Hay prices

Keith_Beef said:
Every winter I read a thread like this.

And every winter there seem to be a lot of people either surprised or outraged by the increase in price.
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I’ve never been outraged by the price of hay before. I remember the days that a small bale was £2.50 but everything goes up in life. I’m paying £60 a bale this year compared to £35/40 last year and £30 the year before.

Seeing bales for £150 is quite startling though. How on earth is anyone affording to feed multiple horses on that?
 
Marigold4 said:
Well, yes. It's a big worry for those on a tight budget with much loved horses to feed.
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Exactly
I do feel so sorry for those who are having to make horrid choices to feed their horses. A friend has just sold her expensive competition horse and lorry so she can keep her old happy hacker due to massive livery price increases .
 
tristars said:
It's always a thing for those who buy in over the winter as opposed to getting stocked up off the field at harvest which is cheaper, and generally the price rises as we go through the winter, and depends on the weather and how much the housed cattle get through and if they have to be housed for longer due to ground conditions or if they can go back out onto the fields to eat grass

But last summers crop was very low yield in some places due to lacking rain, hay needs water to grow, as it gets taller it needs a fair bit to get through to the ground, then if course it needs sun during the harvest to dry it, I once made a whole winters worth of hay from cutting to baling in 24 hours, sun and a strong wind did that, but that was in france !

Sorry for the lecture, but hay is just. Well so important
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Genuine question but how does what livestock eat in hay affect the price throughout winter? Surely if you need it to feed cattle you can’t sell it, so I’d understand places running out. But if you need it then you need it, doubling the price still leaves you with nothing to feed your own surely?
 
KikiDee said:
Genuine question but how does what livestock eat in hay affect the price throughout winter? Surely if you need it to feed cattle you can’t sell it, so I’d understand places running out. But if you need it then you need it, doubling the price still leaves you with nothing to feed your own surely?
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It’s down to yields and how much of your income is generated from selling excess
 
canteron said:
The barley straw this year was short, soft, sweet and good as a partial hay replacer, which keeps prices down and great for do gooders.
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Yes I've been feeding this too. Very useful for chubsy cob. I bought my straw and hay in from my usual farmer pretty soon after harvest so it's been sat in the barn a few months now. I might need a bit more at some point but it feels very good knowing that at a push (rationing!), we'll still be ok. He's been very honest though and sold it at the usual price, just with the caveat that he might run out. He's also only supplying his regular customers, no new people.
 
I bought 60 bales off the field as a reserve. 4.50 a bale. This is east Anglia. My usual hay supplier is 40 pounds a big round bale. He hasn’t increased. But said he will be out by February and hasn’t taken on any new customers. I managed to get 6 big bales of Haylage, which I’ve stored. They are now out of supplies. Every day I see owners on the horse facebook sites asking for hay. Once my supplier is out. I’ll have the small reserve bales. But with four horses, it won’t last until they go onto the summer paddocks in June. I too have decreased the amount I’ve put in field hay boxes. I used to give ab lib. Its worrying. As I don’t earn enough to pay huge prices. It would be cheaper to simply send my four away to grass livery for the winter!
 
KikiDee said:
Genuine question but how does what livestock eat in hay affect the price throughout winter? Surely if you need it to feed cattle you can’t sell it, so I’d understand places running out. But if you need it then you need it, doubling the price still leaves you with nothing to feed your own surely?
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Not quite sure I understand the question!

But buying off the field is usually cheapest, then it's down to the market place, supply and demand, its a big market place agricultural foodstuffs, cos its not just horses eating hay, you've got cattle, sheep, goats, deer etc, the cattle markets and agri news reports on weekly prices per ton all over the country

So in a low yield winter you are starting off with less hay available allover, then the wet weather, most animals indoors, then horses in or enclosed on hardstanding increasing the use of hay daily driving increased consumption

It's supply and demand, when things are in short supply prices move up, if the hay has to be bought in from another area there's transport costs to add.


If the cattle stay indoors because the ground is wet at the start of the grazing season, March April that's more hay used up or needed to be bought in

So farmers having smaller yields also won't be selling so much this year

Hay sold in cattle marts is sold by auction and the price it sells for reflects what people are willing to pay or in this case need to pay to get hay

Also in normal times you can get old hay, from previous years

as you move towards feb mar at lot of the crop has been eaten affecting prices in some areas some years

Other euro countries have had high yields so there is hay to be had and often transported in times of need

Sorry if that's not what you meant!
 
Hay is very scarce in these parts.

The very dry summer meant very low yields, although the quality is good, plus farmers were having feed hay to their stock in the summer as there was not enough grass growing, due again to the dry conditions.

The big suppliers can bring it in from far away on their huge lorries and charge the appropriate higher prices. My local supplier can’t do that, he hasn’t got a wagon big enough to make it worth his while. His hay was flying out of the barn and he either will have or will be about to run out altogether.

Lots of panicked posts on local FB pages from people wanting hay urgently, it’s going to be very tough for those who can only store a few bales at a time.
 
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Keith_Beef said:
Every winter I read a thread like this.

And every winter there seem to be a lot of people either surprised or outraged by the increase in price.
Click to expand...
Well most of us are on fixed incomes and can’t just ask for a pay rise to cover rising costs unlike businesses who can charge more to cover their costs. It’s not just hay that’s gone up it’s every single bill.

I’m fortunate to be on a livery yard with its own hay supply but even then I think the farmer is going to have to buy in this year as his yield was low and so will have to increase prices.
 
Went for a meal with friends last night who use the same hay supplier. He text them last week, with no warning, to say he had run out of hay, but he can buy it in for £8 a bale. He is still supplying one person at the old price. I smell a rat!
 
Flowerofthefen said:
Went for a meal with friends last night who use the same hay supplier. He text them last week, with no warning, to say he had run out of hay, but he can buy it in for £8 a bale. He is still supplying one person at the old price. I smell a rat!
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This is so unfair. People are really getting so stressed about hay situation.
 
It’s just such a crap situation. I get many farmers are squeezed more than ever and why shouldn’t they want to make as much profit as possible while they can. But hay is such an essential for most horse owners, it’s not a luxury you can cut back on when prices go up if you don’t like it. Reading through all the comments and POV’s has been really interesting thank you, I don’t think anyone really wins this winter by the sound of it.
 
rabatsa said:
Margins are so tight on farms that being able to make money on something really does help. Before the family farm was sold we worked it out that the brothers were working for about £2/hour.
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We've never worked it out because if we did, we'd probably find out that OH would be better off at home sitting on his arse.
 
I ran out of grass before my usual hay supplier's hay was ready this year, so ended up using a second supplier to bridge the gap. I've kept on buying from both to ensure that I have enough over winter and spring, as last year my usual supplier ran out of hay before my grass came in properly. I'm feeding seven, four of whom are still growing. I do notice that my usual supplier's price goes down a little bit after winter, when people start cancelling what they've booked due to not needing it after all. It annoys me, because it happens every year and I'd like to be able to book more in advance for mine, as I know that I won't cancel it! But such is life, and it's nice to save a few pence per bale. I'm less stressed this year as there's no risk of me running out thanks to having the second supplier, which is good, as I'm having trouble with my heart.
 
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