Renting ground for hay production

[Bigfoot]

I have never rented ground for making hay. I have cut hay on the shares, a third and two thirds is the best trade I’ll make. Normally, I buy the other man’s third in the field for $25-30 a roll. It makes for expensive hay, when it’s all said and done. That day is gone for me either way, because everything I was cutting has been lost to row crop. It’s all gone.

Here’s the problem here. Every single solitary speck of ground is either in row crop, or the CRP program. I “hear” the banks have cut back on operating loans for cash rent. My sources say, they won’t the farmers to put crops out on the shares. I couldn’t swear any of that will happen, and I can’t promis if it did, it would free up any land.

I’ve ran some numbers, and renting ground for $70 an acre, and planting sudex will make for very expensive hay rolls. I’m talking if you made 4 rolls to the acre having $80 a roll in it. Good year brings the price down of course, and a dry year drives it up. No way those numbers work, not for me any way. Trucking hay in, is equally expensive as well.

What in the world do you plant on rented ground, that makes it feasible?

 

[snoopdog]

I think our climates are comparable, and imo, wheat or oats is gonna be your best bet, but 70 an acre even that's iffy. Is it a long term lease? That could make a difference.

 

[Caustic Burno]

I rented a couple hayfields for years.
They were hayfields.
Now I planted five acres of pearl millet one year and got two fantastic cuttings. Cows loved it what I didn’t like is the drying time.

 

[True Grit Farms]

Can't see planting anything that will work on $70 ground. We pay up to $30 per acre for established hay ground and that's to much.

 

[pricefarm]

I think you would be better off paying 30$ a roll than renting the ground then going to the expense of planting a crop to harvest as hay.

 

[Bigfoot]

I think you would be better off paying 30$ a roll than renting the ground then going to the expense of planting a crop to harvest as hay.

There really hadn’t been any hay here to buy for several years now. I lose ground every year, and hay to buy just seems to get more scarce. It’s almost not about economics, it’s more about availability. Caustic says it best, when he says welfare cattle. I get up that $80 a roll range, and these ladies won’t be making a dime.

 

[pricefarm]

I think you would be better off paying 30$ a roll than renting the ground then going to the expense of planting a crop to harvest as hay.

There really hadn’t been any hay here to buy for several years now. I lose ground every year, and hay to buy just seems to get more scarce. It’s almost not about economics, it’s more about availability. Caustic says it best, when he says welfare cattle. I get up that $80 a roll range, and these ladies won’t be making a dime.

Is there any corn silage around ? Here you can buy corn silage for around 60$ a ton. I wonder how much hay you can replace with corn silage?

 

[Bigfoot]

I think you would be better off paying 30$ a roll than renting the ground then going to the expense of planting a crop to harvest as hay.

There really hadn’t been any hay here to buy for several years now. I lose ground every year, and hay to buy just seems to get more scarce. It’s almost not about economics, it’s more about availability. Caustic says it best, when he says welfare cattle. I get up that $80 a roll range, and these ladies won’t be making a dime.

Is there any corn silage around ? Here you can buy corn silage for around 60$ a ton. I wonder how much hay you can replace with corn silage?

At the moment, there is no corn silage. Amish dairies are quiting milking right and left. They have the equipment and the ground, so that might open as a possibility. I have considered driving to them individually and seeing if an arrangement could be made. Personally, I’d like to keep my dealings with them at zero.

 

[ddd75]

i planted around 3 acres of dwarf sudan right into a existing pasture and got somewhere around 50 rolls.. 4x4's.

 

[ddd75]

been a few years.. i think it was somewhere around that. i got 5 cuttings.

 

[sstterry]

Is there any corn silage around ? Here you can buy corn silage for around 60$ a ton. I wonder how much hay you can replace with corn silage?

This adds nothing to this thread other than to say that growing up it was my job after school to feed about 100 head by hand with corn silage. We stored it in an old cement silo and I had to take a silage fork and throw it out of the silo and then load it in a wheelbarrow and dump it along the feed way. I hated it at the time, but I wish I could go back and do it again.

 

[pricefarm]

Wow feeding silage to 100 head is a lot of shoveling. You must have had a strong back

 

[MtnCows93]

id look into baling corn stalks and having them poured with liquid feed, im pretty sure you would not need a grinder but it would probly pay for itself depending on your numbers. or possibly just feeding the stalks plain and putting out lick tanks for the cows/ creep feeders for the calves. is there any big corn fields nearby you could rent and graze all winter?

 

[Bigfoot]

i planted around 3 acres of dwarf sudan right into a existing pasture and got somewhere around 50 rolls.. 4x4's.

You just burned the pasture down with glyphosate and no till drilled it in? I have lost a few acres to broomsedge, and had contemplated going in with dwarf Sudan. I figure for what it would cost to turn under, fertilize, lime, and reseed that the same amount spent on a Sudan crop in the same place would yield more. I haven’t gotten past the reading about dwarf Sudan though. I think if they named it something different, it’d be grown all over.

 

[Lucky]

It’s looking more and more like feeding a good commodity mix instead of hay is going to be the going thing. I know several that are doing it here and making it work. Seems like 12# a day is what a cow needs. This would put my cost at $1.44 a head. This year it cost me $1.75 to feed hay. I know this is off topic but thought I’d throw it out there.

 

[Caustic Burno]

It’s looking more and more like feeding a good commodity mix instead of hay is going to be the going thing. I know several that are doing it here and making it work. Seems like 12# a day is what a cow needs. This would put my cost at $1.44 a head. This year it cost me $1.75 to feed hay. I know this is off topic but thought I’d throw it out there.

Problem is where does the other 18 lbs come from. Takes 30 pounds to fill a cow up. Otherwise they are walking that 12 lbs off trying to fill a hollow belly.
You can satisfy a cows nutrition needs on 3lbs of feed you still need another 27 pounds of sorry hay to fill her up.

 

[Lucky]

It’s looking more and more like feeding a good commodity mix instead of hay is going to be the going thing. I know several that are doing it here and making it work. Seems like 12# a day is what a cow needs. This would put my cost at $1.44 a head. This year it cost me $1.75 to feed hay. I know this is off topic but thought I’d throw it out there.

Problem is where does the other 18 lbs come from. Takes 30 pounds to fill a cow up. Otherwise they are walking that 12 lbs off trying to fill a hollow belly.
You can satisfy a cows nutrition needs on 3lbs of feed you still need another 27 pounds of sorry hay to fill her up.

I feel the same way CB but it is actually working for theses guys. Couple big operators in the area have been doing it for years with no trouble and now some of the smaller guys are trying it. Friend that runs a around 1,100 hd was really short on hay this yr so decided to try feeding 100 hd nothing but 12 pounds of commodity mix a day as a test. He claims the pasture looks like a table top from last years drought and that set of cows is doing better than any group he has. I’m supposed to go ride through them and see how they look if I get time. I’m guessing he had the ration mixed by the nutritionist at the feed house and the TDN is high. I’d be scared to death to go into winter without any hay but supposedly it’s working. Some are starting to use mixers also but that’s too big of an upfront cost for me. Oh yea he also claimed the cows started calving and are giving more milk than normal.

 

[sstterry]

Wow feeding silage to 100 head is a lot of shoveling. You must have had a strong back

Just young, and other than playing basketball, there was not much else to do.

 

[tom4018]

I rented a couple hayfields for years.
They were hayfields.
Now I planted five acres of pearl millet one year and got two fantastic cuttings. Cows loved it what I didn’t like is the drying time.

Did some pearl millet last year. Good yield, cows ate it good even though it was over mature. Long drying time here also, beat it to death with a tedder.

 

[tom4018]

I have never rented ground for making hay. I have cut hay on the shares, a third and two thirds is the best trade I’ll make. Normally, I buy the other man’s third in the field for $25-30 a roll. It makes for expensive hay, when it’s all said and done. That day is gone for me either way, because everything I was cutting has been lost to row crop. It’s all gone.

Here’s the problem here. Every single solitary speck of ground is either in row crop, or the CRP program. I “hear” the banks have cut back on operating loans for cash rent. My sources say, they won’t the farmers to put crops out on the shares. I couldn’t swear any of that will happen, and I can’t promis if it did, it would free up any land.

I’ve ran some numbers, and renting ground for $70 an acre, and planting sudex will make for very expensive hay rolls. I’m talking if you made 4 rolls to the acre having $80 a roll in it. Good year brings the price down of course, and a dry year drives it up. No way those numbers work, not for me any way. Trucking hay in, is equally expensive as well.

What in the world do you plant on rented ground, that makes it feasible?

A neighbor and myself rented a rough farm a few years. One year we paid $20 an acre and we still ended up with $20-25 a roll in the hay counting fertilizer and baling. We gave it up as it was marginal grass.