BARN TALK
The Unfiltered Voice of Rural America
Issue #021 · August 19, 2026
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Hey folks, somebody flew a drone into a grain terminal five thousand miles from here and the wheat in your bin got worth more. You did not vote on it and you did not plan for it, and it is the biggest thing to hit your marketing plan this month. We also got into coal, where a third of the veteran miners are sick at a rate not seen since 1978.
In this issue
| Grain ports went dark on both sides of the Black Sea and wheat had its best week of 2026 |
| Black lung hit 32.5 percent of veteran Appalachian miners and the rule that would slow it is frozen |
| Corn up 20 cents, cattle down $6.40, and Tork has an opinion about which to act on |
| A closed elementary school in northern Iowa is full of forklifts, on purpose |
| Tyson is pulling three beef plants out of the system and 2,700 people lose a job |
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This Week's Episode
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The Shooting War Moved To The Grain Terminals
Black Sea grain shipments in the first two weeks of August ran roughly 75 percent under a year ago.
Russia and Ukraine have shot at each other for years without it touching your bin. That changed. Both sides quit aiming at soldiers and started aiming at where grain leaves from. July brought 35 attacks on vessels in port and 67 strikes on port facilities. On August 12 two terminals at Novorossiysk stopped work, a third quit the next day. Those three move over half of Russia's wheat.
What that did to the board
Chicago wheat jumped 3.6 percent the session after Novorossiysk went down and closed Friday at $6.74 3/4, up 35 cents and the best weekly close of the year. Loading a boat out of a Russian Black Sea port runs about $47 a ton, double June. None of that is a crop failure. It is about getting it onto a boat.
The part that actually pays you
USDA took 1.5 million tonnes off Russia's wheat exports and a million each off Ukraine's wheat and corn, then added 75 million bushels to what it thinks we will ship. Somebody has to feed the buyers those two countries normally feed, and right now that is us.
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From the Barn
Nobody here is glad a warehouse full of somebody else's wheat burned down. A world market does not ask permission though, and being above the price does not pay the note. Take the money and be honest about where it came from. A war premium is rented. The day a ceasefire gets signed it leaves faster than it showed.
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A Third Of Veteran Miners Have Black Lung Again
Black lung was supposed to be your grandpa's disease. Federal researchers published a study this month saying 32.5 percent of veteran underground coal miners in central Appalachia have it right now, a rate not seen since 1978. The union went public Aug 13.
The reason is silica. The easy seams are gone, so reaching coal means cutting more rock, and rock dust does a different kind of damage. Regulators capped how much a miner can breathe. Industry sued, the courts put the rule on hold, and in April the mine safety agency said plainly it would not enforce.
By the numbers
| 32.5 percent of veteran underground miners in central Appalachia have it. |
| 20 times more toxic than coal dust by itself. That is silica. |
| April 2026 is when the agency said it would not enforce the rule. |
Do not file this under coal
Silica is not a mining problem. It comes off a concrete saw, a rock drill and a countertop shop, and every county has guys doing all three. The union says men in their mid thirties turn up with the worst form of it, which used to take a career. If you cut anything hard, the water and the respirator are not optional.
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From the Barn
We are as tired of regulation as anybody. This one is different. A dust limit is the difference between a man breathing at 55 and a man on oxygen at 40. Every year it sits in a courthouse, somebody working today signs up for a death nobody told him about. Somebody is doing math on what cleaner air costs, and the miner is the line item.
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This week's numbers
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Corn (Sep '26)
$4.59 /bu
▲ $0.20 on the week
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Soybeans (Sep '26)
$11.77 3/4 /bu
▲ $0.18 3/4 on the week
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Chicago Wheat (Sep '26)
$6.74 3/4 /bu
▲ $0.35 on the week
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Live Cattle (Oct '26)
$218.87 /cwt
▼ $6.40 on the week
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Lean Hogs (Oct '26)
$81.75 /cwt
▼ $0.47 on the week
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Crude Oil (Sep '26)
$82.40 /bbl
▲ $4.22 on the week
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Tork's Picks
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Bitcoin
$63,395 USD
▼ $1,545 on the week
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Archer-Daniels-Midland (ADM)
$80.45 /share
▲ $3.86 on the week
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This isn't financial advice. I'm just a farmer with an opinion.
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Tork's Take
The board split hard. Everything out of the ground went up, everything that walks on it went down. My problem with a rally like this is you did nothing to earn it, so you can do nothing to keep it. It came off headlines from a place you cannot find on a map. I am not saying dump the crop. I am saying 35 cents on the wheat and 20 on the corn is paper money until you sign something. Ask anybody long cattle a month ago how $6.40 felt walking off in five sessions.
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Every so often a guy sits down across from us and the conversation turns into a business lesson nobody planned. There is a fella in northern Iowa named Alex Mortensen who sells forklifts out of a closed elementary school. Showroom in the classroom wing, seed warehouse in the gym.
He grew up east of Kamrar on a place that ran hogs, cows, chickens, sheep and 700 acres. Out of high school he wanted to build hog buildings and his dad said college first. He came out of Iowa State in agronomy and spent five years as a seed rep. Then he needed a forklift for seed boxes. He bought one. A customer wanted one, so he bought a second, fixed it and sold it. Then that customer's neighbor called.
“Every good business I know of started when a guy solved his own problem twice.” |
The school came from a customer running his mouth. Alex was pricing a new building and choking on the number when this guy said, half joking, that the school down the road was closing and he should buy that instead. The superintendent called the next day. He told his wife he had made an offer but not to worry, no way they would get it. They got it at 28. He had played ball in that gym as a kid.
What it cost him is the part I keep chewing on. Early on he was working a split rim on a fifties Allis forklift without knowing what one can do. About 100 pounds of air let go, threw him out of the shed and broke his wrist. If it had caught his head he would be dead. He went back and doubled down. If you think there is nothing left to start in your town, there is a building on main street somebody quit believing in.
Got an idea you have not said out loud yet? Hit reply. I read every one.
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Four things that caught our eye
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Tyson is taking three beef plants out of the systemAnnounced August 13. Joslin, Illinois goes dark, better than 2,000 jobs and 3,000 head a day. Eagle Mountain takes 723 more, Pasco is for sale. The beef division faces a $500 million to $650 million loss with cattle the tightest in 75 years. When the herd rebuilds that capacity does not come back, and whoever is left sets the bid. |
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| 02 |
A seven-acre fire got an air force because of who lives next to itThe Washington Post reported August 14 that Michael Boren, undersecretary of agriculture over 200 million acres of public land, leaned on Forest Service staff to send more aircraft to a July 12 fire near his ranch. Nine aircraft worked a seven-acre burn, about $115,000 worth, some pulled off other fires. Every rancher ever told to wait his turn should read that twice. |
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| 03 |
The rural broadband money is buried in a permit pileA report covered August 14 found the roughly 6,900 projects funded under the $42 billion federal broadband build need over 86,000 permits first, each from a county, a railroad or an agency on its own clock. The money was never the hard part, as anybody who has pulled an approach permit knew. |
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| 04 |
The crop tour is walking two different countries this weekPro Farmer scouts hit the fields August 17, sampling 2,000 fields across seven states. South Dakota averaged 150 bushels on five stops that made 172 last year. The eastern leg stood in Ohio mud sampling crops that went in late and never dried. One national yield number comes out of that, and it fits no farm. |
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Barn Talk Poll
Where do you land?
How do you tune in to Barn Talk?
| A. Solo |
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B. In the truck alone |
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| C. In the shop with a crew |
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D. On the TV with the family |
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Did You Know?
Roughly 70 percent of the firefighters in this country are volunteers, and about 85 percent of departments are all or mostly volunteer. The truck that shows up at your place is driven by a guy who was at his own job an hour before.
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Word of the Week
| DOCKAGE |
The weeds, chaff, dirt and busted kernels the elevator screens out before it pays you, and the weight knocked off your ticket for it. The quietest money you lose all year, and it comes off the top whether the board is up or down. |
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Two stories came down to the same thing. A drone pilot decided what your wheat is worth and a courthouse is deciding how long a miner gets to breathe, and nobody in either place has met you. Get a load sold, wear the respirator, answer the whistle. That part is yours.
We'll see you in the barn.
Sawyer & Tork
Hosts, Barn Talk · joinbarntalk.com
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