My biggest hay bill ever!!!

[MindyLee]

I've now owned minis since 2004, and my bill was always super small with 2 minis. Through the yrs my herd has grown and so has my hay bill. Remind you that I have paid anywhere from free (trade for work) - $4.00 per bale. Thank goodness for friends with good prices otherwise I know it would be WAY bigger.

2004 (2 minis) Aprox $150-$200

2005 SAME

2006 SAME

2007 (3 minis) Aprox $200-$275

2008 (4 minis) Aprox $300-$400

2009 (7 minis) Aprox $600-$700

2010 (8 minis) Aprox $800-1000

2011 (8 minis) $1095

Man! if my hubby seen this, he would freak!

so dont tell hehehehehehe!

 

[breezy farm]

well...the cheapest hay I can find that is any good is $7.75 so may top you, lol

 

[Minimor]

I wish I could feed mine for that. I just got a load delivered--$552 and I figure it will last me 3 weeks. That's round bales--the equivalent hay in squares would have been a lot more. I do, of course, have more than 8 to feed

 

[jayne]

I live on the west side of Washington state, and if I want a certain kind of hay (Teff) I have to have it shipped over the mountains from central WA. I pay $150 a ton for 7 tons, so just the hay alone is $1050. Not bad in my opinion for the quality of this great low-starch, low-sugar hay. BUT, to have it hauled is $80 a ton, so there's another $560, so this year's hay bill is $1610. I don't think that's too bad for a whole year's worth for three minis, a pony, two standard donkeys and a clydesdale. They are all easy keepers, so that's good. Actually, if I do the math I need 8 tons, so I'll be looking for one more ton of something they can much on during the long winter nights, but this 7 tons (all my hauler can bring in one load) is a great start.

 

[happy appy]

We were very lucky this year. One of my neighbors hasn't cut his field in a couple of years and told me that we could cut and bale it if we wanted. I ended up getting a local dairy farmer to cut rake and bale for $7/bale. It yielded 37 (4x4.5) round bales. I still bought more hay but that was a great start to the hay I needed for winter. I have large and small horses so go through a lot of hay. My normal hay bill is around $2000/year and my large horses are on pasture in the summer.

 

[chandab]

We put up most of our own hay, so my hay bill isn't as big as it could be, but I do buy some small squares for the barn. This year, they were $75/ton picked out of the field ($85/ton from the stack); I bought about 2.5 ton out of the field. I might go get some more, depending on what our homegrown grass hay looks like.

 

[Little Hooves]

$1450 here for 6 tons

I think that's roughly $9 for a bale.

Not many good hay places in the area and I do buy "tested/classified premium hay" for my minis.

I might start finding a cheaper source next year.

 

[Elizabeth Pannill]

You guys quit complaining about hay prices..wish I could find hay for $ 7 per bale !! In Texas, due to the extreme drought decent coastal ( grass ) square bales are $ 10 /bale right now and alfalfa square bales are $ 15 /bale. I found some irrigated last years hay for $ 8.50 /bale - not as green as this years hay but still OK . There are very few square bales to be found . Round bales of grass hay are $ 130 and up and 3 strand alfalfa hay is $ 21.50 . These are prices for this week. Every week prices go up and the large feed store I deal with says after December they are afraid they will not have anymore hay .For those of you in Texas, it is advised to buy 10 months of hay right now cause later this fall you may not be able to find it and what is available may not be very good and for sure will be more expensive than it is now !

I feed 3 minis but also have 35 dairy goats - so won't even tell you what my hay bill is this year - waay to high for sure.

Elizabeth in Texas where everything is like a desert -very sad !

 

[MajorClementine]

Wow! I am so glad I live in a valley where hay is grown. I thought paying $5 a bale this year was outlandish! Especially since we pick it up off the field. However, our hay bill still hurt pretty bad at 30 tons of hay. Our backs hurt pretty bad too

Just a little statistic for everyone, My neighbor hays (thus where we got our hay) and he's on the local Agriculture Committee and he told me that the US ships 70% of it's hay crop over seas. Last year almost 30% of the US hay fields were converted to corn for ethanol. Better money in it and less equipment involved. So 70% over seas and 30% is corn now... um where does that leave those of us in the US that need hay?

Yup, it leaves us paying the same prices that they pay over seas. $10- $15 a bale and higher. I fear what next year will bring...

 

[myminis]

3 weeks ago I paid 650 for 65 bales of alfalfa and it looks dry. I haven't cut into it yet and am scared to. I should have done it before he unloaded it off the truck but I was so desperate when he came I had only 1 bale of hay'

left before my horses left to go too the trainers for a month and I was afraid I wouldn't have any to feed them so I panicked. I need to cut into it now and get them used to it before Nationals so I'm not switching them onto it while they're there. Gee, I'm glad you posted this, derrr, I forgot all about that!!!!! Thanks

 

[Ashley]

YOu pay crazy. With 3 big horses, and 3 calves this year my hay bill is $540 that was with the delivery fee. Last year I had 4 big horses and one mini and my bill was only $600. I might have to get a few more bales as the calves are eatting more then I expected.

 

[ohmt]

I found wonderful grass/alfalfa mix hay this year for $3 per small square. It's great and only an hour away. Haven't figured out exactly how much I need yet-i usually buy large rounds, but our normal supplier had AWFUL hay this year. It was moldy, weedy, stemmy, and just nasty stuff. He wanted $50 per bale and they were rolled loose so not even close to a ton. I said no way! It was rough finding hay up here too as we had a lot of flooding. Our yard and barn has just now started to dry up and our neighbor lost 500+ acres of crops to flooding. Rough year.

Anyway, with 40 minis and long, very cold winters, we go through about 60 large round bales every 6 months (pay anywhere from $50-$90 per bale). Always a nice big hay bill.

 

[mydaddysjag]

Out of curiosity, how much hay do you guys put up per horse? A few friends told me I put WAY to much up for my guys.

Better safe than sorry, Im just curious roughly how much extra I'll have

 

[Mock2Farms]

We currently feed 5 minis, 2 mini cows, and 2 full size horses. I feed by weight. Hay here is currently around $350-$380/ton for a very nice orchard alfalfa mix. We go through about 1 ton per month. There is speculation of it going up to $500+ a ton by winter. So we just bought 8 ton for $2380 which was the family discount price.. ugh! It's quite scary how high it is this year. We were paying $200/ton last year this time.

 

[Minimor]

Out of curiosity, how much hay do you guys put up per horse? A few friends told me I put WAY to much up for my guys.

Better safe than sorry, Im just curious roughly how much extra I'll have

I am buying approximately 9 rounds (800 lbs) per horse per year. If I were buying small squares it would be approx. 75 bales (70 lbs) per horse per year.

 

[ironbessflint]

I've always lived in Michigan were hay at $2-$3/bale was the norm. I was STUNNED a few years ago when I went to visit some friends in Florida, went with them to pick up a load of hay, and their total for 75 bales was almost $1200. It amazes me that folks in the south can even keep horses at those rates.

As far as how much hay do I put up... To be safe I always plan on a harsh winter, late first cut, and then summer drought, so I plan on 1 bale/day each for the big horses and 1/2 bale split between the two minis. Two and a half bales per day is WAY more than I'll ever need, but I'd rather be safe than run out before first cutting rolls around the next spring.

 

[LittleRibbie]

yup! hay is thru the roof here in Fl. Im not as bad as Diane b/c i dont have as many mouths to feed but I sure dont want hubby to know what hay costs me per year!! We do have a local coastal thats really cheap cheap cheap but it would be like giving your horses a spool of thread to eat and say "enjoy" Local T.S. t/a or orchard grass has gone up to around 17.00/50lbs. but it is excellent and never any junk in it and it comes wrapped so doesnt make a mess in my car!! I wish i had the storage space to get more at a time!!

 

[chandab]

When I had just the saddle horses, and was boarding I bought 10 ton for the year for 3 horses and it got me about through the year with limited grain fed (I actually don't know if it would have made it a full year, as I moved and left the last of my hay to the board barn for last month's rent).

We raise our own hay, so I don't really keep track of how much I use for the minis, but doing the math, I figure I'd need around 1.25 ton per mini (mostly B-size). For 11 minis I go through about 1 bale (75# square) per day, so that's 365 bales a year, but I'd buy extra to be safe, as our winters can be harsh.

 

[Mini Love]

I am in TN the prices are not that bad YET.. Just an thought for those of you who may decide to grow yoour own hay & pay someone to bale it for you..... UNLESS you know them like the back of your hand DONT sign a contrac for x amount of bales to be done & they get that amount no matter how many bales are cropped.... I learned the hard way, My own hay cost me 5.25 per bale & I didnt get half of what got before... Yep a field that for 3 years brings in 260 to 300 bales .. we sign a contact for 1.75 a bale baled for 300 bales in field... DUMB he cut it like he was missing blades so it flatted out spots every were, so when he raked it didnt gather all that was cut, since the flattened down spots effected how it racked it skipped the cut spots to. THE worst looking field we ever seen after it was done... This pasture is at a rental we have so we didnt see it as it was being done. In the end we got 115 bales I flipped. I keep 100 bales and sell the rest for .50 more then what i paid to get it baled... 115 I didnt sell any and who would pay that much for hay aside from me because i signed a contract, he wouldnt even cut the price, I told him that was the worst field i ever seen - his reason was it was to thick and bogged his tractor down while he was cutting it. He all so told me i should hold on to it because hay prices would be bad this year, so he knows his stuff, he was very right about that & this was in early may.. So our good hay pasture got cut crappy, and from all that was left behind, killed off alot - what was left growing has fryed since we have not had rain in 2 months... Lesson Learned I will pay for what is baled after its baled, I do have hay untill the next years cut - we are looking into buying a baler & rake & cutter and doing it our self, we all ready have the tractor thats a start LOL.

 

[2minis4us]

Around here I have paid $19 a bale for timothy, $15 a bale for orchard grass, and as low as $3 a bale for local grass - but it the local grass out to be pretty bad.