Growing corn for feed

[TexasBred]

Screw growing corn for feed, when I can buy 16% pellets with 5% fat for $142 a ton. And I'll only have about 6 hours of time invested in it. My way of thinking is a ton of pellets is about equal to growing 50 - 60 bushel to acre of corn, without any risk or tractor time. Growing your own corn for stockers makes good sense, but to supplement fair hay doesn't pencil out for the cow calf operation.

Wow, never heard of prices like that since the 90's. Would like to see an analysis on that feed. Fat alone would cost almost $40 and most of the remainder would be filler with enough urea and plant protein to bring it up to 16%. The hay might be better than the feed.

 

[True Grit Farms]

Screw growing corn for feed, when I can buy 16% pellets with 5% fat for $142 a ton. And I'll only have about 6 hours of time invested in it. My way of thinking is a ton of pellets is about equal to growing 50 - 60 bushel to acre of corn, without any risk or tractor time. Growing your own corn for stockers makes good sense, but to supplement fair hay doesn't pencil out for the cow calf operation.

Wow, never heard of prices like that since the 90's. Would like to see an analysis on that feed. Fat alone would cost almost $40 and most of the remainder would be filler with enough urea and plant protein to bring it up to 16%. The hay might be better than the feed.

I thought M5 sent you an analysis break down for your opinion on the quality of the feed? Supposedly it's corn, peanut and soybean byproducts made into a commodity pellet.

 

[TexasBred]

Screw growing corn for feed, when I can buy 16% pellets with 5% fat for $142 a ton. And I'll only have about 6 hours of time invested in it. My way of thinking is a ton of pellets is about equal to growing 50 - 60 bushel to acre of corn, without any risk or tractor time. Growing your own corn for stockers makes good sense, but to supplement fair hay doesn't pencil out for the cow calf operation.

Wow, never heard of prices like that since the 90's. Would like to see an analysis on that feed. Fat alone would cost almost $40 and most of the remainder would be filler with enough urea and plant protein to bring it up to 16%. The hay might be better than the feed.

I thought M5 sent you an analysis break down for your opinion on the quality of the feed? Supposedly it's corn, peanut and soybean byproducts made into a commodity pellet.

Grit you folks must have a totally different market than over this way. Heck I don't know one single ingredient that would go into a feed that would cost that little other than something like rice hulls or peanut hulls and even they are $50 a ton delivered. Every other ingredient is $130 a ton and up. Cottonseed meal more like $265 a ton.

 

[Lucky_P]

Another strategy... planting corn for summer grazing...I don't know how this would compare to the sudan/sudex hybrids, but the following was proposed to me about 10 years back by a retired UofKY Extension agent who worked extensively with producers doing management-intensive grazing.

"Consider drilling in corn (2 bushels of bin-run corn/acre with approx 70 actual units of N/acre) for summer grazing (we can plant corn in late Apr/early May and in 80-90 days have the corn ready for grazing - 160,000 plant population/acre will give you tremendous carrying capacity). "

 

[True Grit Farms]

Screw growing corn for feed, when I can buy 16% pellets with 5% fat for $142 a ton. And I'll only have about 6 hours of time invested in it. My way of thinking is a ton of pellets is about equal to growing 50 - 60 bushel to acre of corn, without any risk or tractor time. Growing your own corn for stockers makes good sense, but to supplement fair hay doesn't pencil out for the cow calf operation.

Hi Grit, where do you get your feed pellets? Much interested...

Thanks,

Tim

AFG Feed , 717 w Crawford st , donalsonville GA. 39845 229-524-1348

 

[HDRider]

Wow, never heard of prices like that since the 90's. Would like to see an analysis on that feed. Fat alone would cost almost $40 and most of the remainder would be filler with enough urea and plant protein to bring it up to 16%. The hay might be better than the feed.

I thought M5 sent you an analysis break down for your opinion on the quality of the feed? Supposedly it's corn, peanut and soybean byproducts made into a commodity pellet.

Grit you folks must have a totally different market than over this way. Heck I don't know one single ingredient that would go into a feed that would cost that little other than something like rice hulls or peanut hulls and even they are $50 a ton delivered. Every other ingredient is $130 a ton and up. Cottonseed meal more like $265 a ton.

I'd pay a between $185 (non pellet) to $235 (pellet) for it here.

 

[TexasBred]

I thought M5 sent you an analysis break down for your opinion on the quality of the feed? Supposedly it's corn, peanut and soybean byproducts made into a commodity pellet.

Grit you folks must have a totally different market than over this way. Heck I don't know one single ingredient that would go into a feed that would cost that little other than something like rice hulls or peanut hulls and even they are $50 a ton delivered. Every other ingredient is $130 a ton and up. Cottonseed meal more like $265 a ton.

I'd pay a between $185 (non pellet) to $235 (pellet) for it here.

I just formulate one for the heck of it....16/5 with an extremely low TDN of 55%....ingredient cost alone for this area was $165 a ton. Nothing added for milling, pelleting, bagging or profit. I think I'm living in the wrong part of the country. lol

 

[HDRider]

TB, it is hard to know what I am really getting. People have been known to lie.

 

[True Grit Farms]

Grit you folks must have a totally different market than over this way. Heck I don't know one single ingredient that would go into a feed that would cost that little other than something like rice hulls or peanut hulls and even they are $50 a ton delivered. Every other ingredient is $130 a ton and up. Cottonseed meal more like $265 a ton.

I'd pay a between $185 (non pellet) to $235 (pellet) for it here.

I just formulate one for the heck of it....16/5 with an extremely low TDN of 55%....ingredient cost alone for this area was $165 a ton. Nothing added for milling, pelleting, bagging or profit. I think I'm living in the wrong part of the country. lol

I'm going down tomorrow to get a wagon full of feed and I'll get a feed analysis then. I'm also going to send a sample off to UGA and have one done on the feed I actually buy. I was told again that the feed is guaranteed to test 14+% protein and 4% fat. He told me again that the feed will test better than 16% protein and 5% fat, but they won't guarantee that. I don't know what the TDN is and forgot to ask, but the price is $145 a ton picked up tomorrow. M5 says his cows do really good on this feed.

 

[TexasBred]

I'm going down tomorrow to get a wagon full of feed and I'll get a feed analysis then. I'm also going to send a sample off to UGA and have one done on the feed I actually buy. I was told again that the feed is guaranteed to test 14+% protein and 4% fat. He told me again that the feed will test better than 16% protein and 5% fat, but they won't guarantee that. I don't know what the TDN is and forgot to ask, but the price is $145 a ton picked up tomorrow. M5 says his cows do really good on this feed.

Grit are you buying this from a feed mill or elevator?? Can't believe the state allows anyone to sell without a true guaranteed analysis on the product....I'd be more interested in the ingredients in it than the test results.

 

[ga.prime]

You can buy corn for well below the cost of growing your own.

 

[True Grit Farms]

I'm going down tomorrow to get a wagon full of feed and I'll get a feed analysis then. I'm also going to send a sample off to UGA and have one done on the feed I actually buy. I was told again that the feed is guaranteed to test 14+% protein and 4% fat. He told me again that the feed will test better than 16% protein and 5% fat, but they won't guarantee that. I don't know what the TDN is and forgot to ask, but the price is $145 a ton picked up tomorrow. M5 says his cows do really good on this feed.

Grit are you buying this from a feed mill or elevator?? Can't believe the state allows anyone to sell without a true guaranteed analysis on the product....I'd be more interested in the ingredients in it than the test results.

I'm having problems putting the words to what I'm wanting to say...again. The feed is GUARANTEED to test at least 14% protein and 4% fat. The mill says it will test better, more like 16% protein and 5% fat, but they WON'T guarantee that.

 

[pricefarm]

I grow my own corn and pick it and grind to feed my calves and cows some. This is what it cost me this year to raise 2.5 acres. Corn seed was 238$ fertilizer was 345$ spray was 101$. So that's 684$ not including time and diesel fuel. Of that 2.5 acres I picked right at 400 bushels. So that's around 1.71$ per bushel. I have all the equipment to do it and it doesn't take that much time and I enjoy doing it.

 

[shaz]

I grow my own corn and pick it and grind to feed my calves and cows some. This is what it cost me this year to raise 2.5 acres. Corn seed was 238$ fertilizer was 345$ spray was 101$. So that's 684$ not including time and diesel fuel. Of that 2.5 acres I picked right at 400 bushels. So that's around 1.71$ per bushel. I have all the equipment to do it and it doesn't take that much time and I enjoy doing it.

Could you put down a lot of chicken litter prior to planting and not have to top dress it with nitrogen later?
Say 2 tons to the acre would give 120lbs actual nitrogen approximately and right around 50lbs phosphate and 40 potash.

Would that work?

 

[Son of Butch]

$684 = $274 acre... not including...
diesel fuel, spring tillage, planting, harvesting, drying/storage, fall plowing... so actual cost closer to
$800 or $320 acre to produce 160 bushels = $2.00 bushel

And either land rent or ownership costs would still need to be included to calculate true cost.
180 rent + 320 production = $500 divided by 160 = 3.12 bushel breakeven
180 rent + 274 = $454 = 2.84 bushel breakeven

Elevator is paying 2.85 (basis 55 cents under Chicago) processed and sold as feed 3.85 bushel (45 cents over Chicago)

 

[pricefarm]

$684 = $274 acre... not including...
diesel fuel, spring tillage, planting, harvesting, drying/storage, fall plowing... so actual cost closer to
$800 or $320 acre to produce 160 bushels = $2.00 bushel

And either land rent or ownership costs would still need to be included to calculate true cost.
180 rent + 320 production = $500 divided by 160 = 3.12 bushel breakeven
180 rent + 274 = $454 = 2.84 bushel breakeven

Elevator is paying 2.85 (basis 55 cents under Chicago) processed and sold as feed 3.85 bushel (45 cents over Chicago)

That's probably about right. But I don't sell any I feed it all. If I could buy it for 3.85 a bushel I would. Around here shelled corn is selling for around 10$ per 100.

 

[pricefarm]

I grow my own corn and pick it and grind to feed my calves and cows some. This is what it cost me this year to raise 2.5 acres. Corn seed was 238$ fertilizer was 345$ spray was 101$. So that's 684$ not including time and diesel fuel. Of that 2.5 acres I picked right at 400 bushels. So that's around 1.71$ per bushel. I have all the equipment to do it and it doesn't take that much time and I enjoy doing it.

Could you put down a lot of chicken litter prior to planting and not have to top dress it with nitrogen later?
Say 2 tons to the acre would give 120lbs actual nitrogen approximately and right around 50lbs phosphate and 40 potash.

Would that work?

It might work not sure I don't have any experience with chicken litter. I do spread some cow manure on it every year.

 

[True Grit Farms]

I grow my own corn and pick it and grind to feed my calves and cows some. This is what it cost me this year to raise 2.5 acres. Corn seed was 238$ fertilizer was 345$ spray was 101$. So that's 684$ not including time and diesel fuel. Of that 2.5 acres I picked right at 400 bushels. So that's around 1.71$ per bushel. I have all the equipment to do it and it doesn't take that much time and I enjoy doing it.

If I could grow that much corn to the acre on dry land around here I'd be a local legend. The best farmers on the best years are lucky to see 100 bu to the acre here. Feed corn cost me $4.50 - $5.00 a bushel around here by the wagon load.

 

[shaz]

I'm sure he's talking about 400 bushels including ear. Not 400 bushels of kernel.

 

[True Grit Farms]

I'm sure he's talking about 400 bushels including ear. Not 400 bushels of kernel.

I figured that also but a bushel is figured on volume, and a bushel of ear corn is heavier than a bushel of whole corn.