A common joke of the times was: Two dairy farmers are talking about the merits of the Jersey versus the Holstein. The Holstein dairyman would say, “You can put a dime in the bottom of the milk pail and then milk your little Jersey cow into the pail, and when you are finished, you can still see the dime!”
The dairyman milking Jerseys would say, “And you can put that same dime in the bottom of the pail and milk your Holstein cow in that pail and fill it to the top. Then look through the thin, watery milk, and you can still see the dime!”
One of the things I remember Don Tobler saying was that it was not as important to do something as it was to do that something when it needed to be done.
Consider the correct time to cut, rake and bale hay. Timing is everything. All hay is supreme at one point in time.
When we are born we have the hallway of life before us, with all the doors open. As we start making decisions, some of those doors start to close.
Some events not of our making close the doors of opportunity – for example my cousin, Don Jensen, joined the Air Force. He had in mind to become a pilot.
His vision disqualified him from that opportunity. He made a career out of the Air Force without ever flying a plane. A rain shower on hay does not ruin it. It just adds to the challenge of putting it up.
At harvest time, hay growers watch the weather report, looking for a window of opportunity that will allow them time to get a crop of hay cut and baled and stacked without rain damage.
I once observed two hay growers with neighboring farms. One took a chance on a shorter-than-optimum window and cut his first-cutting alfalfa.
He got some of it in the shed rain-free. Most of it took a shower, after which he baled it with the correct moisture and care to make it the best hay possible.
The end product tested as good dairy hay and that test, plus the proper care raking and baling to maintain leaf retention, got him a top-of-the-market price for the hay.
He went on to make three more cuttings, all cut at the stage of maturity for the forage to be soft and tender.
His neighbor waited for a better weather window and ended up with first-cutting hay that was coarse and high in fiber. He only got two more cuttings, neither of which was high-test, soft dairy hay.
With a cool, late spring some felt that the window of opportunity had passed for making high-test hay. With the decrease in acreage caused by high wheat and corn prices, it appeared that anything with string around it would be of value.
This creates the phenomenon of higher prices equaling lower quality. This shakes out the real professional hay growers from the also-rans. A professional grower always makes the best hay he can regardless of the challenges of weather.
The forage industry produces feed for all classes of livestock. The needs for each class of livestock vary. The nutritionist will list the feed needs of animals in two categories, maintenance and production.
The maintenance ration needs to keep the animal healthy without getting fat. The pet horse is the prime example here.
Add to the list non-lactating dairy cows and wintering beef cattle. The production ration will go to milking dairy cows, racehorses and other working horses and mules.
The classes of hay that will do well for maintenance are called standard, feeder, utility, etc. If the hay is marketed through a feed store, a bale or a ton at a time, then the purchaser will usually demand a product that also looks nice.
Note that horses, as well as cattle, are color-blind. To aim for this market closes doors of opportunity.
Milking dairy cows, on the other hand, demand forage that is high in protein and low in fiber. The modern milk cow is a marvelous living factory.
With the proper genetics, the more fuel (hay and grain) the cow eats, the more milk produced. The correct balance of fiber and energy in a feed that is palatable to the cow will make lots of milk and maintain a healthy animal.
To aim for this market, note that early cut hay that takes some rain will be better feed than hay cut over-mature that goes up bright and green.
In a year like the 2011 crop year, hay in general is of short supply and expensive. We are not seeing the usual price spread between high-test dairy hay and mediocre-testing hay.
This throws the dairy nutritionists into the game of developing rations that do not need high-quality alfalfa hay as the major part of the ration.
With a plan “B” that works, chances of a dairy later returning to a ration using alfalfa hay as the major ingredient are slim. One more reason to make the highest-quality hay you can.
We could waste a lot of time by trying to place the blame for the high price of forages. The weather was not cooperative, other crops took forage acres, other markets are bidding higher for the same forage, etc.
If this is the last year a forage grower will be in business, then it makes sense to sell to the highest bidder and demand full payment in advance.
If a forage grower will need a market for the next several years, then the strategy will be different. Who has purchased the lion’s share of your hay or forage for the last several years? Are they going to be around next year?
Remember that in a short hay year, users of hay travel farther to find hay and they may not be back the next year. If your neighbor can survive 2011, he will still be there needing feed.
With the upset in the world economy, we may be seeing dramatic inflation. We have it already in some products. Now that $1 worth of diesel fuel costs over $4 and a ton of $125 hay now costs $250, it seems that the value of money has gone down.
Not that long ago, a can of store-brand chili was available at 57 cents a can. Now it’s on sale at $1.25. Money has gone down. If $250 becomes the new “normal” price for dairy hay, expect the costs of growing it to rise even more.
Wages will take a couple of years to catch up, which will put us all in a higher tax bracket, which is the only way the government realistically has to pay the interest on the national debt.
So what doors of opportunity do we have open at this point? If we follow the flock and “go for tonnage rather than quality,” we limit our markets.
If the feed store market goes stagnant, then there is limited market for green hay with no test. High-quality hay is always in demand.
Compare it to the car business. Have you ever heard of a dealer offering a new Corvette for sale at a discounted price?
I will admit that a lot of years have seen the top-quality hay sell first for a good price. Later in the season, if there has been a hard winter, feeder hay may be selling for the same price as premium hay sold for months earlier.
In those years the trade-off may only be that the growers of the premium hay do not have to deal with snowdrifts and muddy bottom bales. Notice that the growers with the premium hay have no need to advertise “Hay for Sale.”
Plant more hay. When the country realizes what an all-around disaster subsidized ethanol is, the price of corn could drop enough to break some of those writing the big-dollar contracts.
The marketing of forages remains more of a regional undertaking. Unless this country is going to become vegetarian, there will be a market for all classes of livestock feed. Early in 2011, I made the statement that this year would be a wild ride. Partner, it isn’t over yet!
Do not let the door of opportunity close that identifies you as a producer of top-quality hay. If you make the quality, the buyers will come early. FG
