What do you pay for a large bale of hay ATM?

pintoarabian said:
Quite a bit of profiteering going on methinks! I am paying £25 for a large round bale, the same price as last year. It is excellent quality and that price includes delivery.
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Hmmm, i don't think 'profiteering' is the right word. However I do think that initially, last Autumn, a lot of farmers, knowing that there was going to be a shortage did hike prices. However, being married to one such farmer I can give you his viewpoint. He has been saying for years that the profit in hay/haylage is ridiculously low, taking into account the hike in fuel prices and also the outlay to buy the machinery to make the stuff. Our tractor, baler and wrapper probably cost more to buy new than the current average house price!

We have people on the phone increasingly desperate for haylage who we are having to turn away. O.H is in negotiation to bring some out of Ireland at the moment. We are currently on £35.00 for a round bale (last year it was £20). It will go up again before the horses go out!!

With wheat prices double what they were last year I wouldn't be surprised to see more farmers turning grassland to Arable.

As a further downer I would be VERY surprised to see prices dropped much next year, regardless of weather conditions. I woud guess ours will stay around the £30/35 mark as most farmers will feel this better reflects the true value of forage production.
 
My grumble doesn't just relate to price, although small bales have this week gone up again to £4.50 with £10 delivery (max load 34 split between hay and straw) But I agreed with the farmer that supplies me hay after he cut it last year that he would keep an allocation of 120 bales of hay for me to be supplied gradually over the winter. This week on top of raising the price he tells me that he is getting low on supplies! I have had about 50 bales from my allocation so how can he be running low unless he's sold it on to someone else!! I have to accept the price rises as obviously he's had to store for me because of my lack of storage space but in my book if you agree to supply an amount of hay to someone,you should stick to that! Annoying thing is that this is the best quality hay that I have managed to find in my area and I don't want to alienate this farmer because I need him to supply me next year! (And he knows it)
 
minesadouble said:
Hmmm, i don't think 'profiteering' is the right word. However I do think that initially, last Autumn, a lot of farmers, knowing that there was going to be a shortage did hike prices. However, being married to one such farmer I can give you his viewpoint. He has been saying for years that the profit in hay/haylage is ridiculously low, taking into account the hike in fuel prices and also the outlay to buy the machinery to make the stuff. Our tractor, baler and wrapper probably cost more to buy new than the current average house price!

We have people on the phone increasingly desperate for haylage who we are having to turn away. O.H is in negotiation to bring some out of Ireland at the moment. We are currently on £35.00 for a round bale (last year it was £20). It will go up again before the horses go out!!

With wheat prices double what they were last year I wouldn't be surprised to see more farmers turning grassland to Arable.

As a further downer I would be VERY surprised to see prices dropped much next year, regardless of weather conditions. I woud guess ours will stay around the £30/35 mark as most farmers will feel this better reflects the true value of forage production.
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I understand your point but the farmer who supplies me does think its profiteering and gets quite angry. He says why would he put up the prices halfway through when its cost him the same to make. I pay £15 per bale, same as last year and it is the best hay I have ever fed
 
$30, that's 19.34 GBP for both round and square bales. Well, I would be paying that if the farmer didn't owe me a whack of cash, at this rate he owes me about 200 big bales!:D I get them delivered and unloaded as well:)

Small bales are $3.00 = 1.93 GBP
 
Spyda said:
Not including delivery?

I know there are different sizes but this is the one that's rectangular 6-7' long x 4'.

Ours has gone from £25 to £90 per bale :eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek: all of a sudden this month. These bales are grown and baled by our livery yard and sold direct to us. The small bales of hay from the same fields are £3 per bale.

Just wondered what the going rate is.
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Whre in Devon are you ... I am outskirts Exeter and was quoted £100 large bale last weekend (was paying £15 last year !) problem with this area is there are a lot of cattle farms and they just cant spare any and are buying up everything as they do need it. Managed to get some at £50 but is also £10 bale delivery charge on top.
 
South Cambs:
Large 7x5x3 bulk bale - Was £55 Now £70 Going up £90 soon
Large bale (av. 10 slices) - Was £3.50 Now £5.50 Going up £7 soon
Standard bal (av. 6-8 slices) - Was £3 Now £5 Going up to £ who knows....

The Large bulk bales that we have delivered to our yard are tightly packed, dry and dusty and my horse doesn't like it at all. But that is what is delivered so he has it and I have to mix straw with it and wet it so he eats it.

If there was something else I could feed him to boycott the hay pricing hike then I would! It's rediculous and they are profittering while horses are being half starved because owners are being squeezed from all angles on what they earn.

BOYCOTT BUYING!!!
 
£70 for huge bale equivalent to 20-25 small bales . was paying 3.50 for small bales so same price really and as the hay is lovley and they eat it im happy.
 
I'm in Southern Hampshire and the average price is £7.00 for small bale, I Paid £7.50 for some recently and a couple of month ago had 2 tonnes delivered which worked out to be £8.67 a bale.

Round bales average £75 and I have seen the large rectangular bales advertised for £100.

So count yourself lucky!!!

Even small bale Barley straw is £3.50.
 
Maybe part of the reason for your price increases is farmers having to 'buy in' after poor yields last year. The stuff we are buying in (to sell on) now is literally twice the price it would have been last year. We have even bought in small bagged haylage (of a Horsehage type) we are so short and there's so little available.

The snowy conditions in December also meant a lot of farmers having to supply forage to sheep etc. which wouldn't normally get fed at that time of year. This has also contributed to the shortage.
 
Our sheep were eating 4 bales a day at the worst now down to less than a bale and our own animals come first, our local livestock auctioneers have cancelled january forage sale due to lack of entries, and why cant people put up prices to suit market demands would you tell tesco that? People have got to accept that horse keep is never going down, and perhaps make sure you can afford to keep the number you choose to have.
 
holmedown said:
Whre in Devon are you ... I am outskirts Exeter and was quoted £100 large bale last weekend (was paying £15 last year !) problem with this area is there are a lot of cattle farms and they just cant spare any and are buying up everything as they do need it. Managed to get some at £50 but is also £10 bale delivery charge on top.
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I'm over at the Lyme Regis end of Devon. EVERYTHING'S more expensive in Devon. I moved here from Middlesex ten years ago. Wages are rubbish, house prices sky high and the cost of living is horrendous (i.e. water rates, council tax, even pay extra for broadband!) Grrrrr....

I buy the small bales myself. I only use about 2.5 a week, so not too bad for me. But those liveries that keep more that one horse do the big bales. When I saw the amended price list go up this week I though WTF. That's a big addition to your livery bill when you were expecting to pay IRO £25/bale. Eeeeek.
 
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Kayfm said:
£8 small standard bale. £40 square haylage. If it contiues to rise like this I will cut down on feeding it. Some people I know are mixing with straw. This has gone beyond a joke. Being a horse owner = rip off.
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Kay, Don't know if you buy the small ones now?? but there are 2 places near me that are selling for £5.50 bale, you've got your trailer, come and fill up.
 
bexwarren24 said:
£25 a round bale in Devon. There was an auction a few weeks ago where it was selling at about £50 a bale. £90 is excessive and there is no way I would pay that.
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Pretty similar here £24 delivered. Hay quality ok, not amazing though- seen some at that price mind- shocking!
 
I pay £30 at the moment from our local farmer - no delivery charge and it's a pretty big bale. Lasts me about 6 weeks (when we're not having to feed hay in the field due to snow!)
 
I am in berks and we have haylage VERY large bales for sale for £35 pickup/not including delivery. They weigh around 400 kgs!! We feed one bale a day to our 20+ polo ponies that are out at grass- they go a long way! We farm it ourselves on site. £90 for large bale of hay is soooo expensive!!
 
I expect the farmer is looking at current market price , ie what hay i s sellilng for at the local livestock markets. hay is priced per tonne so if your bale is half a tonne and hay is £180 per tonne then the price is correct. This happened to me this year a big hesston bale of wheat straw was £8 then £12 in Nov i bought another a couple of weeks ago and it was £20. its supply and demand. heating oil for the central heating i s the same i t was 47p a litre then went up in 1 week to 71p a litre. nightmare.
 
This is so shocking. At these sorts of prices it would probably be worth sourcing up here in Scotland and transporting down. I think in the central belt they had really good yields. West coast too dry and east coast too wet but even so. I just couldn't afford to pay those prices.
 
As someone already said, £8 for a standard bale in Surrey, but set to hike up to £9 pretty soon. It's ridiculous, I almost am tempted to drive to Scotland with a trailer! Although, having said that, with petrol at £1.30 a litre I might be cutting my nose off to spite my face!
 
merliebug said:
As someone already said, £8 for a standard bale in Surrey, but set to hike up to £9 pretty soon. It's ridiculous, I almost am tempted to drive to Scotland with a trailer! Although, having said that, with petrol at £1.30 a litre I might be cutting my nose off to spite my face!
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True enough! However for those feeding big bale hay, it has to be worth getting for £25 up here and transporting loads via lorry. If I had more time I might do it myself as a nice little earner!
 
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