A modestly higher start is expected this am, roughly 5 in wheat and beans, 2 in corn. Crude oil is a little lower but so is the $, not offering much guidance to the grains.

This afternoon's Weekly Crop Progress Report is highly anticipated this am as it will show how much (or little) harvest progress was made over the last week in Midwestern corn and bean fields. It will also reveal the extent of winter wheat planting progress with traders attention here focused on the Midwestern soft red winter wheat states, which are expected to remain way behind normal with the optimum planting time already behind us in much of the belt. Agronomists with the Universities of Arkansas and Mississippi in the Delta report huge bean quality losses from excessively wet weather the last 6 weeks, which has prevented harvesting. Losses in the Delta currently are estimated anywhere from 20-90%! Bean harvesting this afternoon is expected to be roughly 40-50% for the US as a whole with corn guessed around 20-25%.

The southwest winter wheat belt, where hard red winter wheat is grown had highly scattered weekend rains. The southwest part of this region received up to 1/2". Up to 1.5" more is forecast the second half of the week, but the 6-10 day calls for below normal rain, which will be welcome. Farmers are behind schedule in planting the hard red winter crop so drier weather will give them a chance to catch up. The Delta will see more unwelcome rain tomorrow and again later in the week, expected to cause even more quality losses and harvest delays. The Midwest had up to 1" of scattered weekend rain. Light, scattered rain is predicted the next few days but the second half of the week up to 1.5" is forecast scattered over much of the area and the 6-10 day currently calls for above normal rain. All this moisture will further delay harvest efforts and support prices.