The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Pets & Working Animals => Horses, ponies, donkeys & mules => Topic started by: waterhouse on December 14, 2010, 10:55:15 pm
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I just had to pay an astonishing £6.75 per bale for a small load of not brilliant hay, (having been quoted £50 per big bale for hay that horses won't eat but sheep might). By contrast I'm paying £6.20 for 20kg bales of the best haylage ever.
The hay crop was dreadful round here. What's it like outside the Home Counties?
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Here in the West Country, I am paying £35 for a square large bale of hay - 8' long ! Slightly shorter haylage is £35 for first cut and £30 for 2nd cur. All excellent.
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Here in Worcs we're paying £4 per small bale of very good hay and £25 per round bale.
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I payed £25 for big round bale of premium grade horse hay, and £20 for big round bales of softer hay for the sheep. Maybe I am lucky!
Emma T
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I'm paying £27.50 for round bale hay from someone I've bought from for years. Other suppliers in Fife seem to be £35 or more :o That includes delivery tho..
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I think prices are rocketting because of the cold weather.
what REALLY REALLY BUGS ME is the waste i see driving around. Bales being put out for horses, and the scatterings obviously not being picked up. Call me Scrooge but i go out every evening and scrape up the scatterings for the horses in their stables, before they get their nighttime haynets. I reckon that, out of every large bale put out in my field we waste only half a haynet....whereas others seem to waste half of each of their bales- they get left and trodden into the ground.
these are the folk who then clamour for more hay cos they are running out, thus driving prices up etc
And dont even get me started on the waste of straw, when folk muck out ::)
Emma T
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we're paying £4.70 per small bale here and its difficult to get.
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The local feed dealers are now out of stock. It is weird to be feeding them haylage because it's cheaper...
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My lot have this stuff called grass ;) ;D (Actually I think some people call it Fuggage or something)
(http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y190/jinglejoys/hawfrostmulesdec10172.jpg)
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Jinglejoys, if you have a spare caravan and room for a wee pony I could be there fairly soon!!
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we cant afford our normal £30-£35 for a round bale this year, so have had to change our supplier and are paying £3.50 for a small square bale and £2.50 for sheep stuff.
having said that, we gather up all the stuff the horses havent eaten in the morning and feed it to the sheep so there is no waste.
ellied - any chance of sharing your supplier details? PM me if you will. thanks
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Have just paid £50 for a round bale of hay so in shock at the moment.It was delivered in the dark too so wont be able to have a good look at it until the morning . Fingers crossed that it is ok.
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thats shocking 6 bales to the ton is £300
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we cant afford our normal £30-£35 for a round bale this year, so have had to change our supplier and are paying £3.50 for a small square bale and £2.50 for sheep stuff.
having said that, we gather up all the stuff the horses havent eaten in the morning and feed it to the sheep so there is no waste.
ellied - any chance of sharing your supplier details? PM me if you will. thanks
Sorry I've just discovered this and pm'd you. I'm not sure he has spare but should see him midweek and will ask what he has
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im currently paying £25.00 for a round bale, its not the best hay but i think after reading this thread im very lucky, :wave:
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I'm very much a novice as regards hay - how do you tell good stuff from bad or not do good stuff? Is it just by smell?
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smell is a good in dictator, you cant beat the smell of nice fresh hay, if it pulls out in big clumps stuck together thats an other sign its not so good, if its dust that is not good, and if it has any blackness or mould on it thats not good. hay should smell sweet and be dust free
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smell must be sweat
color preferably green
definitely no mould or ragwort
you can get meadow hay timothy hay or rygrass/timothy hay
any part you are not clear on just ask
where are you getting you hay from just now
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and as dust-free as possible.
You know good hay when you see/smell/feel it. Everything else is what is for sale around here!
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We have managed to 'make' our small bale hay this year though not until Sept, so not exactly 'good' hay. We had to get a contractor in as we don't have the equipment as yet... We had 100 bales from just over an acre. Having read the prices paid on here we got off lightly cost us £250. Early next year (as soon as the snow goes and we can get onto land) we intend to lime (grateful for all the information gleened from forum members :wave:) then give the paddocks a good going over with the harrows and top seed with a good pasture mixture, hopefully this will improve the sward. We can't plough and seed which would be the ideal situation.
Our little flock of 8 are munching it quite happily. It does smell very sweet and is surprisingly still green. Just hope it all lasts until next summer. Snow still on the ground -though I did hear dripping coming off the sheep shed tonight - maybe a little bit of a thaw?
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hay cut and baled at the right time self seeds with a square baler(small)
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Liming is one of the most effective things you can do to acid pasture, and most pasture gradually becomes acid. Get a soil analysis done and that will tell you how much lime is needed. We needed 10 tonnes per hectare and it took a while to find a contractor willing to do a few hectares. We use "inch to dust" lime which means that you get up to golf ball sized bits of chalk which break up in the rain over some weeks.
Make sure the contractor can get his kit through your gates! Our guy was delivering more than 10 tonnes a load.
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I have been quoted £60 a big bale in Dorset.....does anyone know a good dorset/somerset source that won't break the bank?
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in the end it all comes down to supply and demand you are creating the demand and they are controlling the supply
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Liming is one of the most effective things you can do to acid pasture, and most pasture gradually becomes acid. Get a soil analysis done and that will tell you how much lime is needed. We needed 10 tonnes per hectare and it took a while to find a contractor willing to do a few hectares. We use "inch to dust" lime which means that you get up to golf ball sized bits of chalk which break up in the rain over some weeks.
Make sure the contractor can get his kit through your gates! Our guy was delivering more than 10 tonnes a load.
I did a PH test it was between 5.5 and 5. we have aquired a small Vicon spreader (our Christmas present to ourselves... sad or what) and want to use the granular lime - comes in 600kg bags from our local farm suplies. Presume we can put on once the snow has finaly gone and the soil has thawed out a bit more. It's only about 2.5 acres we have to do. Thought I would ring the 'lime' people up and find out how much they say we would need to apply.
Sorry didn't mean to hi-jack the thread.
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Wow that's acid. Ours was 5.54 and 5.67 and the recommended lime dose was 9.6 and 8.3 tonnes per hectare not to be applied at more than 4t/ha at a time. I have a spinner but the loader is on the same tractor and I didn't fancy shovelling it all by hand into the spinner.
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Wow that's acid. Ours was 5.54 and 5.67 and the recommended lime dose was 9.6 and 8.3 tonnes per hectare not to be applied at more than 4t/ha at a time. I have a spinner but the loader is on the same tractor and I didn't fancy shovelling it all by hand into the spinner.
I' m from the 'acres era' :-[ :-[ hectares don't mean a lot ??? ??? so did a Google calculater 2.5 acres = 1.01 hectares; if you use granular Lime apparently you use a lot less per acre/hetare - haven't found that bit out yet... and as you say it has to go on in Two parts - one this year and one next - less is best as too much can lock up the grasses/plants absorbing other nutrients they need.
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Ah but you're buying 600kg of lime so you'll have to convert that to pounds if you want to stay properly imperial. I learned imperial at primary school, metric at grammar school and can switch almost seamlessly between them. Except for fuel consumption in litres/100km which doesn't work for me.
I note my haylage bales each weigh 20kg (44lb), trying to get this thread back on course, which is just over 15p/lb (three shillings) at the last price I paid.
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thats £337 per ton in old money or new money
back on course i think
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how much does that work out at a bale? how many bales in a ton??
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51 bales to the ton
£6-12 shillings per bale or £6-60 pence on figures supplied by waterhouse
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Rounding errors makes it £6.75 (six pounds fifteen shillings) per outrageously expensive bale, which makes the wonderful haylage I got for £6.20 per bale seem really cheap. However, 72 bales at £6.20 is a big cheque to write. Here's hoping for a good hay crop in 2011.
Perhaps I can run the car on haylage given where diesel prices are heading.
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I have had 1/3 of a big bale disappear overnight, now either horses were REALLY hungry or someone has helped themselves.
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is there a trail of hay leading away from the feeding area????near a road????
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thanks for the cost and amount per ton.
pinching hay and straw seems to be getting more amd more popular, that will have taken some doing pinching a third of a bale
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well once its in the back of a van could you positively identify it ???
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Wow that's acid. Ours was 5.54 and 5.67 and the recommended lime dose was 9.6 and 8.3 tonnes per hectare not to be applied at more than 4t/ha at a time. I have a spinner but the loader is on the same tractor and I didn't fancy shovelling it all by hand into the spinner.
I' m from the 'acres era' :-[ :-[ hectares don't mean a lot ??? ??? so did a Google calculater 2.5 acres = 1.01 hectares; if you use granular Lime apparently you use a lot less per acre/hetare - haven't found that bit out yet... and as you say it has to go on in Two parts - one this year and one next - less is best as too much can lock up the grasses/plants absorbing other nutrients they need.
600kg roughly 11 .81cwt... 1322.77 lbs :D
Found out differance between 'conventional lime' and 'granular lime' is all to do with 'microns' and the lime dust going through holes 60 in a square inch (back to imperial) ;D Has to be 150 microns; for ' Con lime' it has to contain 40% of 150 micron dust a tonne - which equals to 4cwt of micron dust per tonne - the rest of the ton is made up from finer/larger lumps of lime; 'granular lime' is made up of dust (150 microns) that has been gunged together into the little balls so we will only need 8cwt per acre, I think thats right - ;D ??? To be on the safe side we will do it in two applications over two years - will PH test again before 2nd app.
Re £6.15 shillings (price of current bale) that used to be my weeks wage in late 50's 15/- used to buy a pair of stockings ;) ;)
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Went to get a big bale of hay this afternoon- price increased to £27.50, with possibly going up to £30 later on.....
Beth
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Have just paid £42 per large round bale. >:( Usually we have so much we give it away, but not this year (typical)......
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Our vet said that someone round here is asking £8 per small bale. Presumably delivered by armoured car.
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i should hope so for £8!!!! i would want gold threaded baleing twine aswell for that!!!!!!!! :o
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fodder for south east, £10 small baled hay £140 large hay, £18-25 for large wheat straw
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Bl***Y H**L Thats scary prices, I paid £40 for a bale of haylage last week, I have about 60 small bales of hay left which should last about 30-40 days so am going to feed hay and haylage week about.
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Lillian - off topic but could you remove or make smaller those moving pics you have on your posts? Migraine making. Ta.
8)
Thank you. :wave:
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could of cried yesterday when i got 2 large bales delivered...gone up to £30 a bale from £25..i know its not a great deal but its another £10 extra every 2 weeks which i really didnt need!! :-\
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thats half the price we pay.
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i went into sainsburys yesterday, not buying hay but just nosying at the price of it,
how about £6.10 for 3.5kg
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probably ok for the odd micro horse. still with the way things are going it may work out cheaper buying it from them. ok i can understand why they are putting feed prices up but why has chaff gone up in price. there can't be a world shortage of it.