Bismarck Tribune

By LAUREN DONOVBy LAUREN DONOVAN

BEACH - Vern Tosner can't remember having this much fun.

He's a salesman at West Plains Implement of Beach, and in that vast and beautiful wheat country there have been so many dry, lean years.

Fun then? Not so much.

But a recent March day that dripped wet snow one minute and sunshine the next was as full of possibility as the weather. It's a new day down on the farm.

"I've probably never seen so much momentum and optimism," Tosner said. "This is a different page in the book."

Last year and this year, new and used farm equipment disappeared off West Plains' Case-IH and New Holland sales lot like hotdogs at a county fair.

Growers who want to upgrade equipment have money in their pocket, thanks to average-to-bin-busting '07 yields coupled with prices that started high before harvest and are still climbing into '08.

They started buying last year and sales at West Plains increased significantly over the year before, said co-owner Bern Zachmann.

Growers snapped up the existing inventory of four-wheel drive tractors, combines and air seeders or placed orders for this year, from Beach to Elgin, where sales were up 50 percent from a year ago.

Because of strong demand, anyone who places a factory equipment order now won't see delivery until late fall or next spring.

Tosner said growers are anxious to add bigger equipment that can cover more ground - gargantuan 70-foot air seeders can cover 500 to 600 acres a day - and has computer-aided technology on board.

The computer assist doesn't eliminate the driver, but it does allow for precision steering. With input costs anticipated to reach a record-high of $200 an acre, meaning what it will take in fuel, seed and fertilizer to get a crop in the ground, row passes that don't overlap or leave gaps add up to serious dollars.

Tosner said the bigger, smarter equipment costs double what it did 10 years ago and in some cases, also is double in size.

The cost of a new combine might "touch" $400,000; a new 535 hp tractor goes for around $350,000; an air seeder goes for $300,000.

These are big dollars, but they're buying big performance machines for ever-bigger operations and they can replace a second machine and that hard-to-find hired man to operate it.

Zachmann said equipment sales could be even stronger this year than last, if it rains. As always, rain is the ultimate deal-maker.

Last year's timely rains sprouted a 300-million-bushel wheat harvest, according to the USDA agricultural statistics service.

That yield, multiplied by an average of $7.70 a bushel, generated $2.3 billion in wheat income alone, doubling the state's wheat income in '06.

Cash bids today at Southwest Grain near Richardton, a regional grain handler that loads out the 100-car grain trains, are more than $9 a bushel for August wheat delivery.

In Elgin - the other edge of western wheat country - Dakota Farm Equipment manager Russ Rebel said sales are "really good" after several tough years.

He leafs through the neatly stacked paperwork on his desk and figures he's got more than two dozen tractors on order for delivery from now through July. The phone rings and rings.

"In 30 years with John Deere, I've never seen this pace of sales," he said, using that finger-up gesture to indicate "wait a sec while I take this call."

He said he's had situations where he's selling the fourth trade-in generated from the first sale.

Equipment movement is constrained by timing. A guy who's waiting for a new tractor is unwilling to let go of his used piece, especially this time of year, Rebel said.

Zachmann said he tried to "inventory up" for this year. But even so, new equipment is limited.

Rebel said the same goes at John Deere.

"The stuff that's left keeps moving. Tractors are tight, and combines? We're done," he said.

The fact that new equipment is in tight supply only increases the value of used equipment and Zachmann said it tends to go fast.

"It might be here one week and gone the next," he said.

If it's good and clean and somewhere less than 10 years old, in particular, growers can expect good money for equipment they no longer want or need.

Ernie Jordan of Mott was to find that out Friday.

He was holding his 16th annual consignment auction for farm equipment and, "It's the biggest one I've ever put together," he said.

There's a host of reasons why, he said he figures, sitting in the office at Ernie's Repair, while the radio played quietly out in the cavernous shop.

Some growers are buying new equipment and selling their used equipment, while others are looking to sell so they can update to better used stuff. Some smaller-acreage growers who are going out of farming and cash-renting their land don't have enough equipment to justify their own sale.

North Dakota doesn't tax sales of used farm equipment, so there's no way to track the big picture of what those sales look like across the state.

The state does tax new equipment sales at 3 percent, a lesser rate than the normal 5 percent retail tax.

Kathy Strombeck, research analyst with the State Tax Department, said sales of new farm equipment grew 28 percent in '07 compared to '06.

In raw numbers, growers shelled out $257 million for new tractors, combines and the like last year. The year before, they spent $201 million. Overall, sales are up 32 percent since 2003, Strombeck said.

"That's very good growth," she said.

Zachmann, at West Plains, said deciding nearly a year before harvest how much equipment to order for inventory is a gamble, similar to the one a grower makes every year.

Based on demand for equipment and the going price of wheat, Zachmann's having a second thought he probably doesn't often have going into spring.

"I don't think I ordered strong enough," he said.

(Reach reporter Lauren Donovan at 888-303-5511 or lauren@;westriv.com.)