Let me first say, I enjoy reading your posts. I do have a couple questions tho.

SC   "They also utilize sorting software to eliminate the 'outliers' (farmer reports which are purposely altered or do not fit within their statistical confidence level)."
 
 Does that mean, they just dont think those numbers are right ?

SC  "If any of us were faced with bushels unharvested yet in the field, which approach would you use? USDA, in my opinion, performed correctly. Go with what they have and compare it to the stocks....then re-survey. As I posted several times on my website....historically big crops get bigger....and in the past grain stored as unharvested suffers minimal loss"

Any guess on what they used for percentage of loss of whats in the field ? I would guess the stuff under 6-8 foot of snow would have a significant loss. Not that whole fields are that deep with snow, but some is, and would seem it will impact ave yield a fair amount.