PASTURE RENT

Phil H

Member
I am going to rent our pasture out for the season, but I was wondering if there is a good rule of thumb to use for rent price. I rent per head per day, and limit the number of cow calf pair to keep from over grazing. The season starts when we get enough rain to water the cows from a run off pond, till the end of May. In the past, I look what hay is going for and cut that number in half, to be fair to the person who wants to rent the field. All fencing is taken care of by me and the person who rents has full access to come and go. Would like to raise the rent price a little at a time, approx. 3% every 3 years. Does this sound fair? Any thoughts.
 
Pasture historically costs 45 cents a head per day.

The problem from the producers side of things is that wholesale food prices do not go up. Farmers need to make any inflation up with better efficiency, more grain or meat per acre.

You want to charge 1% inflation per year. Beef prices are as likely to fall as much as go up any year to year.

The farmer needs to improve the amount of beef he can get per acre by fertilizing better, adding fence to mob rotate graze, improve the forage with reseeding, or otherwise improve.

If you aren?t doing anything to improve the pasture along with the farmer, that soon makes the pasture rent unaffordable.

Certainly a difficult situation for all. You have to look at why your land should be worth a bit more every year. If you own a building in town, you will re roof, repaint, keep up to new building codes, more people will be coming to that shopping center, and other improvements will happen to make the building worth more rent over time.

The pasture land, you likely get more taxes assessed over time and you have the yearly fence cost, but what is improving the pasture to make it worth more?

Paul
 
Where I live the snow doesn?t leave until April or maybe May, the grass doesn?t start growing until May, you wouldn?t want to start grazing until May 15th. If someone charged me half the price of the hay, I would sooner make the hay, bale in first week of June and again in August, and leave you half the hay.

You must be in a very different climate to stop with grazing or hay in May, so what I view as normal for pasturing might be very different than where you are.

Paul
 
In my area landowners rent by the year usually Feb 1st to Feb 1st was how I rented when I was renting several farms.Some landowners set a price,some put it out for bids
let the market set the price.If you get a good renter you can work with them on a long term basis,if you get a bad one they're gone in a year.Grass starts growing here in April and I still haven't fed the cows any hay since I had a couple fields with stockpiled Fescue. Will start to feed soon though.
 
Yes, I agree. I am improving the pasture each year, I remove all the trees that take up space, clear all the brush. This last year I have spent nearly $1200.00 in herbicides to kill the brush and the star thistle. That doesn't include the cost of diesel to clear the brush and remove trees to open the pasture. The taxes have gone up nearly 5% and the pasture rent doesn't come close to even paying for the herbicide let alone the taxes on the land. I want to keep the renters but I just can't keep sustaining a loss to improve everything without some return. That is why I was using the cost of hay to get some kind of value for pasture rent.
 
I never thought about putting it out for a bid. I don't think people know how much it takes to improve pasture. Taking care of a pasture isn't free, and when you work at improving things then there has to be some return or it isn't worth it. I'm not trying to make a living at renting pasture but it has to pay for itself.
 
I've never seen hay $1.50 per bale. A 1000 lb cow will eat about 100 lb in 3 days. A 100 lb bale of wild hay mix will go for $8.00 to $12.00 per bale but you could cut that by about 50% if you raise it (MAYBE) that still leaves a lot more than $1.50. per bale or .45 cents per day per head. In my neck of the woods, things just don't add up. At .45 cents a head per day I wouldn't even open the gate. I would do something else with the land to make it pay. Like raise feed for the cows that people want to graze on pasture.
 
Here in Nebraska the pastures we rent go for an average of 300dollars a season which is 150days. This is cow and calf pair. The calf is around a month old when going into the pasture. Pairs go onto grass around May 15th and come off around October 15th.
 
I?ve never seen hay over $10 a bale, until the last few years didn?t see it sell for $5 a bale ever.

Often see round bales sell for $30-35.

Just different places different deal. Grass hay is mostly a waste product made from road ditches and areas too wet to farm in spring.

Glad to hear how things are where you are.

Paul
 
Sounds like it is about the same for us, just the growing season is shifted. I was renting for just about exactly what you are saying is the average, where you are. I just couldn't sustain the cost of improving everything without passing some of the cost on to the renter. It is a fine line, but it will benefit both me and the renter. I like to keep the same renter each season, but it does cost to improve the pasture, and maybe I can get to where I can plant some triticale and run the cows in a little earlier and even increase the number of pairs. I think I can then cut and bale the triticale after the cows are out for the season, then sell the bales. There is a mountain lion around though, not sure if it will be a problem, but it will be another thing to deal with. May have to get someone with dogs to hunt it down if it is a problem. thanks for the comments.
 
Have a neighbor a few miles from me that raises alfalfa to sell to a lot of dairies, even some in other states. He has real good quality alfalfa, with very little of any other grass mixed in. I am not sure what he gets for it, but he makes a living at it, and gets around 6 cuttings a year, not 3 like in Colorado where I am from.
 
Not much pasture land rented near me, land is too valuable to rent for row crops, anywhere from$100.00 to $200.00 per acre. Most pastures are more marginal land, with thin topsoil, or hilly rough terrain. There is a community pasture a few miles away, were the topsoil is thin and best suited to grazing. I understand it is mostly young cattle on the pasture. They are weighed in and weighed out, and the renter pays so much per pound of gain. I have no experience with this myself. The pasture manager looks after the livestock.
 
Thanks, for the input. The cattle owner has full access to my pasture, they are his cows and if he wants to check on them every day that is fine with me. If there are any concerns he can call me or stop by and let me know, I take care of everything right away.
 
I do everything! I take care of all the fencing, provide the water, and keep an eye on the cows when he is not here. If some can't afford good pasture then maybe they shouldn't be running cows.
 
Wow, 6 cuttings on alfalfa.

Here you get 3. Some cut early and make 4, but ends up about the same volume you might gain a little quality.

We have been way too wet for 4 years, even those who wrap bales have struggled to make good hay, and wreck the fields doing so.

Grass hay is historically high priced as it?s been so difficult to make good quality stuff.

Lots of volume, lots of rotten hay made just to get it out of the way.

Typically a heavy might be wet or over ripe first grass cutting, and a drier lighter high quality second grass cutting. The past 4 years the first cutting is a wet mess, the second cutting has been wet and poorly timed as well.

Paul
 
Here you can run a pair per acre even more in spring, a dry August would set you back. So, 45 cents a head a day is $80-100 an acre. Pasture is only on junk land, rocky or gravel or too wet. Something you can?t grow corn on.

Up to $100 an acre on junk ground is pretty good income here.

With you maintaining the fences and water that certainly is a premium setup and should be on the higher end for where you are.

We are row crops here, cattle is small time hobby to use waste land. Serious cattle setups the state encourages monoslope roofs and feedlots and controlled manure. Is what it is.

Paul
 
I wish I could run 1 pair per acre. Out here it is so dry in the summer and NO rain. We only run 1 pair for every 10 acres. The only water is when the rain comes in Late Nov. or first part of Dec. That's why we need the run off ponds to have water in them before we can bring in cows. Some times I will fill my 300gal. water tank for a while but can't always because the temp. goes below freezing and would cause more trouble than it is worth. I am thinking about making a really big run off pond so it should have water in it year round. Was even thinking about using some of the water if it is big enough to flood irrigate some of the pasture in the summer. The one I have now is about 1/2 acre, and dries up around Sept. If I could run 1 pair per acre, @.45 per pair that would be equivalent to $4.50 for 10 acres. Now you are talking a lot more money. That is over 2 times the money I am getting now. It's good to have comments, and it gives me a better idea for what I can do. thanks..Phil
 
Yeah, I know, I couldn't believe it, like you, where I'm from in Colorado we got just 3 cuttings, and that was it, and hoped we could get it baled before it got rained on. This guy applies a lot of fertilizer and a lot of sprinkler time to get these cuttings. In the summer, with the real warm weather and a lot of water he gets a lot of alfalfa. Don't know what his prices are but he makes a good living at it, and has paid help doing it. Phil
 
When I was renting pasture (farm where I live, my mom inherited from dad, she has dementia so I didnt want to invest a lot on it until I saw if we'd have to sell or not. Now that she's passed and I'm the sole owner I'm making some changes. )

I charged $150 per momma cow per year, they kept cows here year round, and I paid the water bill (city water), bush hogged twice, and sprayed once every 3 years. Payable in 2 installments, minimum charge based on 3 acres per cow. Hay had to be purchased from me as well, and I took care of the feeding. I figured that the total cost was between 60 and 70% of the value of the calves, any less and I might as well buy the cows myself. Now horses are a different story, $1800 per mare or gelding per year in monthly installments of $150. 4 bush hoggings per year, I pay the water bill, furnish a run in shed, and the hay comes from me. Squares they feed, rounds I feed.

I stopped renting for cows a little over a year ago. Fences were getting pretty bad and its easier to rebuild fence without them here. Plus, neither of us was making enough to fool with. I'm adding horse pasture and going to move my replacement heifers in on the rest of the ground. As I fill horse pastures I'll add more and keep cutting cow numbers.
 
i Agree but there comes a point when it?s no longer worth it to pay more money than the cattle make unless you are some hotshot doctor or lawyer who needs to write off some money . Farmers have no way to pass their added cost of production to the customer yet the price for everything I do goes up every other time I go to town.
 
SV, keep the price down by not going to town every other time. Just go every time. That is why we don't have cows anymore. Make more boarding horses and selling hay.
 
Sounds like a good idea . I do pretty good on my cattle eventually like to get enough to utilize all the pasture instead of having to lease it out I do pretty good on pasture lease but I?d like to not Have to deal with anyone at the same time and if they were all my cattle the last I?d would make me still more money
 

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