BELLE PLAINE, Minn. (AP) – For Dave Woestehoff, the surge in soybean prices couldn’t have come at a better time.

Six months after pests and drought devastated his crops, the Belle Plaine farmer sold 40 percent of his harvest for about $8.50 per bushel in February – up to $3 higher than recent years.

Woestehoff turned a profit when he had expected to lose money on every acre of soybeans he farmed.

With prices at a 15-year high, the bottom lines for many U.S. soybean farmers have enjoyed a much needed boost. Those who had stored their beans were able to unload at a handsome profit. Others have locked in substantially higher prices for their 2004 crop.

In other words, it looks like a good year to plant soybeans.

“It was fortunate,” Woestehoff said. “Historically, beans don’t spend very much time over $9 so I thought it was a good time to get rid of them.”

In fact, in the past 30 years, the soybean price has topped $9 about 4 percent of the time, said Bob Wisner, an economics professor and grain marketing specialist at Iowa State University. Last fall, Woestehoff sold 16,000 bushels for $5.90 apiece; on Wednesday, he sold another 4,000 bushels at $9.85, ten cents below what soybeans closed at on the Chicago Board of Trade.

Experts attribute the soaring price of soybeans to three main factors:

– Last year’s U.S. soybean crop was severely reduced by drought and aphid infestations. In all, the United States produced 331 million less bushels in 2003 compared to the year before.

– Growing concern about drought, excessive rain and rust damage to the soybean crop in South America, the world’s largest producer. Forecasts suggest that Brazil will produce 150 million to 180 million fewer bushels than expected.

– Strong demand from China.

Unlike Woestehoff, most farmers had already sold most of their beans and haven’t yet benefited from the higher prices. According to Dwain Ford, chairman of the American Soybean Association, about 70 percent of soybeans were sold during last fall’s harvest for about $6 per bushel.

“People think that farmers are making lots of money – they didn’t have anything to sell,” said Ford, a farmer from Kinmundy, Ill.

But Ford said farmers who have so far missed out can set prices now for this fall’s crop that will guarantee them a profit. That could allow producers the financial freedom to make improvements, such as buying new equipment or upgrading facilities, they couldn’t afford until now.

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EUGENE, Ore. (AP) – A coalition of pesticide makers and farm groups in Oregon, Washington and California on Wednesday sought to block implementation of a federal court order banning the use of some pesticides along salmon streams pending an appeal.

The coalition filed a motion in U.S. District Court in Seattle to block a recent court order banning the use of cholorothalonil and dozens of other toxic pesticides along thousands of miles of salmon-bearing waterways, Heather Hansen of Washington Friends of Farms and Forests said.

“We are very concerned about not only the damage the order will do to agriculture in Washington and Oregon,” Hansen said from her office in Olympia, Wash.

Last January in Seattle, a federal judge restricted the use of 38 pesticides near salmon streams in Washington, Oregon and California based on a lawsuit brought by environmental groups arguing that even tiny amounts of chemicals in rivers harm salmon.

Judge John C. Coughenour barred the use of the pesticides – ranging from agricultural sprays to some household weed-killers – within 20 yards of the waters until the Environmental Protection Agency determines whether they are likely to harm protected fish.

The coalition appealing the ruling includes CropLife America, a trade group representing pesticide makers such as Bayer, Dow and Monsanto, and farm groups.

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