# A Head Scratcher to me



## Thorim (Jan 19, 2015)

Even with lower fuel cost I wonder what the quality of this hay is....... How can one afford to sell hay at this price.

http://saginaw.craigslist.org/grd/5603222807.html


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## slowzuki (Mar 8, 2011)

Still see that here time to time. Sigh. I'm arguing with someone about charging 40$ for a 60 mile trip to deliver 50 bales of straw, they feel I should deliver for free at 3.25 a bale...


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## r82230 (Mar 1, 2016)

Simple, you 'borrow' grandpa's equipment that has been setting in the shed for a few years. You 'harvest' a hay crop off a buddy's field that nothing has been done to for years (this way your 'hay' is diversified using last several years worth of growth in each bale) AND you harvest this 'hay crop', when you can get the most quantity / least quality (like mid-July or August, in this area).

You pay for no equipment, no land rent and no depreciation (let alone, know your costs to produce and make a real small profit). AND if the equipment breaks, someone else will pay to fix it now or down the road, when they (grandpa's heirs) go to sell the 'borrowed' equipment. (I was thinking of calling them liberals, but I am afraid this subject would go way off course. )

It much easier to make money this way. IMHO The good thing is they will not be in operation for long-term.

I have a friend who has an excavating business, refuses to sell his old equipment for the reason, he feels he does not need the people who would buy it to under bid him. We can not do the same, because it would hurt the legitimate people who are really trying to get started doing hay the RIGHT way. IMHO


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## Thorim (Jan 19, 2015)

slowzuki said:


> Still see that here time to time. Sigh. I'm arguing with someone about charging 40$ for a 60 mile trip to deliver 50 bales of straw, they feel I should deliver for free at 3.25 a bale...


I'd tell them to come and get it them selves if they don't want to pay a reasonable delivery fee... Is that 60 miles one way or round trip?


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## RuttedField (Apr 24, 2016)

Hay Flip!

Buy it from the person for $2 a bale and turn around and sell it at your regular rate. The next thing you know you will have your own TV reality show on RFD flipping hay bales...and not in the typical hay mound way. (Now I am really aging myself, I think the hay mound went the way of the dime store). 

All joking aside, we get that here too. Bales full of smooth bed straw and queen ann's lace and people wonder why your hay teeming with orchard grass, timothy, clover and alfalfa is more money per bale. "Jeesh lady, look at it. I had worse looking greens at a salad bar." Humor sometimes can sway them and make a sale.


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## RockyHill (Apr 24, 2013)

The really bad thing is that we KNOW the cost and value of hay but when those prices are out there, somehow some buyers form the opinion that those low ball amounts are floating around and that they must be real.

Describe hay accurately, price accordingly and eventually the buyers you want will learn the difference. It can be discouraging getting established customers though. A lot of the time the customers that are only concerned about price are not the ones you want for the long run.

Shelia


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## Vol (Jul 5, 2009)

I always tell my whiners that they can buy a car for $1500 too....but not much of one.

Regards, Mike


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## Tim/South (Dec 12, 2011)

A local who jumped into the hay business told me, "All horse hay is just hay put up cured". He had people believing that. No fertilizer, no spraying, no lime. Just cut what the Good Lord grew, cure and bale.

He sold all of his equipment last year.


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## RuttedField (Apr 24, 2016)

I get the opposite from Haying Contractors here. For some reason they think sheep will just eat any ole stuff, but that is not the case at all. Yes they like weeds and do not need pure hay bale of Timothy to be happy, but they like lush forage and not anything that is straw-like.

I really got burned last year. The guy cutting my hay said he wanted my fields (a 50/50 split for me and him), but despite asking him several times, he did not get here until July 30th. Even in Maine, this is pretty late for 1st crop. He never came back for second crop at all, and it left me buying a lot of grain to supplement the sheep all winter. His excuse was, "The Amish were paying him well". I can understand that, a man has to feed his family after all, but it cost me a lot of money. The kicker came when he chooped my corn fields he uses...rent free...and cut through my sheep fence to gain "better access" when the two WIDE OPEN GATES we had to get in the field. I can see cutting your way through a cow fence as there is nothing to mending that, but 4 foot page wire fence is a pain to retension! I was pretty upset and ended that haying arrangement.

I am in no shape machinery wise to do my own this year, but have got another guy lined up. Soon though I must do my own, but...and don't kill me because this forum specifically says hay AND SILAGE...and so silage is where I think I will go. Just so I don't have the weather issue that is hard to deal with in Maine.


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## Vol (Jul 5, 2009)

RuttedField said:


> I was pretty upset and ended that haying arrangement.


I hope you got in that low-lifes face over cutting your fence....I would have required some sort of restitution....in one form or another.....especially since the amish were paying him so well.

Regards, Mike


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## somedevildawg (Jun 20, 2011)

Good move to send that guy packing......


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## RuttedField (Apr 24, 2016)

No, I am not really like that, though I was a bit upset.

We were really good friends, and still are in some ways. I realize that when people are up against it, they do some stuff they normally wouldn't, but it bothered me that he put a group of people that blew in from away just a few years ago, and neglected a long time friendship. (We are related too if you go back far enough, but then again just about everyone is here when you consider many are 7-10th generation farms.

The first year, the arrangement was he would use his equipment and put up the first crop for me, and take second and possibly third crop for him, while using some of my land for corn fields.

Then last year he said twice; as the summer progressed, he would do the same arrangement, but after baling the first crop so late (July 31st) he took half the bales. I was not happy because a deal is a deal, BUT I can understand that maybe I was getting too good of a deal. But he never came back for second crop and I was short of hay for my sheep.

So I paid a guy to bale second crop in late October, but this guy is NOT a farmer, nor a haying contractor, and baled in the rain and the bales got so hot I thought they were literally going to be fire balls. They were so hot and moldy I did not even dare use them for bedding. Then this winter the FSA office calls and tells me the haying-in-the-rain guy is trying to sign up as co-farmer with me. It is a long story, but somehow in the 1930's my Great-Grandfather signed up with a government program because our farm is considered "Vital to the state of Maine Agriculture". So we get money for this...and this guy wanted it, but I had no intention of getting him...he bales hay in the rain!!

But to the Amish-Loving-First-Guy, he did do me a favor and spread cow manure on my fields, and I recognize fertilizer has value. But then when he cuts his corn off, he cuts straight through my fence with two gates wide open, and a wife that is home to ask permission. The guy would be livid if I left gates open for his cows, but he just cuts right through my fence.

I feel I have been gracious, but cutting my fence was the last straw. Since 1994 he has used our fields rent free because we have a soft spot for dairy farmers, but once he sold his cows and went into selling hay to the Amish, it changed the dynamics of things. Here land rent is cheap at only $6 per acre or so, but it still adds up over the years. So while I did get my fields fertilized, I also let him grow corn, so in the end I don't think I owe him a whole lot. The Amish can pay him...but here is the thing. They do pay well, but only for a year or two before moving on to someone else. Its just how they do business.

Sometimes people just forget who their friends are. It hurts, but is still forgivable.


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## Thorim (Jan 19, 2015)

RuttedField said:


> No, I am not really like that, though I was a bit upset.
> 
> We were really good friends, and still are in some ways. I realize that when people are up against it, they do some stuff they normally wouldn't, but it bothered me that he put a group of people that blew in from away just a few years ago, and neglected a long time friendship. (We are related too if you go back far enough, but then again just about everyone is here when you consider many are 7-10th generation farms.
> 
> ...


If a friend cuts your fences because he's to lazy to drive a bit and go through a gate then I wouldn't want to see what someone would do to you who didn't like you. I am a forgiving man and can forgive almost anything but when someone does something that threatens my lively hood which in turns threatens the well being of my family that is unforgivable, A true friend wouldn't put you in that situation and no friendship is worth putting my lively hood or family in jeopardy jmho


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## mlappin (Jun 25, 2009)

Yep, deal with it all the time, so and so is selling for this price, why can't you?

I don't haggle, I don't negotiate, this is the price.

I'm out of hay again and barely had to haul any to the auction to do it.

I don't advertise either, all by word of mouth. Picked up a new hopefully long term customer, a vet that's doing equine embryo transfers, wants my good stuff, can't have any of his brood nags aborting for any reason, willing to pre pay as well. One of my other steady customers had just got two bales from me and the vet stopped in at their place and seen it, then he called me. Which works out very well as his practice is from home, so anybody that stops in their and sees he's feeding obviously pregnant mares round bales&#8230;

Personally I don't mind when somebody that is only worried about price goes elsewhere, in my experience those are the check bouncers, complainers or those that show up an hour late to get their hay.


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## CDennyRun (Nov 26, 2015)

Garbage hay should be sold cheap. Not "horse quality". If it's that cheap, it's not horse quality. If it is high quality, at $2 a bale, he won't last long.

Around here it's the oposite. People sell crap hay for the same price as great hay. It makes me sick. I don't think those people stay in business very long either.

Chris


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## luke strawwalker (Jul 31, 2014)

Caveat Emptor...

Later! OL J R


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## RuttedField (Apr 24, 2016)

I am not a horse guy at all, but I have alays heard that horses are a great way to get quite acquainted with your vet...in other words, they get sick a lot. But considering what most people spend on stables, arenas, trucks to pull the horse trailers, tack, etc; they must cut back somewhere. I have often wondered if it was not from the feeding of crap hay that brings some of this illness on their horses?

(That is a question, not necessarily a statement).

I know good hay lasts a long time it just leeches key nutrients and so you must feed a lot more of it, and I hear of a lot of horse people bragging about the "latest deal" they found regarding cheap hay, and I really wonder if it was ever that great of a deal?

I admit I had crap hay last year and I paid for it using extra amounts of grain.


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## slowzuki (Mar 8, 2011)

From my experiences around them, horses that are left outside year round with a well ventilated run in shed, and have pasture in summer and dust free hay the rest of the year tend to stay very healthy.

Horses that are kept in tight stables, wear blankets and are fed huge quantities of grain and other high protein feed generally seem to be sick all the time.



RuttedField said:


> I am not a horse guy at all, but I have alays heard that horses are a great way to get quite acquainted with your vet...in other words, they get sick a lot. But considering what most people spend on stables, arenas, trucks to pull the horse trailers, tack, etc; they must cut back somewhere. I have often wondered if it was not from the feeding of crap hay that brings some of this illness on their horses?


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## CDennyRun (Nov 26, 2015)

RuttedField said:


> I am not a horse guy at all, but I have alays heard that horses are a great way to get quite acquainted with your vet...in other words, they get sick a lot. But considering what most people spend on stables, arenas, trucks to pull the horse trailers, tack, etc; they must cut back somewhere. I have often wondered if it was not from the feeding of crap hay that brings some of this illness on their horses?
> 
> (That is a question, not necessarily a statement).
> 
> ...





slowzuki said:


> From my experiences around them, horses that are left outside year round with a well ventilated run in shed, and have pasture in summer and dust free hay the rest of the year tend to stay very healthy.
> 
> Horses that are kept in tight stables, wear blankets and are fed huge quantities of grain and other high protein feed generally seem to be sick all the time.


You guys both nailed it. Poor feed can make them colic (gets very expensive) among other things. Give a horse enough space to move around, take care of their feet, proper exercise, good diet, vaccinations, wormer, and you can avoid the vet for years.

Most people I know that only buy cheap hay, are people that shouldn't have horses. Usually the same people that hoard them, keep them in a tiny muddy pen without cover, never work them, etc. etc.

In all fairness; I'm guilty of complaining about hay prices in the past. I think I even started a thread on this forum about it, when I was looking to get into haying. Turns out there was a lot we didn't know about farming quality hay. I still do complain about guys driving the prices up on crap hay. I see it all the time, and it really bothers me. Looks like things have turned around this year though. Over the past few days I've been seeing guys selling what looks like good local grass for $4, and lesser quality for $2.75. The only people selling GOOD timothy and orchard are right on par @$6-7.

Chris


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## BWfarms (Aug 3, 2015)

A wise man told me, you only cheat yourself if you set the price too low because you want to be fair. Set your price and if the buyer wants it, they will pay your price.

Quality and quantity does need to coincide with the price. There are a lot of guys that sell 4x4's at the same price (or even for more or slightly less) as my 4x5's. If you look closer, their bales look flat because they are not tight or baled too wet. Am I shooting myself in the foot? Maybe? Maybe Not? I'm happy that my sale is made and the customers keep coming back. Granted they bitched at first about the price but after going through the winter and seeing my bales lasted longer and cows were gaining, it was a non issue. The guys priced right up there with me with less weight, their ads stay posted. Then again I've seen hay that was so green it had to mold priced at $85 dollars a 4x4 bale, imported from New York. Only a fool parts with his money and thinks he's getting a good deal.

Hay is not my intended source of income, I just sell surplus. I doubt I would ever sell for less than $5 a small square bale.


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