Hard red winter wheat cash basis bids in the US Plains were mostly steady to firm on Thursday, with country movement remaining slow, merchants said.
Spot truck bids inched up 2 cents in Hutchinson, Kansas, and 5 cents in Kansas City, as merchants tried to entice fresh supplies, but selling should remain quiet, they said.
"There's just not much old-crop wheat left around. Everybody's waiting for harvest," one Kansas merchant said.
Some farmers who have old-crop wheat left to sell may be waiting for poor yield outlooks in the new crop to continue lifting prices before moving wheat, merchants said.
Although recent rain in the Plains may still help buoy yields in some areas in the final weeks before harvest, wheat experts warned that this winter's drought may have already damaged the crop beyond repair.
Merchants reported heavy rain throughout much of Kansas and Oklahoma Thursday morning.
Scouts with this week's Wheat Quality Council crop tour said a survey of 420 fields over two days indicated a 21 percent decline in yield potential for a large swath of Kansas, largely due to the drought.
Overall analysis of fields throughout the central and western two-thirds of the top producing state indicated an average yield of 36.9 bushels per acre, down from an estimated yield for similar areas a year ago at this time of 46.5 bushels.
However, several scouts said that, while wheat had suffered this winter, the crop has fared better than expected in some of the areas worst hit by the drought.
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