Straw users that pay for their straw..help pls

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clairencappelli

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I am thinking of going back to straw next weekend and running my equisorb bed down as i use 1/2 a bag of megasorb then have an equisorb bed on top and i use 1 of these a week at the mo as my horse comes in 7-8 ish.

I was paying 6.89 for equisorn and this has just rocketed to 7.95 a bale and the megasorb has gone up from 5.76 to 6.20 a bag. So the two are now costing me 11.00 a week and thats only going to get worse in the winter when they come in at 4pm.

Anyway im rambling..sorry...

how much do you pay for barley straw?.

I ask as our has just come in and its nice but doesnt shake upto that much and its 2.20 a bale! The year before last it was 1.80 and huge big golden fluffy bales that shook up to masses.

On average i used 3-4 a week of the nice bales so the only way i will know it to try going back to it again.

I plan on running the bed down and this weekend taking out the equisorb and bagging it up and putting it in the barn and trying the straw. This way if im using 5 or more a week i can put the equisorb back in thats if the price doesnt rocket anymore.

any advise of ideas of costs in your areas would help.

I have a box so can go and collect isome but the y/o wont let me store it in his brn and i cant be lugging it in my car unless it goes in my garage but id forever have a bale in the back using this much a week?

I have said to y/o i think its quite expensive as it doesnt shake up well either but the quailty is nice so would you pay this for straw?
 
Its cheaper if you can buy the big round or square bales, often better quality. They are a bit of a pain to move around but I use an old aggregate bag to shift mine.
 
As Lordy100 said...The cheapest way to buy straw is in big bale form, either round or rectangular, 3 years ago I was only paying £10 per bale bought in, obviously would be more now but I reckon less than £20 (I get it free from OH now) and they can be equivalent to more than 10 small bales per big bale. I was using 1 big bale per 3 weeks with 2 horses in 24/7..... but it sounds like you might not be able to do this if YO won't let you store it!
If it doesn't pull apart easily it can be a pain in the backside to use, but as long as it pulls apart easily and isn't too dusty its probably just cut quite short, it should be fine. My OH was baling someone elses straw and it was very short as he said the combine that cust it was a bit old and knackered but it did make a good bed!
 
Woah is your horse in 24/7????

Mine are just in during the day and each gets 3 or 4 slabs a day of little bale straw, as they are also eating it.
I would not use more that 2 bales per week per horse!!!
 
The big bales arent an option as y/o wont buy them and i would have no where to store them but it does seem cheaper that way.

I think i might have OCD when it comes to my bedding and take every scrap of wet out. Do i use far more than everyone else then?

How much do you all use?

In the winter i use half a bale a day on average but thats when shes in at 4pm and that was the nice straw.

Does this just seen a tad expensive for straw even if its nice?.

this is how my bedding generally kept althought i wont be having it quite so deep now as my horse has had leg troubles so dont want to put so much strain on her fetlock my wading throught this much now.

P7230030.jpg
 
That's a very thick bed
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Mine are on earth floors, so I can be stingey as no hard concrete underneath them. They also eat around 60% of what I give them, so are on around 1 small slab per day for bedding..!
 
Straw will go up a lot this year, small bales will between £2.00 and £3.00 depending on where you live. This is because there arn't many people making small bales and the farmers have put the price per acre up for buying it off the field afer it has been cut.

Why do you use barley straw?
 
Main reason price has gone up is that farmers are chopping straw this year because:

A) The straw has a fertilser value when it is chopped and ploughed back in, if the straw is removed then the fertiliser to replace the nutrients in the straw is costing 3 times what it was last year and so the value of the straw has gone up considerably

B) Cost of fuel to bale, cart stack and deliver has obviously gone up.
 
I pay £1 per bale for straw, I use about 3 - 4 bales per week for a very dirty horse (who's leaving next week so that's that problem sorted!) Two bales each for my youngster and the pony. Provided new foalie isn't too mucky then I expect my straw bill to be no more than £6 per week this winter.
 
£2 or £2.50 but i hate the smelly stuff and am going on to happy jack (chopped straw like bliss bedding). i can't put up with smelly of my piss's horses stable every morning.
 
I don't pay for mine but the farmer I get it from is selling it at 50p a bale if you pick it up or he will deliver for that for deliveries of 60+ bales. That's for wheat straw though and this years is still not harvested. Barley straw was cheaper last year
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I personally get straw free but will be using other bedding this winter.

At work we use straw on rubber matting. The ponies get about two small sections of straw a day leaving about three sections of 'old' in, and are quite comfy on that. This does vary, dependant on the pony and straw.

The horses get about 4 or 5 sections a day, about half a bale... with about 1 bales' worth left in, again, dependant on the horse and straw (the horse I have in mind is a large colt who is messy so does well on a medium bed).

All in all rubber matting will halve your costs.
 
We charge £12 per large bale of nice long stuff. I can't bear the short stuff - it usually means the field has been cut using an axial flow combine and there are a lot of these about these days.
 
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