Market News & Headlines >> Winter Wheat Seedings Smallest in 109 Years

U.S. winter wheat seedings for 2019 harvest are down 3.8% from a year earlier and are the smallest since 1909, according to USDA's delayed Winter Wheat and Canola Seedings report released on Feb. 8. 

USDA pegged U.S. all winter wheat seedings at 31.290 million acres, down from the 32.535 million that were planted for 2018 harvest and 2.6% below the average of trade estimates in a Reuters News Service survey. Trade estimates averaged 31.128 million acres in a range from 31.500-33.300 million. 

Winter wheat seedings were limited by low prices and additionally by excessively wet fall weather in some southern Plains HRW wheat growing areas and also some Delta/Southeast SRW wheat states. 

Winter wheat seedings in the top producing state of Kansas were down 500,000 acres or 6.5% from a year earlier at 7.2 million acres. The largest percentage drop in acreage among significant wheat growing states was in the SRW wheat state of Arkansas where seedings were down 31% at 120,000 acres.