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OT-- HAY BUYERS

G

gitrib

Member
Son sold his hay in field. One buyer came and looked at the hay and said "I want 100 bales we will be back this evening get it". Son monitors bale weight real close tries for 75 to 80 lbs. She (it was a women horse owner)excuse me Nancy. They proceeded the field husband & son. In a little while they pulled in the yard with 20 bales on trailer. yOUR BALES ARE TO LIGHT. Son pulled out scales they were 80 lbs. THEY ARE TO LIGHT!!! What about what you have on your trailer? Guess we will pay for them. She was a horse owner Oh well another one came along and was really happy. They are baling up every thing in the country. Johnson Grass, Pasture wheat stubble regrowth. Very little good hay. They do not know what it is. I have been around milk cows and only the best for them. Got a Guernsey that is away at a Ayrshire herd she is milking 140 lbs a day official test. They do not do that on trash.
gitrib
 
Very few people around here want an 80 lb. bale. I don't know what he's getting for them but I can almost assure you they had other reasons for not taking it, whatever they may have been.
It's a shame they couldn't have been honest with you.
 
From what I observed over the years, there is always a game with selling hay off the field or ANY other time when they think they have the leg up on you.
I generally try to avoid selling off the field simply because most of them never show up when they say and then the hay gets wet... and that's my loss, not theirs.
Over the last couple years we've developed a nice market for stored hay, mostly to the point that I don't have to deal with too many of those jokers anymore.
There are enough decent people out there that do recognize good value... and if you have good hay at a fair price you probably won't have a hard time selling it out of the barn. It is more work... but you take your pick?

Rod
 
So true about the weight ,.. , Most Wannabe hay buyers gripe if they have to pick up heavy bales , especially if they are getting more than a truck load .. No matter how PERFECTLY CURED AND COMPACTED .. Around here 3 yrsback the Hay got hit with a killer Frost that reduced the 1st crop to half , followed by NO RAIN til fall ,, hay Prices went Sky HI $6 for anything youcould get a string around was cheap,, HORSEY People were turning Their luved ones loose in the state Forest to fend for themselves ..... Used to Have 10 or more Folx to call each time I cut hay ,,, Less than half still have Animals , goats , lamas, ect..
 
$4.50 a bale for top qaulity, fertlized, irrigated Alfalfa. Oh well the next guy took most all. Put the rest in the barn. Will be hunting for space to put the next two cutting. Got one cutting in barn already. It really bothers me to see people feeding trash to there livestock. gitrib
 
that is only 112.50 a ton.If you big square it and it tests good enough I would be interested in that.I feed alot of alfalfa to my milk cows and I am going to be really short on good hay this year.
 
I used to try to sell all my hay out of the field, but got tired of calling people to tell them when I was gonna bale(at their request)and having them say they couldn't make that day because Johny had a ball game or scout camp or whatever. This year it all went into the barn & I'll sell it this winter for more per bale. People in this area cry if the bales are anything over 40-50 lbs. Mostly sell to horse owners & women & kids do the feeding.
 
I sell probably a third of my hay out of the field, but I almost always have at least two customers coming, sometimes three in case one doesn't show. Right now I estimate I'm about three hundred bales short, so I I've been spreading urea to try to enhance the second cut.
 
"She (it was a women horse owner)"


I wouldn't worry about. Most women (and the men aren't much better) horse owners I know wouldn't have had a good thing to say if you had given them the hay and hauled it to their place for free.
 
Maybe we're not typical but my wife is the horse person and the ONLY time she has ever complained about hay she bought it from a guy who was just retired and decided he wanted a hobby farm and put up some hay. He baled it wet and all the bales were hot. It was his fault and he refunded her money and took it back.
The guy we buy it from has excellent hay and a good relationship with his horse people. He will give a discount if we take it off the field, works great for us and gives him more time to bale instead of having to haul it back to the hay barn. Square bales are a lot of extra work.
 
I used to give my hay away...only about 8 acres, but usually good for a dozen or so large round bales.

But I quit that...hayer run their swathers too fast, tear up the ground or they aren't ready to cut it when I want them to, or they tell you they will cut it and never show up..(lots of hay around..see old bales everywhere)

So I bush hog it down myself...around the last of august.
 
I had a guy come to pick up hay and he said it was too weedy. I kinda looked at him and asked what he meant. He then pulled some ALFALFA AND CLOVER out of the orchard grass, and it was all I could do not to laugh. He bought some and said his horses really liked it. Wonder why?
 
We planted some cover crop oats with alfalfa that year (2007). We cut it just right and the horse people were almost fighting over it. Guess we sold it too cheap?

The next year it wasn't as dry here, but the "dry spot" moved your way Jim.
 
I did four loads of hay that was a pasture mix, dry, nutricious, some timothy , clover, alfalfa and no rain. A horse lady up the road wanted to "try" the hay and thought she would like 250 bales, about two loads...so I took two bales of hay off the wagon and went to her barn door and set them there for her to try. Well she left them sitting there and a day or so later it rained on them. A week later I saw her and she told me that when she opened the bale it was all wet and mouldy..so she didn't want any. I never said a word. Those four loads of hay set on the wagons for a month or so and another horsey lady bought a load...said it was the best hay she had ever had..eventually she took all four loads, about 500 bales alltogether. There's no cure for stupid and I don't try to cure stupid anymore, I just smile and agree.
 
(Teasing Alert!) The horse people that want hay should be told to bring their horses over to mow and rake the hay before baling. Local Amish horses are better behaved from working for their supper-"hobby/pet" horses(and their owners) need excersize also. Brother used to sell to some horse owners and adjusted the old 14T for smallest bales for customer ease of handling-could easily carry one in each hand or some times 2. Small bales did help him load in pickup under topper- when I brought home a little trailer he used it behind pickup for delivery route to 3-4 customers at a time instead of part load in pickup to each. Trailer spare tire also fit pickup and was in open instead of buried like pickup- was needed a couple times when pickup tire picked up horseshoe nails. RN
 
The only suggestion I can offer is to do what I do. Put it all in the barn and wait until Jan/Feb to sell. They get a lot less picky then. Of course they have to pay more too. The only regular customers I have work off their bill by helping me bring in the rest of my crop. By the time they load a few wagons, they're a lot more congenial and a lot less complaining about light bales.
 
(quoted from post at 06:20:06 06/28/10) Maybe we're not typical but my wife is the horse person.
Click to expand...

Yea but.........You got a horse, makes you an automatic idiot to some of these clowns........

It's that "seen one ya seen em all" attitude that comes from thinking the world drops off at the end of town.

Bought some big square bales once (600-700 pounds) that were tied 5 times before the big bail was tied. That was a one time deal, made me look like a real pansy :shock:

Just baled up small squares that are 30-40 pounds then baled up a bunch of short and tight at about 25 pounds.

Just bought 50 big rounds (25 each from 2 farmers) that think my horses are just wonderful and and pay them cash for all as soon as it is in their barn without being rained on. They store it and I pick it up as needed.

Dave
 
I have really enjoyed all of your posts. Over my years it has been interesting what people consider what is good hay. Have a total nutient analysis run on it. Sons hay usually runs close to 20% crude protein with a high TDN. Had some last year that was seventh in world competition ot of over 300 entries. He has thought about baling it in small short bales stcking it on a pallet,wrapping it with plastic and seling it at feed stores, Thanks every one for your imput.
gitrib
 
The only thing that counts for good with the horsey set is DUST FREE and greenish. There's as many that want fine texture as coarse texture... and a CP/TDN analysis means nothing to most of them anyhow.
Dust is the only thing that they ever really reject hay for around here. Price... if there's lots around... but they get pretty mallable if hay is short.
The analysis will only cost you more money...

Rod
 
Some horse owners are just idiots when it comes to hay. They don"t bother to learn about the horse"s digestive tract.

There are two concerns with feeding alfalfa to horses. One is blister beetles. If it comes from anywhere south of Colorado, it needs to be certified to be free of blister beetles. 1/4 of a blister beetle will kill a horse.

Two is protein level. Most alfalfa is way high in protein for horses. People get all excited and say its great because it takes less of it. They don"t understand that a horse"s digestive tract is designed for quantity, not quality. Because of the high protein level of alfalfa, it doesn"t take much to satisfy what a horse needs in protein, but you may very well have a horse that"s still hungry.

Here"s my opinion. At 20%, your hay is really top notch stuff, but at that high a protein level, I would feed only very small amounts as a supplement. My horses are "easy keepers" and it doesn"t take much to keep them in good flesh.

If I was feeding dairy cattle or raising cattle for market, I would buy all I could afford.

For my horses, I prefer a good quality grass hay that runs about 10%. A horse can eat all they want and never founder or colic on it. My horses are pleasure horses and don"t require the nutrition and protein of say a race horse or performance horses.

Each horse owner has to determine what it takes to keep their animals healthy and happy. Hopefully, its an educated decision. Too often, its not.
 
$4.50 for an 80 lb. bale of alfalfa?????? Those people are total idiots. Around here, coastal squares about half that weight are selling for $9.00 a bale.

Went on a trail competition back in April. I bought a couple of squares from the feed store because it was convenient. Cost me $17.50 for two bales at about 50lbs. per bale. I didn't like the hay very much and neither did my horse.
 
Several years ago we were buying hay from a producer just a few miles away. After the first purchase, we were moved to the top of his call list. Why? Real simple. He would call and say when he would be bailing and we would be there. We bought what we said we would buy (and frequently more) and we paid cash.
 
(quoted from post at 22:10:38 06/28/10) Several years ago we were buying hay from a producer just a few miles away. After the first purchase, we were moved to the top of his call list. Why? Real simple. He would call and say when he would be bailing and we would be there. We bought what we said we would buy (and frequently more) and we paid cash.
Click to expand...

That is EXACTLY the arrangement we have with the producer we buy our square bales from. We also feed round bales which come from our neighbor across the road, it's always good quality hay and like you ours are pleasure horses so they do not require the same nutrients as say a race horse would. Aside from that, if they have a round bale they'll stand there and eat it all day. Most of what we get is a good mix of timothy, alfalfa and clover with other assorted grasses. Seems that there are probably a LOT of people who are not well informed and they probably make it hell on those of you who produce hay. I can't apologize for them but I can say that there are idiots in every group much like the "producer" who didn't know the first thing about hay that sold us hot bales. But does that mean that I should assume that all producers are idiots who don't know good hay? Of course not. I'm sure that many of you can easily weed out the bad buyers and only sell to the good ones who appreciate what you do.
 
Sorry Doc no big squares our barn is a tie stall type and we like the small squares for sending to the shows.
gitrib
 
I remember growing up how frustrated Dad would get with the horse crowd. Got to a point where he simply wouldnt sell "horse hay". No matter what the hay looked like.....when asked about it his answer was always the same...."aint got hay for horses".
 
I used to sell a lot of hay in the 1980s. 25-30 thousand bales each year. I developed a good horse owner market. I usually sold them pure timothy or a tomothy/alfalfa mix. How I did it was taking the time to educate them on what their horse needed. Most horses are just pleasure horses around here. They are in a stall or small pasture 95% of the time. They don't need high protein hay. It is much better to feed them a 1/3 of a bale per day of cheaper grass hay than a flake of pure alfalfa. Heck most of the people around here are feeding sweet feed and oats too.
As for your bales weight. I usually always tried to make them weight around fifty pounds. To get a 70-80 lbs bale in grass it is either very long or wet.
 

I agree most horse wouldn't recognize a good bale of hay as all they care about is green color ,no stickers(grass burrs) and no dust. I sold a rd bale to some horsey people that they picked out of a row of bales. Called me a few days later and said their horses only ate 1/2 of the bale and left the rest. I told I guess they need to learn how to pick out hay as I don't keep horse hay.
 
You hit it right on the nose, Nancy. We feed about 2 bales of alfalfa a year- just keep it for "special projects". They just get non-moldy grass hay, and we don't care much about protein.

Had a woman who wanted to sue everyone- bad water, bad grain, aliens from the planet Zortron- her horses were always lame. I told her to bring in a sample of her hay, and sure enough, it was 3rd cutting alfalfa, all leaves and looked good enough to eat. I told her her horses were in a permanent state of founder, and it wouldn't stop until she got some crummier hay. She couldn't believe what an idiot I was, and left in a huff. Good riddance.
 
I mentioned this thread to my wife last night and first thing she said was that IF you feed any alfalfa you only feed a tiny bit. She was trained by a guy who now breeds and trains very expensive horses. I think a lot of "horse people" think it's as simple as just getting a horse and feeding it nothing but top quality feed. Many have either self taught themselves or been mis-informed by other self taught people. I'm not a horse person, my wife is, that's why she makes all those decisions. We have very happy horses! :)
And to the best of my knowledge our hay suppliers are happy with us too.
 

Bought about 80 bales of "just in case" alfalfa last year. Gave about 75 bales away last week. We feed 1st cut, good pasture mix and a cup of minerals each day. Last 2 months before foaling gets pellets added and the stallion gets dad's special mixture of barley, pellets, minerals, and a bottle of whatever beer I find on sale or malt while breeding. I give him the beer cause we get an ugly mare now and then :roll:

Dave
 
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