Roanoke Valley Farmers See Strong Prices in Hay Market
Posted on: Tuesday, 17 January 2006, 21:01 CST
By Rob Johnson, The Roanoke Times, Va.
Jan. 17--Prices for "horse-quality" hay -- field cuttings rich in protein and relatively free of dust -- are strong in the Roanoke Valley this winter, as memories of the fall harvest fade and spring is still far away.
Winter is the time when many farmers who have extra hay to sell see demand pick up, and this year could be better than average for them.
That's partly because the ice storm in December "hurt some livestock that couldn't get to the ground, and some people are feeding early, more than in past years," said Wayne Goff, a Floyd County farmer who stored about 17,000 square bales of 55 to 60 pounds each last fall.
He's advertising the best of that, his second annual cutting of hay, taken late last summer, for $4.50 a bale. Goff's cheaper hay, from his first cutting in May and June, is priced at $3.50 a bale. That's barely up from what he charged last year, but most of his clientele are longtime customers.
For livestock owners without steady suppliers who must brave the open market, hay prices are up by as much as 20 percent.
"My prices are up because my costs are up," said Tristan Ziegler, a hay broker in Green Spring, W.Va., who has some customers in the Roanoke area.
"Delivering the hay is part of the problem. I'm paying $2.40 a gallon for diesel fuel, compared with $1.75 last year. That makes a big difference. My prices are up more than my profit."
Another price factor: Prices of the string he uses to bind the bales are up.
"I hear it's the Chinese buying up the resin that goes into making the string," said Ziegler.
Most of Ziegler's Roanoke-area customers are horse owners. Horses have more delicate digestive systems than cattle, and require higher-grade hay. His current price: $4.75 a bale.
That can get expensive for his customers. A typical horse of say, 1,100 pounds, eats in the range of 1.5 percent to 2.5 percent of its body weight daily, according to agronomists. Thus such a horse consumes about 4,000 pounds, or two tons, of hay or other food in a typical period of six months.
The amounts being charged by Goff and Ziegler are for relatively gourmet hay. You can buy much cheaper from the likes of Steve Agee, a part-time farmer in Floyd who also works as a salesman of educational software. He's charging a mere $2 a bale for so-called "mixed grass" hay. "I'm just getting into this," Agee said of his hay business.
And he makes no brash claims of his hay's quality. "I really don't know what's in it. Some clover, I do know."
-----
To see more of The Roanoke Times, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.roanoke.com.
Copyright (c) 2006, The Roanoke Times, Va.
Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.
For information on republishing this content, contact us at (800) 661-2511 (U.S.), (213) 237-4914 (worldwide), fax (213) 237-6515, or e-mail reprints@krtinfo.com.
Source: The Roanoke Times
Related Articles
- Oprah, We Hear You: A Local Women's Accessory Manufacturer Takes Care of His Customers in Good Times and Bad
- Avista Requesting to Lower Natural Gas Prices for Washington and Idaho Customers for Second Time This Year
- MedAvant Converts Thousands of Customers to Real-Time Claims Processing Engine and Rolls Out Virtual Call Center Technology
- Ore Prices Made Strong Showing in 2005: MINING:Prices Were Up Nearly 72 Percent Last Year.
- Why Are Gas Prices Climbing? / Economic Growth in Uncertain Times Seems to Be a Factor
- Gas Prices Below $2 a Gallon for the First Time in Months
- Roanoke Gas Files With SCC for 3 Percent Price Reduction
- UK Gas Prices to Rise By 14 Percent
- Heating Oil Customers Taking More Time to Pay, Dealers Find
- Ohio Consumers' Counsel: Approval of Plan for Cincinnati Bell Will Likely Result in Higher Prices for Many Customers
 |
 |
User Comments (0)
RSS Feeds