This morning’s crop forecasts of corn and soybean production both dropped 1%, based on estimates released by USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service.

Corn production is forecast at 12.4 billion bushels, down 1% from the September forecast and down slightly from the 2010 production estimate.

The corn forecast is for the fourth-largest production total on record in the United States, according to USDA.

Based on crop conditions as of Oct. 1, yields are expected to average 148.1 bushels per acre, unchanged from the September forecast, but down 4.7 bushels from 2010. USDA reports this would be the lowest average yield since 2005.

As expected, USDA revised up its estimates of U.S. corn stocks for 2010/2011 based on results of the quarterly stocks survey, according to the Daily Livestock Report (www.dailylivestockreport.com) published by the CME Group and written by Steve Meyer and Len Steiner. The change added about 208 million bushels to last year’s ending stocks, boosting overall supply for the 2011/2012 marketing year.

Soybean production is forecast at 3.06 billion bushels, down 1% from September and down 8% from last year. Based on Oct. 1 crop conditions, yields are expected to average 41.5 bushels per acre, down 0.3 bushel from last month and down 2 bushels from last year. The yield forecast is for the second-lowest yield since 2003.