilizer prices for their farmers. As well. So, yeah, when you have governments interfering in free markets like that, high fertilizer prices are unfortunately affected by those subsidies flowing into the. Into the growers.
[00:31:02] Speaker A: Yeah, that was one thing that was on my. Has been on my radar the last few weeks as well, is just another cash injection. And. And what that does. And what that does, you know, that ripple effect. And I. And don't get me wrong, James, like, I. This isn't like a blanket statement for everybody across the prairies, but if I think about even our own farm, like I said it on the show all year long, like, we had a goal of 6 million bucks. Like that. That was, you know, 600 bucks an acre. That was our goal.
And we were nowhere, nowhere near that the way things were looking in. In July. Right. And it was getting better, but we were nowhere near that. All of a sudden, you know, two weeks ago, I started doing the math on, you know, where we need to finish our canola marketing, and we're here. And not only that, but we are. We have a path to higher than 600 bucks an acre on our farm. And I think a lot of farms across the prairies, you know, can kind of relate to that. Not everyone, but a lot.
And so for us, the planning stage for. For 2026, like, it's not like we weren't planning, but feels a lot better now than it did a month ago or six weeks ago. And so I think farms across the prairies need to, you know, kind of think about that as well to say, hey, you know, I. Maybe I did pull off a pretty nice 2025 here from a yield perspective.
You know, let's. Let's rock and roll and tackle this beast for 2026 and. And get after it. So the US is getting, you know, this is a different thing. Subsidy from the government's way different than a good year. But I'm just trying to say that cash availability is better now than what we thought it was going to be a few weeks ago.
[00:32:42] Speaker C: So it is. And, you know, one of the things that we hear anecdotally is that, you know, oh, we're going to cut back on fertilizer this year because grain prices are low.
[00:32:52] Speaker A: And.
[00:32:54] Speaker C: You'Re not going to save yourself out of this environment. The way you're going to save yourself is grow the biggest crop you can. And, yeah, you hear that from the US Growers in the I States right now. If not a record crop, a near record crop. So some of those guys are going to be banging out 250, 280 bushel corn. They're not going to be cutting back because they know they need to grow as many bushels as possible. And I see the crop that we removed here in western Canada too, and it's hard to believe that there's going to be a lot of nutrient reserves in the soil. You might cut your phosphate back five or ten pounds for a year.
You know, we've been not replacing phosphate removal for ever in Western Canada. You grow a 50 to 70 bushel canola crop and you're putting 35 to 40 pounds of pee down with your crop, if that.
There's not many guys doing more than that, but you're at a 20 pound deficit there already. So I don't think cutting fertilizer back is the answer in this scenario. And I'll probably get a bit of hate mail about this because we're, we're sellers of fertilizer. But I'm a firm believer that, you know, you need to grow as many bushels as you can in all times, but especially when prices are low.
[00:34:05] Speaker A: Well, and I'll pair that up with you as well, James, because from where I've sat in this space over the last 15 years or so I call it like, like full sin, like let's, let's get after it. Go for the biggest every single year because you need to get, you need to get those bushels and you get all the bushels you can get in this environment.
And I was telling my consultant clients last year, like, let's go for it. Like let's figure out how to go for it and see how this works out. And you know, it.
Yeah, it's certainly helping, it's going to help them this winter and plan for next year. So definitely sensitive topic. But you're a no nonsense guy. You've, ever since you've come on the show, you've told us straight as it is out there and the listeners certainly do appreciate that. And I know it's tough, it's tough to look at next year and try to create your path to profitability. But that's what we're all doing right now, trying to figure out that crop mix, trying to figure out how to tackle that marketing, how to save some money here and there. Where can we get more efficient? But that's good business and we should be doing that each and every year anyway. So. Yeah. All right, James, anything else you want to add before I let you go here? Certainly appreciate your time this week.
[00:35:20] Speaker C: I wouldn't mind your input in telling me where you view canola as one of the. Where does it rank in profitability for next year's crop? Because from our side of the desk, it looks like Canola definitely is near the top earners. For the growers.
Wheat does not look good for us. So, you know, when we work that back to nutrients, we see greater demand for sulfur products next year than we did in the past.
[00:35:49] Speaker A: Yeah, I, you know, I think overall from, you know, from a line across the prairies north here, I haven't done crop rankings that include all the specialty crops or canary seed or, you know, some of the smaller acre crops. I haven't gone there yet, but Canola ranks the highest for many farms and flax is in there as well. Like flax would be, would be a top one. But again, friends don't let friends grow flax. Right? So, yeah. So, you know, I think from a crop mix perspective, you're going to see that Canola acre climb. It's going to bump up as high as it can for many farms and then they'll try to reduce their, their wheat acres as best they can.
You know, with that being said, though, James, like, I was able to lock in a scenario for $8 spring wheat for next fall not far from Camrose, Alberta. And so, you know, not that eight bucks gets anyone excited, but, man, if you told anyone across the prairies today, hey, you can lock in $8 wheat in the stuff that's in the bin would, you know, everyone would put their hand up and would take that. So there are scenarios out there that aren't terrible. I'll say. But yes, canola $650 is where November is. Trading for 26 or $14, canola 13 and a half to 14.
I'm sure we'll get a little rally yet at some point. That's the crop that's going to pay a lot of bills again for 20, 26. So, yeah. All right, man. Well, I appreciate you coming on the show and yeah, if something changes, we'll get you on as fast as we can. All right, great.
[00:37:35] Speaker C: Appreciate the opportunity.
[00:37:37] Speaker A: All right, take care.
Well, folks, always good to hear from James. I know that, you know, it's certainly not easy when it comes to making some input purchase decisions for next year. But, you know, I think there has been some global weakness, some lower prices here across western Canada.
And you know, my opinion, you kind of do have to take a peek and layer in a sale at this time.
All right, before we get to Tyler your rim truck, let's get into positive moments for the week. Now, the farm wrapped up harvest 20, 25 is in the, is in the bin.
Also had a good jump here on fall work as well. Jeff's been out there just cruising and keeping up with harrowing and everything right behind. So, you know, we're sitting in, in good shape here. We're hitting planning mode here, kind of trying to dial things in for the 26 crop year. And so, you know, wrapped up, everyone got, got home safely.
Crops ended up being, you know, better than expected, especially earlier this summer. So that was, that was a big win. Quality held out as well for us. Some decent quality made malt low bleach on the greens, one and two on the wheat. Just feeling very, very fortunate here heading into Thanksgiving. Second positive moment for the week. Willa, my daughter, five year old, she, she, she's started swimming lessons and she's taken swimming lessons before, but she started her next round of swimming lessons and between her last lesson and now, you know, there's been a little bit of the water hasn't been her best friend. All right. And so she went for her first swimming lesson this week and you know, she had some, some nerves around it, a little bit of anxiety. She, you know, she didn't really want to go to swimming lessons. So we talked about, you know, her ability to do hard things that, yeah, you know, she might go be out of her comfort zone a little bit or she might be unfamiliar with, with the lessons and getting going and she was, you know, going to put herself out there and that would, it was okay to do hard things and that she can do hard things. And of course she went to her first lesson. She absolutely crushed it.
She asked us before she got to the vehicle if she could go to her next lesson already and we had to let her know that it was a week away so she gets to do it next week again. But just nice to see your kid, you know, succeed, find some confidence in that. So it was a great, great moment for her for, for this week.
Last thing, I got two, just last ones. You know, I did do my first round of golf here this year with the boys. Went out on Tuesday. Beautiful afternoon, 23 degrees Celsius and course was in unreal shape. My golf game terrible. But I did get a couple of good pokes out there. Got a couple of nice drives, didn't make many good putts. But anyways, it was a good time. And then lastly, I'll just go back to my, my blue and orange here. With my Oilers resigning McDavid for two years, it was a huge sigh of relief. For me. So didn't think I was stressed about it, but apparently I was, so that was great. All right, I think this is a nice segue here to get into our discussion now with Tyler Yaremchuk from the Nation Network.
All right, folks, I've got Tyler Yaremchuk making his what the Futures podcast debut. Tyler, man, how's your morning going?
[00:41:20] Speaker B: It is going good. I'm not a farmer, so 8, 9am that's early for me. You know, you got me out of bed for this.
[00:41:27] Speaker A: Well, you know, these commodity markets trade all night, Tyler. So we get going nice and early. We got to read our news by 6am so we're, we're early birds here, early risers.
[00:41:35] Speaker B: Yeah, I get it, I get it.
[00:41:37] Speaker A: So Tyler, give the folks a little bit of your background. Like what, what are you, what do you do? Like, what's your, what's your day to day? What's, where do you work?
What's your passion here?
[00:41:48] Speaker B: Yeah, so for me, I mean I started in, I started in sports radio when I was, I was only 19 when I started at TSN. I worked at TSN for four or five years and then I made the jump to Oilers Nation and the Nation Network and that's kind of where I've been for the last four or five years.
Right now I host a couple of shows on a day to day or week to week basis, I should say every day. 10:00am Mountain, I'm live on Daily Face off with former NHL goaltender Carter Hutton and we do like a 30 minute news kind of show that just kind of updates people on everything going around, around the entire league. And then at noon, Mountain, I'm live for 90 minutes a day on the Oilers Nation YouTube. And all of this is available as podcast too on The Oilers Nation YouTube with Oilers Nation every day. Myself, Liam Horribin. It's just us kind of shooting the. And doing an oiler show for 90 minutes. So I do that. A couple of other pods for Oilers Nation, Oilers Nation, Radio Nation, real life, stuff like that.
And yeah, that's kind of, that's kind of my day to day is I'm usually doing anywhere from three to four shows, articles, all that stuff, just churning out hockey content.
[00:42:51] Speaker A: Nice, man. Well, I don't know how you keep it all organized. I have to do one show a week and that, that seems to be enough over here. So.
Awesome, man. Well, I appreciate you jumping on. I was golfing with Farmer John yesterday, or you know him as Farmer John, my first round of the year and I never golfed in October. Right. So we hit up Coal Creek yesterday and I said Tyler was going to be making his, what, the Futures debut? And he said, can you ask him what he thought about the Trump Carney meeting in that the White House this week and how that's going to impact farmers? So as a joke.
[00:43:23] Speaker B: As a joke, yeah. I was going to say, I know who those two people are. And that is about the end of that. Like you said, how do I keep it organized? My life is just sports, so anything outside of that purview, I always laugh. I'm a very one dimensional human being.
[00:43:37] Speaker A: Awesome. All right, buddy. Well, that's why we got you on. Let's talk some hockey now. So the oiler season starts today. All right, so let's get into it. I want to know, where were you when you got the McDavid extension announcement and how did you feel? Like what? Walk us through those.
Those emotions.
[00:43:55] Speaker B: Yeah, so I was sitting exactly where I'm sitting right now when I was talking to you because the news broke at around 10:15.
That's right around when we started to get the first trickles of information that like, hey, this thing is going to get done today. So I was live on the air with, with DFO Live. So, I mean, you know, I can watch the show. I'm kind of just. I keep looking at my phone, I got a big smirk on my face. Like, I was so relieved to see it finally get done. And then obviously DFO live ends at 10:30 and it's like, oh, shit, I got to get to our office downtown because we're going to start Oilers Nation every day early. Like, as soon as I get there, we're hitting record. Go live. And we're rolling. So I was speeding my way to the office and my phone kept kind of lighting up. And, you know, you look and you see, okay, it's a two year deal. That's not all that surprising. And then, you know, I drive a little bit more and Twitter lights up again and I Look, whoa, under $14 million. Like, that's crazy. I thought at the lowest this thing would be $14 million and driving a little more. Look, under $13 billion.
[00:44:53] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:44:54] Speaker B: Kind of like, am I dreaming this? Like, what is going on right now? So that was kind of how the morning unfolded for me. Just honestly stunned that he took the discount that he did, like two years was rumored the whole time. But if you would have, you know, put a gun to my head and said, take a guess on what the AAV is, I honestly probably would have said 16.
[00:45:12] Speaker A: Yeah. I couldn't believe it as well. I was at home and I was one of those people.
I've been very. A very emotional fan the last couple years, and I've said some things that I. I need to walk back. So, like, my buddies would be laughing if they heard that comment.
So I was trying to play it cool, and I'm. I'm like, the extension, it'll happen. I'm not worried about it. But when it did happen, I had to just sit down for a moment. I had to just sit down, breathe a little bit. I was so. There's like a pressure release valve. Like, it was unbelievable. I went for a little walk just to calm down because I was so excited. So awesome, man.
[00:45:46] Speaker B: No, like, for me, I was talking to some of the guys about this. Like, I'll be honest, we didn't really hype up the home opener, the season opener, as much as we usually do at Oilers Nation, because I think the McDavid thing was putting a damper on. On the whole fan base. And, like, for me, I was maybe like 4, 5 out of 10 excited for the season. It was like, all right, it's the start of the year. We all kind of know the playoffs are what matter around here. But now that, like, Conor signed and then Walman, you get Ekholm today, and it's like, all right, I'm. I'm up to like, a nine out of ten. Like, let's go.
[00:46:15] Speaker A: Let's Flames. Oh, yeah. I'm pumped for tonight. I am pumped. So. So the Ekhom extension comes out earlier this morning. What do you think about that? I think I saw, like, three by four, something. Three by four.
[00:46:26] Speaker B: I think it's a really smart piece of business, I'll admit. Initially, like, over the last, you know, month, two months here, I've kind of been more in the camp of. All right, he didn't look that good coming back from injury. What we've heard about his injury, or honestly, that might even need to be pluralized, it might have been injuries for Matthias Ekholm. They were pretty serious. And he's 35 years old, and there's a lot of miles on that body. And, you know, do you really want to commit to him before you see him on the ice this year and see that he can truly get back to, you know, not quite the Matthias Eicholm of old, but something close to it, because in the cup Final, he was. We were talking about taking him out of the lineup. Like, he was very serviceable defenseman. So I was initially hesitant to do this, but when you look at that price tag of three years, $4 million. I mean, go look at what the LA Kings were paying defenseman this year. He's not getting as much as the Brian Dumoulins of the world, who's far from a household name. So you do this with Ekholm and you know what, if you would have bounced back this regular season, he's probably a guy that commands a three by five, a three by six. Like again, look at the way the cap's going up. So to lock him in now at 4 million, even if he's not the Matthias Ekholm of old and he's a good third pairing veteran defenseman who kills penalties, that's the going rate for those guys. So it's a nice bet by the Oilers because if he bounces back, it's a bargain. If he doesn't, you still paid market value.
[00:47:48] Speaker A: I have a soft spot for Ekom. I have a Ekom jersey, obviously. But the reason I bought that jersey is we took a little family vacation to Maui after the playoff run two years ago and bumped into Ekholm and his family at the resort we were staying at. So it was trying to get my, my 3 year old at the time to make friends with his kids because she wanted to make friends with everybody at the resort. But the Ekhom, she got shy and turned away. I'm like out of everybody here, this is who we want to be best friends with.
[00:48:17] Speaker B: So I mean his story too. Like he's so easy to like. And when they acquired him, like, you know, a player coming from Nashville to Edmonton maybe wouldn't be all that excited about it, like their family, lifestyle wise. But I remember reading the stories that like his wife was crying tears of joy saying like our kids are going to get to grow up in a real climate. They're going to get winter now. They truly love Edmonton. They came here that first year at the deadline and they didn't leave all summer. Like he had his, I think, third kid in Edmonton. Like they've embraced being Edmontonians, which I think is awesome.
[00:48:50] Speaker A: Yeah. And you know, again, limited experience meeting them, but they were just great, great to chat with as well in that, in that moment. So cool. All right, now we do have listeners in Saskia. We have listeners of Manitoba. Kyle Connor. A great little clip by the Winnipeg jets this morning at the KFC Drive Thru. Did you, did you catch that one? Anything come down on what's going on with Kyle Connor?
[00:49:13] Speaker B: Yeah, so an eight year deal, a $12 million AAV. So I'm not great at math, but that's $96 million. And how about this? When the Winnipeg jets were sold back to Winnipeg from Atlanta, the purchase price was $110 million in 2011.
So Kyle Connors contract value is almost as high as what the jets sold for a number of years ago or were sold back to Winnipeg for.
I, I like this from a couple of perspectives. You know, there was this narrative about Edmonton for a long time before they became a Cup contender and there's still the narrative that, ah, no one wants to play in Winnipeg. And then you go and look and it's like, well, Connor Hellebuck signed for the rest of his career in Winnipeg and Mark Scheifele signed for the rest of his career in Winnipeg and Neil Peonk signed for probably the rest of his career in Winnipeg and now so does Kyle Connor and like two of those guys, three of those guys I think are American born players. So I love it because it can kind of, again, this should have been squashed after Scheifele and Hellebuck, but it can squash the narrative that people don't want to play in Winnipeg. I think maybe guys don't want to go to Winnipeg, but when they go there, they love it and they stay. I'm like, now we can look at three legitimate star or superstar level players who have said, I will commit to being here for the rest of my prime, for the rest of my career. So I think that's really cool. I mean, for the fan base in Winnipeg to not have that story lingering over them the entire season. And you know, if you're in the playoff bubble come deadline time, you don't have to have the conversations of like, oh, do you trade Kyle Connor while you can get something for him? Like that narrative is just squashed and they can focus on winning because I do think they've gone a little under the radar this year from the perspective of they were a 110 point team or close to it last season and everyone kind of has them falling back to third in the Central, maybe a wild card spot. And now with this kind of cleared up, I think the path is there for them to be once again a really good team.
[00:51:00] Speaker A: Yeah, and I know for the league it might be better for superstars to move around, but I'm old school. I love seeing those guys stick around, you know, play their careers out.
You know, you see Crosby, what he did in Pittsburgh, I like seeing these guys stick around. I know the league probably needs them to move around But I like seeing it, so. All right, man, this is why you're the professional. This is a great segue. I have my one last one for you.
Either do you want to rank the Canadian teams or do you want to say which Canadian teams do you think will make the playoffs this year? Either, or you decide which way you want to go.
[00:51:34] Speaker B: Maybe I'll do like a hybrid of both here. I'm just. I'm just pulling up the standings to make sure I don't miss anything. So the Leafs will still get in. I have no concerns about that. Like losing a 100 point guy in Marner. Maybe they don't win the Atlantic, but I think they're in. And they're probably not even a wild card team. They're probably in one of those top three spots. I like Montreal. I know a lot of people are kind of picking them to regress. You know, last year wasn't quite an anomaly, but the goal differential doesn't really line up with where they finished. They had a high shooting percentage. That's usually a sign that things could fall back down. I. I still like Montreal. I think Demidov is really, really good. I think Dobson is going to be a good addition to that blue line. So I got the Habs getting into Ottawa. I'll put them third out of the eastern teams and say that they'll be right on the bubble again, similar to Montreal. I. I wonder if maybe last year just a lot of things didn't go right for them and like if a New York or someone else is going to get in, like someone's got to fall out. And I wouldn't be surprised if it's Ottawa. So I have them ranked third in the east out of the Canadian teams. A bubble team. We'll call them out west.
Edmonton's number one. That. That's an easy one for me. I think they'll finish higher than Winnipeg in the. In the standings this year just because again, I think Winnipeg will maybe take a step back. And I also think Winnipeg will lean less on Conor Hellebuk this year and really try to watch his minutes throughout the season. So I'll go. Edmonton 1, Winnipeg 2. They're both in the playoffs and I think that might be it. I think both Calgary and Vancouver will be on the outside looking in. I got Calgary ahead of Vancouver. I hate that Canuck center depth chart. Like, it's bad, bad, bad goaltending again. People keep pointing to Demko and being like, oh, well, Thatcher. Demko is healthy and ready to go. People forget Kevin Lankanen was amazing for the first half of last season. Like goaltending is absolutely what not absolutely not what caused them to crater last year. It was distractions off the ice and goal scoring and they traded away J.T. miller. So part of you I guess could say, well they got the distraction out. Quinn Hughes, contract situation in his future, that's going to be a distraction. Elias Pedersen, if he's not performing well, that's still a distraction. I just think they're a bit of a mess so I'll go Vancouver as a clear four and I think yeah, once again it's just Edmonton and Winnipeg getting in in the, in the west.
[00:53:44] Speaker A: Yeah, I think Montreal is one of those maybe good vibes teams. You know, they got some good vibes around them and my dad's a big Habs fan so he'll appreciate you hyping them up a bit. And then yeah, I had Calgary Vancouver out as well. I know Calgary is going to be feisty with good goaltending, but yeah. All right, just to wrap up real quick, what's your. This is a wild card. What's your favorite piece of memorabilia that you have? Like is it a jersey, a hat? Is there anything that stands out? I know you have quite the closet of stuff, but anything stand out as a special piece?
[00:54:15] Speaker B: There's a couple of things that I really, really like. I do have. If anyone's like a hockey card junkie, I have a Connor McDavid Young Gu card and I got it graded and it's like a nine point, it's a 9.5. It stays at my parents house. My dad likes to keep it in his office and I'm too scared to fight him for it. But that one is probably like the top piece of my collection. Growing up I was a big Rick Nash fan. So I still have a, I have a signed Rick Nash jersey on my wall kind of like right behind my camera that I'm always looking at. So that one too is a good one. My dad got it for me when I was real young as a Christmas present and then he forgiven, forgot he got it for me. I think I was like 13, he forgot he got it for me. And I'm cleaning out the basement one day with him and there's just like a black bag and I rip it open, I'm like holy. Like this is a signed. Like imagine being 13 years old and you're doing a tedious chore and you're like this is a signed Rick Nash jersey. And my dad was like, oh, that's Where I put that, like, that was for Christmas last year. And it's like, damn. So I like the story behind that one too. So those are the two that pop out.
[00:55:15] Speaker A: That's awesome. That's awesome. I. I have a dry saddle jersey. Signed jersey. And this was in the 2017 season, I think. Can't quite remember, but I went to an event with an auction and ended up winning this jersey. It wasn't signed at the time. And the team, like, I don't want to call him the priest, but the, you know, some spiritual guide with the team. We'll say that he's like, hey, I'm gonna get that signed by Draisaitl and I'll meet you in a couple weeks and give it back to you. And I'm like, ah, this probably not happening. Sure enough, met the. The spiritual person, leader person again A few weeks later, signed dry Seattle jersey and went. So that's pretty cool.
[00:55:55] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:55:56] Speaker A: All right, man. Thanks for coming on the show. Look forward to having you as a guest each and every month throughout the hockey season here. Enjoy the home opener tonight. And how can people get a hold of you? What's your Twitter. Twitter handle? What's the best spot?
[00:56:09] Speaker B: Yeah, Twitter is probably the best spot to hit me @tyleremchuk. Same thing on Instagram. My DMs are open on both, so if anyone ever has a question or whatever, I'm always more than open to having a conversation. So, yeah, Twitter, Instagram, easily the best two spots.
[00:56:21] Speaker A: Awesome. Thanks, bud. Take care.
[00:56:22] Speaker B: See ya.
[00:56:26] Speaker A: Well, folks, a little curveball for you here as we brought Tyler into the. Into the show and just, you know, mixing it up from a content perspective. We'll give it a try here, but I'm looking forward to those conversations and reviewing what's going on in the NHL and in the sporting world each. Each and every month. Okay, so the.
The voicemail. So if you go to what the futurespodcast ca and hit the voicemail button. I did get a voicemail this week from Colin.
So Colin is our first entry here into Colin Teukshrer. He's our first entry into the voicemail contest for this month. Of course, we have a John Deere LED light that I don't have in front of me right now, but I promise you, it's beautiful.
All you have to do is go to the website, click the send voicemail button, and just make a declaration that you're. That you're gonna sit down and update your crop marketing plan. All right? That's all you got to Do. So let me know. Send that to me in the voicemail. Say, brian, it's Farmer A here. I am going to. I have sat down, I have made my crop marketing plan for this rest of this winter. Just a declaration for. For yourself, all right? Anyone that does that, gets their name entered into the contest and you might even hear your voicemail played back on the what the Futures podcast. Okay? Eating your veggies for this week. So I believe, folks, I believe, you know, into to my core here, that we are in an environment, pricing environment from a crop marketing side here that you want to take advantage of, that's going to provide a bit of a bounce and that you're going to want to do something in this bounce, okay? So I think it's a bounce that you have that you have to take advantage of. That. That's what I want to say here.
So what I'd like you to do now, don't run and put in an $8 wheat target. That's not what I'm saying here. But what I'm saying is go out and get some of those targets in place. Targets that have some meaning behind them, targets that have a chance. You need to move some grain shortly. You need to pay some bills. Give them a chance. All right, if the market is 7:20 for spring wheat in your area, don't do the $8 target, all right, don't do that. That's a waste of paper right now.
Can do that one later. Do that one for next spring, but not for December, January, all right, but go and get some targets out there. Part of getting that plan organized and getting that plan together. You know, you may surprise yourself.
It's been weird out there. It's been weird from a basis perspective. There's been little opportunities where, hey, my location's looking for a train of canola. The basis is it's reasonable, I guess, you know, I have an opportunity. Are my elevators looking for a train of wheat or half a train of barley? You know, having those targets out there can be.
Can be effective. Okay, all right. I wanted to grab my prop here for this week, my crop marketing workbook. You're going to get an updated version of this if you join us in Moose Jaw. We actually had a meeting on that today.
So here's your marketing plan checklist for October.
All right, so we've got targets as number one in eating your veggies. The second one here, I'll tell you all of them, but the second one, review it next year seeding plan and update your crop power Rankings.
Okay, update those crop power rankings. I thought we talked about them today. I'm going to save them for the live show on Tuesday.
All right, crop power rankings coming at you shortly.
So that's number two. Review next year's seeding plans. And along with that, that crop power ranking, I do about 16 crops. I think you should do half a dozen. Give it a try.
Last thing for eating your veggies right here, guys. First one, book my ticket to the Crop Marketing Made Cool conference. All right, right up to the camera there. First one, book my ticket to the Crop Marketing Made Cool conference. That's where we're at, folks. Less than a couple dozen seats available. There you go. That's eating your veggies for this week. All right, let's get into it here with Kyle Gibson from a Guy three. And just a little fun we're going to have. Getting teed up for the harvest hustle contest and the trip to Halifax.
Alrighty, folks, I've got Kyle Gibson joining me from a Guy three this week. Kyle, are you making your show debut? Is this your first time?
[01:01:14] Speaker D: This is my first time, yeah. Thanks for having me.
[01:01:17] Speaker A: We've had. Lisa has been on the show, John's been on the show, Mark has been on the show. Now we got. Now we got the right guy here. We got the. The right guy for us.
[01:01:25] Speaker D: So I think Ray's been on the show, too.
[01:01:27] Speaker A: Ray? Yeah, Ray was probably the first one. You bet. Yeah. All right. Okay. How's the year at Egg i3? We're wrapping up harvest here. You know, just broad brush it. I know there's pain points out there, but, you know, what'd you guys kind of learn this year? Are you at that point yet that you can talk about it?
[01:01:43] Speaker D: Yeah, we're just finishing up harvest like you said. There's still a lot of pockets that are ongoing right now, especially in parts of Manitoba and eastern Saskatchewan. What we've seen for the most part, I'd say is that. Okay, so compared to last year, Rory went in thinking it was here's my expectation, and it came out below the expectation. What we've seen so far from our farms is that is everything's coming back above their expectations.
So overall, it hasn't been a terrible year. Obviously, prices don't. Don't agree with that, but production wise has been okay.
[01:02:15] Speaker A: Well, that's great. We obviously, the more bushels you can get, it helps on the price side, so. Exactly.
All right. All right, Kyle. So over at egg i3, you just maybe give the listeners just A quick little background or like a one liner, what you guys actually do over at Agai3 Sure.
[01:02:39] Speaker D: Overall, I'd say we're an enterprise risk management company.
Our focus right now is on insurance. Insurance, sorry, throughout Western Canada. So Alberta, Manitoba and Saskatchewan. Our primary product is crop insurance. It works very complementary with the government insurance. And then we do actually sell private or, sorry, property insurance now as well.
[01:03:02] Speaker A: Okay, so if, if I want to take my buildings and my equipment and find some insurance quotes on that, you guys, you're in that space now as well.
[01:03:12] Speaker D: Exactly. We work right across the prairies. And so the idea is that if you ever think about agriculture insurance, you should be thinking about AGI3 so that we can service different products like our forward protect the grain contract insurance. We have other crop insurance products. We're launching property and some new products that will be coming out in 2026 as well.
[01:03:32] Speaker A: All right, awesome. And we're going to talk about the harvest hustle. We're going to talk about Halifax in a second. But before we get to that, is there anything kind of like new and exciting or anything you want to tell the listeners here across the prairie? Something you guys are focused on for 2026?
[01:03:51] Speaker D: I'd say right now we're growing. That's the biggest thing. And so as we go into 2026, we're actually hiring. Right now we're looking for crop insurance brokers to join the team.
But as we go into 2026, we are excited to be launching a new product.
A bit of a tweak on Edgar Enhance.
[01:04:08] Speaker B: It's.
[01:04:08] Speaker D: And then as we extend into property and commercial, I think what people will start to see is that you have a holistic insurance opportunity by going right with a guy three okay.
[01:04:19] Speaker A: All right. So you said you're looking to grow the team as well. If someone hears that here, how do they, how do they get more information? Where, where can we point them to if they're looking at a career move here with, with a three yeah.
[01:04:33] Speaker D: Really? If you head to the website, a guy three AI. That's the perfect place to go. We have the email, that's information guy 3ai. And then we do have brokers all throughout the prairies. And so if you know somebody there, reach out and they can always contact me as well.
[01:04:49] Speaker A: Perfect. Great stuff. So folks, you may not know this, but I get to see statistics of where, you know, the show is listened to across the globe. 25 countries and counting. Thank goodness farmers take vacation because my, my, my. That list of countries grows every winter but anyways, we have a sweet spot in, in the Maritimes and in Halifax specifically. We, we really pop when it comes to, to podcast listens. And I got a message from Jeff a few weeks ago. Jeff. What's Jeff's role at a Guy three, by the way? I did. I forgot to look it up before.
[01:05:25] Speaker D: Yeah, so Jeff Labrash, he's with actually ARM consulting. So that's our technology partner. It's a Canadian based kind of insurance consulting company.
And so, yeah, I actually used to fly in the military with Jeff. And so he reached out, he heard it on your podcast, he's a pretty frequent listener of yours and thought about this new idea.
[01:05:44] Speaker A: Yeah. So, you know, it was great getting a message from him and saying, you know, we were thinking of this. And so, you know, basically, folks, the Harvest Hustle, it's obviously the. You submit your harvest photo, you get a chance to win two tickets to watch the Olympic, the Canadian Olympic curling trials. You've got your hotel covered, your flights are covered, you've got meals in the VIP lounge for the entire week. This is eight days of Canadiana Curling Olympic trials.
And we're missing one thing. We're missing some transportation.
So AG i3 has stepped up. Jeff has stepped up and said, hey, Ryan, I would love to get these folks from the airport to the hotel. I'd love to get them back from that hotel to the airport when they're ready to go. And they. Guy 3 put their hand up and said, what do you think? And so I thought that was a great idea.
Obviously now we've got even more bases covered when it comes to the Harvest Hustle contest, which does. You have to get your entries in by October 20, so don't forget that, folks.
But yeah, Kyle, I appreciate you guys stepping up for a little bit of transportation.
Jeff is, is a local to Halifax, right? He's the guy, he knows where to go in the hotspots, is that correct?
[01:07:00] Speaker C: Exactly.
[01:07:01] Speaker A: Yeah.
[01:07:01] Speaker D: He lives right in Halifax. He grew up there. And so it works perfect. I've been Halifax a few times, but it's growing, it's been changing a lot. So we thought having a local person on the ground, you could ask questions to figure out where to go, where the best restaurants are.
A little bit of transportation thrown in there too.
[01:07:19] Speaker A: Awesome. Well, I really appreciate you guys stepping up. Kyle, thanks for coming on the show this week and look forward to seeing what you guys, what you unveil here over the next weeks and months. I know you'll be active in the, in the circuit here this winter, you know, get in front of farmers and updating everyone on the latest. So I look forward to seeing that as well.
[01:07:39] Speaker D: Thanks, Ryan. No, appreciate it. You said we're, we're excited for 2026.
[01:07:44] Speaker A: Awesome. Take care, man.
[01:07:45] Speaker D: Yeah, you take care. Cheers.
[01:07:49] Speaker A: Well, folks, I always like to, I always like to give a, a hand and a thank you to, to those service departments and, and the parts departments over there with our John Deere dealerships. They, you know, they get put into some very interesting situations when, you know, when the pressure's up, you know, where are the parts located? Do I have them? How far away are they? How fast can I get them?
You know, troubleshooting. You know, I was talking to a farmer the other day. His is John Deere technicians were out bright lights. Those guys have all the good equipment, right. And they're out there in the dark well past midnight making sure he was ready to rock and roll for the next day. So just a shout out to, to all the folks out there in our John Deere service and parts departments that, that have gone through it as well with us this, this harvest. I was golfing again with the boys earlier this week and you know, a word I hadn't heard for a while was, was green light. You know, we were talking about. Oh, but all sorts of stuff you get, you know, you get talking on the golf course when you're, when you're out there having some fun and green lighting our, our equipment, green lighting our John Deere combines.
That, that was the topic of conversation. I just hadn't heard. Green light, you know, and we'll talk about green lighting for, for a minute. So it just caught my attention this week. And, and of course that's a good inspection after you've ran that equipment, ran that combine for the season to get that done. So reach out to your local John Deere dealership and talk to them about the green light options available for you and your farm. Alrighty, folks. Well, we're approaching the end here.
Kind of a neat idea though to have, have a little transportation from the airport to the hotel and back and we'll see what else they come up with.
Open to suggestions for the, with the winner on, on that one, folks. Over at a guy three. All right, so from a crop markets perspective, I would just kind of highlight a couple things, couple last things here. Obviously yellow or all the, the pulse markets are showing some strength. But you know, yellow peas not really climbing this week per se. But, but I would say that that 725 to $8 spread like that is, that is out there across the prairies, you might see a little bit better than that. Some of these prices now are getting posted out into late, later in the, in the calendar year. All right, so like we're October, like December. But to me, this is a little selling opportunity for yellow peas, green peas, all of $11 are better on those green peas. Now for low bleach maple peas showing some strength in the $12 range.
Red lentils, I saw some 23 cents per pound here now on those reds.
And I don't know if I've seen anything better than that lately. I saw a bunch of 23s though, so that I think that's a little bit better this week as well. So a bit of strength there. And again, some of that is you guys locking it in the bin for sure. You know, that demand coming in and you locking it in the bin. Other than that, I'd say it's been kind of quiet. Feed grains have been quiet. Malt has been quiet, kind of dull, you know. Canola, Canola futures. As of recording here, the January contract, we're kind of switching over to January, you know, trading at 6 29. It's, you know, it's not showing us a big move here by any means, but you know, we did trade as low as 610.
And yeah, like we're, we're up from that. Okay, so we'll see some quiet optimism there. The wheat market again, for now, finding a bottom. And hey, as of recording, up four and a half cents on the December contract at 560 for Minneapolis wheat.
Honestly, when I look at that chart, it's got a nice little pop up in it tonight.
And you know, we were 550. Now we're 560 again. I won't get super excited until we get to the $6 range. All right, well, can we get there? When can we get there?
Yeah, that's what we need.
You know, the last thing I'll add here is basis. We base this across the praise when the company needs it or wants it. The basis they're offering is actually not that bad.
It's actually pretty darn good historically.
And so you're, you have that drop in the Canadian dollar kind of helping out right now.
That exchange is helping. And so it's just something to consider to look at. If you can kind of marry that up with little pop in futures, you know, maybe decide to sell it at the price and reown a bit on paper, something like that. It's just something to look at. Okay.
All right.
Yeah, that's it for this episode, episode 96. So we are cruising towards 100. Please share the episode with your friends, your neighbors, your colleagues in Western Canadian agriculture. Certainly appreciate it. And go hit that subscribe button for me on YouTube.
Go hit that button for me wherever you subscribe to your podcast, Apple, Spotify, you'll get an alert when we put out a new episode.
And I appreciate your time. Appreciate you hanging out with me for the what? The Futures podcast. My name is Ryan, and I'm out of here.
