Cost in a round bale of hay.

Animal

Well-known Member
I bale a4X5 net wrap and would like to know what you think your cost is per bale for mow Ted rake and bale not counting your labor and what you think is fair for custom work.
 
Used to be,back when Dad used to put up some hay on shares,we got two thirds if we did everything. So what's a bale worth? Use two thirds of that. At least that's how I would have figured it back then.
 
And there lies the problem in this area people are charging$20 per bail for Moe rake and bail. Most of the hay here is selling for $20
 
Back when I would bale hay for others I would get 2/3 of the crop and they got 1/3. If they wanted to keep the hay they payed me $35 per bale that I would have gotten and those are the 6X6 bales that I make
 
average around $20/bale but on some years the cost was up to $27.50 per bale for a 4x4, 450 lb. bale. I calculate costs based on how much to produce a ton of hay and with my rounds at 4.4 rounds per ton. You need to make at least 50% profit to make a living doing hay because of the limited amount of hay you can produce in a season; so when you see people selling round bales for $20-$30 per bale, especially if producing larger bales they are almost always loosing money, a common practice in the hay business as most people have no idea what their production costs are.
 
What do you figure your fertilizer cost are going out in that hay?

Locally, a few guys here were selling straw out of the field in recent years for less than what the potash was worth in it. I haven't run the numbers on hay, but am certain at the cheap round bale prices you are quoting, you are just mining the soil, even before the cost of baling $20 round bales.
 
A year ago hay and especially straw was making some money around here.

This winter, back to 90 cents a small bale of hay, 1.60 for a small bale of straw, big round bales of either are likewise pretty low prices. Only think that brought a little money was alfalfa, and it had to be good, good stuff at that.

Hay market was a loser this year. My local cragslist is filled with hay and straw for sale yet, I guess supply was way over demand.....

See what 16/17 brings I guess.

I agree, it seems hiring a round bale made brings more money than just buying a round bale around here.

Pail
 
I am sorry fellas, I kind of led you off the subject of what I really want to know. What do you think you spend in fuel for mow rake and bale, and how much in Net wrap. What I am thinking is that I will probably burn a half gallon of fuel per bale and $2 to wrap each bale, or am I way off base?
 

Ultimately there's more involved in the cost of baling a bale of hay than fuel & wrap. Just to name a few things there's grease,cutter blades,rake & baler pickup teeth,brgs,flat tires.

My rd baler tractor uses a little over 3 GPH and I can normally bale 25-30 BPH so fuel per bale is about 0.12 GPB. Cutting tractor uses 2 GPH of fuel cutting an average of 4-5 acres per hr. In 2 bale per acre hay that would be .25 GPB. My rake tractor I've never keep up with but since normally I rake 27 ft at a time fuel usage is low.

I will guess total fuel used per bale is a little less than 1/2 gallon per bale & wrap costs very close to $1 per bale.
 
What size equipment are these guys using.

Can't truly compare my experience to yours. Here it is hot and dry enough that I don't usually need to rake, except to put windrows together for ease of feeding the baler.
1. I cut with a 9' mower, use a 9' rake to rake three rows together. Feed a 530 JD round baler and make 5ft bales (loader's too small to handle bigger). In hay that does 1 ton to the acre I figure I have about an hour an acre into the job, at about 4 gallons an hour (cut and bale with 1486 IH, rake with JD 70). I get 2 bales per acre. So just fuel I have 10.80 (at 2.70 per gallon) an acre, or $5.4 per bale

2. My neighbor cuts at 36' wide, rakes 4 together at twice the speed I can go at, uses an almost new JD round baler, makes a 1600 lb bale. Tells me he is using the same 4 gallons an hour. He figures a bit over 20 minutes an acre. He is spending about $3 an acre in fuel, or about $2.4 per bale (and nearly twice the hay per bale)
 
Neither way you measure them do they come out a true 6X6 bale but the manual calls them that. Really more like a 5.5X5.5 bale if you push it to the max which I do not do
 
(quoted from post at 11:36:17 05/15/16) What size equipment are these guys using.

1. So just fuel I have 10.80 (at 2.70 per gallon) an acre, or $5.4 per bale

2. My neighbor cuts at 36' wide, rakes 4 together at twice the speed I can go at, uses an almost new JD round baler, makes a 1600 lb bale.

$5.40 per bale in fuel cost sounds way too high to me. Where do you live that fuel cost is $2.70 per gallon?

Your neighbor that bales a windrow that 36' cut & rakes 4(144') together must have some very poor/thin hay that's not worth cutting.
 
When fuel cost was over $3/gal I figured it cost $28/bale for a 4x5 bale. This was in central OK using a swather or a 9ft disc mower and a rake. Baler was 648 NH net wrap. Wrap runs 1.25 to 1.5/bale as I put 2.5 wraps on the bale. Until 2015 I got $50 for a bale of prairie hay or johnson grass/clover/prairie mix. Only sold enough hay to pay yearly fuel bill. Baler was 5 years old when bought and had 5200 bales on meter. At 9500 bales had to replace all belts. Used heavy 3 ply and John Deere lacing, coast about $1750 including lacing. This year had to replace bearings in sledge rollers and gears also. $2500 +/- and 3 days work. My NH648 makes a beautiful bale, and it can pack as tight or tighter than a square baler. I use more wrap than others as the wrap protects the hay when stored outside. I have fed bales that were 5 years old to cattle,sheep, and horses and they loved it. I bale my hay with a high moisture content so that it "sweats". The only problem is Bermuda, that has to be properly dry to prevent mildew. Prairie, Johnson, clover, and wheat can be baled green. I have baled wheat hay so green that juice would run off the belt rollers. When it was fed that winter, cattle would clean up every bite.
During the drought of 2011, we had 120 acres of Oats that when baled we had a cost of $120/bale just in seed and fertilizer. The plant made grain but no leaves, and it was only 8 inches high. Bales had so much grain that we lost 3 head of Barbado sheep to overeating before we figured out what was causing it.

Just my $0.02 after 50 years of farming.
 
We are burning around three gallons per tractor hour. That is the average for cutting, raking, and baling. Moving equipment and repairs are not included.
 
(quoted from post at 09:57:01 05/17/16) When fuel cost was over $3/gal I figured it cost $28/bale for a 4x5 bale. This was in central OK using a swather or a 9ft disc mower and a rake.

There's no way a 4X5+ rd bale of hay cost me $28 to bale as in the nearly 30 yrs of custom baling hay business the most I've ever charged is $22 per bale to cut/rake & bale and I still put $$$$$$$ in the bank every yr from baling. I can't remember farm diesel reaching $3 per gallon.
 
In the last 15 years , 50,000 bales, I never sold a 45 lb bale of alfalfa/OG for lees then $3.75, and the same for quality brome/blue stem prairie grass. And that was out of the field. You pick. And I bought the property just to train some bird dogs and gun dogs on. Alfalfa bought the Farm,all 95, baler, rake and Moco with profits.But this year have great stand of winter wheat going. It's up to the top of my bibs.
 
My actual on a per bale (and I still do a few farms on a per bale rate as opposed to per hour). I've got somewhere around a gallon to a gallon and a half of fuel, around 15 minutes of payroll $6, $5 in repairs and maint, and $1 in netwrap. Figure added to that my 15% charge for overhead (covers my mechanic who's on payroll, his service truck, and benefits, shop expenses, liability ins, cell phone, time billing, time looking at jobs, my company truck, gas, insurance, etc). Somewhere around $20 per roll. Then add profit and return to capital.

For just rolling, in good hay with a new baler 20 rolls per hour. Repairs about $2, depreciation on the baler about $1, labor $1, net wrap $1. fuel 20 cents. Somewhere north of 5 and south of 6. Add in overhead and profit at 15% each.
 


1-1/2 gallons of fuel,$6 labor & $5 repair per bale all sound extremely high to me. I know my costs are no where near that high and my CPA won't let me deduct 100% of my cell phone cost off as a farming expense.
 
Yields are really good on fields fertilized early, best I've ever had. What wasnt fertilized isn't worth cutting. Tough getting much put up though, rain showers, just enough to mess you up are about 12 hours too close together. I've rolled about 2800 this year myself so far, one of my contractors is at about that or a tad less, other one is about double that. We've got plenty right now but its going to go fast when it starts going. Pastures are terrible, dry April, cold wet May, dry June and now hot.

I'm sending around a semi load a week south to Georgia right now, shoot me a message if you need a load.
 
I wont disagree its high. Fuel costs based on 30 rolls per hour baling (4 gph), 4 acres
per hour cutting at 4 gph, 4 acres per hour tedding and raking each at 2 gph. 45 min per
trip with the Mack hauling 11 at a time to barn at 50 gallons per day and the same rate
on the Freightline at 40 gallons per day, skid loader on each end stacking in barn at 12
gallons per day on the case and 20 on the cat. Diesel in the truck checking hay fields,
pulling soil samples, and all that.

Repairs, average 1 discbine module per year, 1 tractor clutch, 2 rear tires, 4
batteries, 1 starter, 1 alternator not to mention all the other stuff from rake teeth to
grease to engine oil, hay barn roof repairs, floor gravel, grading, etc. Right around
20,000 per year on 4000 rolls we do in house.

Payroll, 4 men, 400 rolls per week. Two cutting, tedding, raking, rolling and 2 loading,
moving, and stacking in barn. About half the time single stacking in cooling barn and
then re stacking tight after sweating. 500 per week plus benefits per man.

As to cell phone, the last IRS audit was a blessing in disguise. It cost me 10 grand but
the education was priceless. Auditor gave me 100% business use for cell phone so long as
I had a land line that I didnt claim. Now its a lot simpler, we're a C corp. Every full
time person (including me) has a company vehicle and cell phone, plus uniforms, housing
allowance, steel toe shoes, etc. For the phones I got tired of people that I needed to
talk to being out of minutes, phone broke, what ever the excuse was.

There's no question Im a high cost operator. But, I decided a long time ago there were
always people willing to work cheaper. So, I went after the very high end of the horse
industry. Premium round bales, never wet, perfect color, never even dew on them once
baled, roll back delivery service, 30 day billing with approved credit. Its been good to
me for 20 years. Twice I've not sold out in that time period. Try to produce around 4000
and buy about twice that many to resell.
 

I think your $20 cost per bale is a lot HIGHER than my cost per bale excluding fertilizer.

None of my tractors utilize to harvest hay burn 4 GPH. My JD 4255 uses 3.2 pulling rd baler making 4X5.5 bales,my Kubota M7040 uses 2.1 GPH pulling 9' disc cutter & my Ford 6700 use a whole lot less than 2 GPH pulling 14 wheel rake but I've never really checked the Ford but I know it will run a long time on a tank of fuel.
 

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