Feeling pain again at the gasoline pump? Don’t blame it on corn and the cost of ethanol.

Weather insurance isn’t a new product. It’s been used for years in a variety of situations ranging from movie production to concerts, motorsport events and even weddings. Your favorite retailer may buy insurance against a blizzard on Black Friday or a cool summer that reduces sales of air conditioners and fans.

Where it first breaks over the crest of the Loess Hills from the east, Highway 136 offers a spectacular view of the Missouri River Valley in Atchison County, MO. Treelined oxbow river channels, such as Langdon Lake, still provide groves of cottonwoods and wildlife habitat among fields of row crops.

Consumers want the U.S. to help other countries feed themselves rather than relying on American farmers to feed the world, according to a food-industry survey released last week.

The fast-proliferating critters may make exciting target shooting, but farmers in a large swath of the U.S. find wild hogs to be a serious— and expensive— pest.

“Farming’s not like it used to be where you needed a strong back and a weak mind,” said Katie’s father, Joe. “Now, it’s better to have a strong mind and weak back.

House and Senate Agriculture committee leaders failed to finalize a letter the Friday before last on proposed farm bill budget cuts and a rewrite of farm programs that they were planning to send to the super committee on deficit reduction, but were expected to send it last week.

The American Soybean Association (ASA), the National Corn Growers Association (NCGA), and the National Farmers Union (NFU) are backing the House and Senate Ag Committee leaders decision to recommend to the deficit super committee that farm bill spending be cut by up to $23 billion over 10 years.

Fights began breaking out last Tuesday among agriculture interests over what the super committee might do with the farm bill, even though no one knows how the leaders of the House and Senate agriculture committees are planning to move ahead with the proposal that they sent to the super committee last Monday.

Its not just the summer of $7 corn that superheated Midwest land markets. Investors rattled by the prospect of a double-dip recession still see U.S. farmland as a safe haven amid economic turmoil. That surge of nontraditional buyers lessens the threat of a downturn in farmland values anytime soon, real estate and Wall Street experts contend.