Post by simplynaturalfarm on Aug 4, 2010 14:54:16 GMT -5
What is hay going for this year in all the different regions? I am getting different things on the internet - some reputable websites are saying hay is dropping and other good websites are saying it is going up because of the weather this year.
I was so extremely irritated by the conditions of my cows coming out of winter this spring on the three different hays I bought last year - even my horse who gets fat on air got thin had to be supplemented because he kept losing weight. I have never supplemented him with anything because of his tendency to founder. The people selling went on and on about how good it was (one said theirs was horse quality which is way better than I wanted as horses don't need alfalfa, just dust free and I guess we only ended up paying about $65 a ton for any of it so it wasn't a huge amount of money to lose. The ditch hay my BIL put up the cows really liked but I only had 180 30lb bales so they were gone right away. The 1400lb bales were supposed to be mixed alfalfa and grass, and other stuff was ditch hay. The ditch hay you couldn't find any greenery in if you wanted to (the cows refused to eat it and just bellowed at me ) and the other stuff was leaves, stalks and cattails. I have 10 bales left the cows won't touch that I am mulching the garden with. I have purchased hay from 4 other people and it was all horrible - I would guess they made it out of noxious weeds and overgrown sloughs. I have NEVER had cows lose condition in the winter, but the 3 years we have had animals up here, they have always lost condition. Everybody I talked to this spring said they had a hard time locating good hay and that cows were losing condition. Maybe the problem is most people raise grain and beets and make hay when they have time instead of when it is prime? And then I went and visited the one place that sold us the "alfalfa and timothy" and they were feeding silage and tractor buckets full of corn. No wonder their cows were fat as ticks. Their horses that are on the hay were skinny as rails, so at least it isn't just my horse that lost weight. I have fed 2 and 3 year old hay that put fat on my cows in the winter - I kept telling myself that my cows should be hardy enough to get fat on anything, but there must be something seriously wrong with the hay because they keep condition on stockpiled grazing better than the hay I have purchased.
DH just reminded me that the year we made our own hay everybody started to get fat and had to be given free choice poor quality hay to keep busy. The other problem was some of the bales had mold all the way through, maybe they sat in water and rain all summer. . . .
Anyway, I told DH I would pay top dollar for hay this year so I can watch my cows get fat (okay, I never have fat animals because I don't like seeing that, but I would rather have to find poor quality hay for them to play with all day long than supplement with pellets to keep their condition up). We have a client who sells dairy quality alfalfa and I told DH I wanted a little bit for my young heifer who will be calving this October as it keeps them very happy while you are milking. It cost $55 for a large square and it is like candy. When DH drove into the yard you could smell him coming, and I could sleep on the stuff it is so gorgeous. It threatened to rain that night and I sacrificed my pool cover to cover the tiny bit that stuck out of the shed because I would have cried if it got a drop of rain on it. It is absolutely gorgeous. *G* He gave us the test sheet for it and it is testing beautifully for protein AND carbohydrates. I almost wished I could eat hay lol.
BUT I can't seem to find anything in between and I do not feed my steers and dry animals $150 ton hay. . . .
What are you all paying for decent grass hay? I prefer grass hay except for the milking time when I like to give alfalfa for treats.
Heather
I was so extremely irritated by the conditions of my cows coming out of winter this spring on the three different hays I bought last year - even my horse who gets fat on air got thin had to be supplemented because he kept losing weight. I have never supplemented him with anything because of his tendency to founder. The people selling went on and on about how good it was (one said theirs was horse quality which is way better than I wanted as horses don't need alfalfa, just dust free and I guess we only ended up paying about $65 a ton for any of it so it wasn't a huge amount of money to lose. The ditch hay my BIL put up the cows really liked but I only had 180 30lb bales so they were gone right away. The 1400lb bales were supposed to be mixed alfalfa and grass, and other stuff was ditch hay. The ditch hay you couldn't find any greenery in if you wanted to (the cows refused to eat it and just bellowed at me ) and the other stuff was leaves, stalks and cattails. I have 10 bales left the cows won't touch that I am mulching the garden with. I have purchased hay from 4 other people and it was all horrible - I would guess they made it out of noxious weeds and overgrown sloughs. I have NEVER had cows lose condition in the winter, but the 3 years we have had animals up here, they have always lost condition. Everybody I talked to this spring said they had a hard time locating good hay and that cows were losing condition. Maybe the problem is most people raise grain and beets and make hay when they have time instead of when it is prime? And then I went and visited the one place that sold us the "alfalfa and timothy" and they were feeding silage and tractor buckets full of corn. No wonder their cows were fat as ticks. Their horses that are on the hay were skinny as rails, so at least it isn't just my horse that lost weight. I have fed 2 and 3 year old hay that put fat on my cows in the winter - I kept telling myself that my cows should be hardy enough to get fat on anything, but there must be something seriously wrong with the hay because they keep condition on stockpiled grazing better than the hay I have purchased.
DH just reminded me that the year we made our own hay everybody started to get fat and had to be given free choice poor quality hay to keep busy. The other problem was some of the bales had mold all the way through, maybe they sat in water and rain all summer. . . .
Anyway, I told DH I would pay top dollar for hay this year so I can watch my cows get fat (okay, I never have fat animals because I don't like seeing that, but I would rather have to find poor quality hay for them to play with all day long than supplement with pellets to keep their condition up). We have a client who sells dairy quality alfalfa and I told DH I wanted a little bit for my young heifer who will be calving this October as it keeps them very happy while you are milking. It cost $55 for a large square and it is like candy. When DH drove into the yard you could smell him coming, and I could sleep on the stuff it is so gorgeous. It threatened to rain that night and I sacrificed my pool cover to cover the tiny bit that stuck out of the shed because I would have cried if it got a drop of rain on it. It is absolutely gorgeous. *G* He gave us the test sheet for it and it is testing beautifully for protein AND carbohydrates. I almost wished I could eat hay lol.
BUT I can't seem to find anything in between and I do not feed my steers and dry animals $150 ton hay. . . .
What are you all paying for decent grass hay? I prefer grass hay except for the milking time when I like to give alfalfa for treats.
Heather