No one dislikes arguing about a national crop yield more than myself -- but here we go again. As much as I don't want to, with the global corn supply issues developing (drought reducing Europe's corn crop while Ukraine exports are at risk) which will almost surely result in a significant increase in U.S. corn export demand, the topic is too important to avoid.

Trying to count 17 billion of anything is going to have errors, but when that being counted is spread across an entire country in everything from a commercial storage facility to a backyard bin, and everything in between -- you can't avoid a margin of error. USDA would be no exception, especially given the extraordinary circumstances employees were dealing with during the downsizing efforts in 2025.

Production totals are routinely revised in the following September WASDE report as necessary; but in the meantime, the feed and residual use category is the catch-all for any potential errors. And current USDA yield and production figures for 2025-26 corn certainly appear to contain significant errors.

The topic of yield was a very contentious one last summer and many were in disbelief at the final USDA estimate. It appears they had good reason. The feed and residual use total for 2025-26 (in green on the accompanying chart) is almost 1 billion bushels (bb) more than 2024-25 (912 million bushels (mb) to be exact). Yet the grain-consuming-animal-units (GCAU) are almost identical. For more than a decade, USDA has used GCAU to account for all the various forms of animals being fed and by how much, trying to standardize feed requirements as various animal totals fluctuate. For 2025-26, the GCAU figure is essentially flat at 100.14 compared to 100.09 the year before, suggesting no change should be expected in feed use. That leaves residual use to make up the difference, suggesting last year's production was overstated based on quarterly grain stocks reports.

So, why does that matter now, you might ask? If the ending stocks estimate is correct due to the offsetting amounts, is it important to consider? The answer to that is the impact the data may be having on unrealistic expectations going forward.

Warren Buffett once famously suggested, "Only when the tide goes out do you discover who's been swimming naked." An overstated yield for 2025-26 could set unrealistic expectations for the 2026-27 yield, resulting in the realization that corn is swimming naked in a sense with inadequate supplies to satisfy record demand.

The problem is that the 912 mb lower production as implied by the feed and residual use data suggests the corn yield for 2025-26 was overstated by 10 bushels per acre (bpa). It's worth considering that 176.5 bpa would be far more reasonable, especially considering the stresses impacting some of the top-producing areas, adding credibility to the theory.

That would have an impact on the trendline yield calculation. Especially if you are like me and question if we are in an era of diminishing returns on genetic and technological improvements. If you consider just the 10-year trendline yield, leaving out the dramatic improvements seen decades ago, it comes in at just under 177 bpa for 2026-27 (when 176.5 bpa is used for 2025-26). And such an outcome could be very problematic, especially considering the potential for increased exports.

Such a yield with all the other components of supply and demand in the balance sheet remaining unchanged, would drop 2026-27 corn ending stocks to just 1.26 bb -- an unrealistically low level. And all of the other components don't look like they will remain unchanged from the July WASDE update with both old- and new-crop corn exports now looking like they are currently too conservative. With Europe's drought-damaged corn crop, their imports are likely to hit record levels at a time when one of their two main suppliers, Ukraine, goes offline due to Russian attacks, leaving the U.S. to do much of the heavy lifting as South America focuses on increasing their own domestic use.

So, everyone can now resume the less-than-pleasant debate over the potential crop yield out there, not to mention the old crop still getting cleaned out of the bin.

I welcome feedback along with any suggestions for future blogs. My daily comments can be found in Plains, Prairies Opening Comments and Plains, Prairies Quick Takes on DTN products.

Mitch Miller can be reached at mitchmiller.dtn@gmail.com

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