American producers planted more acres than originally intended to most special crops this year.
Friday’s USDA acreage report estimated this year’s US lentil acres at 836,000, up from March intentions of 762,000 and a whopping 58% above last year’s 546,000 acres. Dry pea acres were reported at 1.03 million acres versus intentions of 974,000 and 966,000 a year earlier.
Dry edible bean acres came in at 1.35 million acres, up just slightly from intentions of 1.32 million but 18% higher than 2023, while chickpea acres increased to 502,000 from intentions of 429,000 – up 36% on the year.
Flax area was bumped up to 140,000 acres from intentions of 105,000, but that still represents a 21% fall from last year and represents the lowest since 1996.
The one main exception was sunflowers, with producers reporting a planted area of just 898,500 acres. That’s down from intentions of 957,500 and 32% below 2023. It is also the lowest US sunflower planted area since 1996.
