London's feed wheat futures market settled mainly higher on currency moves on Tuesday, but volumes remained relatively slim as participants continued to hold out for the harvest, dealers said.
Front month Liffe September closed 40 pence up at 65 pounds a tonne on 25 lots, while most active November finished 15 pence higher at 66.35 pounds on 83 lots.
November 2005 wheat ended 75 pence lower at 72.50 a tonne on 12 lots, taken from a total turnover of 130 lots.
"The US dollar value is a slight improvement on yesterday and there was a little bit of spillover buying from Tuesday that had been lurking around at the close. That seemed enough to lend it some support," said a broker.
But volumes stayed light and a pick-up seemed doutful until the harvest arrived, he said.
"The amount of natural hedge selling in the market will be minimal unless a little bit more buying comes into the market from people who want cover because they can't buy physicals," the broker said.
"That's bound to push the market out of line again and that's exactly what you've seen again today," he added.
UK agronomists said earlier that rains had stalled an early start to this year's barley harvest but Britain's crop cycle had returned to near-normal levels.
"It's going to be a very slow start to the harvest and judging by how damp the weather's been, a pretty patchy one. We're a few days behind average and a good 10 days behind last year," Stuart Knight of The Arable Group said.
Knight also said that the winter wheat harvest in the prime grain-growing areas of east-central England was unlikely to make headway until well into August.
On currency markets, sterling shed more than a cent in value against the dollar on Tuesday.
The pound also fell against the euro, even though the euro had lost ground versus the dollar.
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