Argh - hay!

[AliceandtheGinormousBaps]

Struggling to find small bales of hay now. My hayman has got none in, may have 20 coming at the weekend.

Seriously, why is there less and less each year? Is there some great hay conspiracy going on that i am not aware of?

Mean to add that it is about £5/£6 a bale here and they reckon it will be £9 after christmas

my mum cant get any either (suffolk) and has taken to buying huge bales of haylege stuff for her sheeps

I'm in suffolk too

I used to always get huge bales of hay, can still get them, but the yard we are at now has no room for big ones. Can pm you if you want the number of big bale man

My mum saw some small bales advertised for £10 each the other day . We've been buying bits and pieces of hay wherever we can for months now so we've managed to build up a stock although it's a bit of a mixture. The two huge bales have had to go outside under tarpaulin which isn't ideal but the best we can do.
I've read that the police are advising people to cut the strings on hay bales to make them harder to steal!

It's all gone hay crazy! What seems to have happened is that the rumour started that because of the weather this summer, hay would be in short supply. To an extent it was. People then started to panic buy hay, and the hay merchants put up prices to take advantage. The more people bought, the less available and the higher the prices. It's wild here on Essex/Suffolk border. The high prices are encouraging people to steal it. Rounds or hestons are advisable at the moment, as they are hard to steal, but you run the risk of buying an eight foot Heston bale and discovering it's full of crap like i did last year! Cutting the string is the other way to stop theft.

It's definitely gone hay bananas here too (Berkshire).

The weather meant hay producers round here were only able to get one cut of the stuff this year so 1/2 their normal output. On top of that maize (for example) didn't grow as well so farmers are resorting to other feedstuffs (hay) to feed their cattle over the winter.

Fingers crossed for better weather next year so we can go back to paying normal prices again!!!

We spent £50 on a big bale a couple of months ago only to find it was rank when we cut it open. Luckily the farmer agreed to change it but said he couldn't collect it as we'd cut the strings. So we had to press-gang my step-dad with his ropey old trailer to ferry it back to the farm a bit at a time. What a palaver!

There are less small bales around anyway, because it is much more cost effective for farmers to make big bales.

ALice if you could PM me his number that would be fab - thank you

big shortage here.

..one reason I have been told.. I would appreciate knowing if its true, is that Defra are giving farmers grants to 'retun land to nature' or someting, so that farmers get more for letting land do nothing as opposed to farm it.

I know of a few people who have been kicked of grazing land for ponies due to this.

Other reason was lack of rain in Spring, those who I know made hay made a lot less than normal.

I think you mean the countryside stewardship scheme. It means that on arable headlands are much wider (10ft I think) and poaching of land by horses is frowned upon and could result in a loss of grant. It is about making sure farmland (which is an environmental desert most of the time) is more wildlife friendly, rather than mothballing it, as in set aside.

Around here there was only 1 cut of hay and not 2 as in a normal year, due to lack of rain at the right times. I think the hay that cut was good quality but fairly sparse too.

Yes, farmers can get more to leave the land fallow (reform of Common Agricultural Policy)rather than rent it out to grazing but hay can, depending on the acreage, pay. In Yorkshire we managed to get 2 cuts but the price has still gone up.

Last year big round bales were £20, this year I can't get hold of any!

My shettie has got a wee touch of lami from green hay as I couldn't stockpile enough old hay .I had to drive 150 miles at the weekend in the snow just to pick up some 2 year old hay from a distant acquaintance so the shettie won't starve as I couldnt keep giving her green hay and all the taps have frozen so I can't soak it! The things we do for our horses!

Hay up X4 on last years price.....my livery has just jumped up £10 per week to cover it as I'm on full livery, ouch. Good luck!

Our yard owners boyfriend is an agricultural conctractor and so supplies all our hay at a decent price..and luckily he makes sure we stay supplied as he struggles to supply some of his contract yards. There are some big polo yards around here too. We are on the BERKS, BUCKS, OXON corner and he was getting calls from IRELAND from yards desperate for hay earlier on the autumn. I think we only got one cut this year too.

Look at it this way, the hay yields were down this year. My hay man got just over 30% of his normal cut. So of course the prices are higher, they've got to live. I don't agree think that it's profiteering. I get hay from two different sources, and both have protected their regular customers, not allowing any bulk buying, or newcomers coming in and buying up stocks. However, the hay is more expensive than last year, which I can completely understand.

£10 small bale? That is INSANE. I feel a complete breakdown coming on but will save it until I'm off this train.

Alice we (horses anyway) are poss moving closer to bury st eds (woolpit ish) so if your man delivers there might be good to have his number when you have spare minute?

There's no evidence that the person actually managed to sell it for that amount, it was just an ad my mum saw so don't faint just yet. Mind you, I expect some people might be getting desperate enough .

I am shocked - as are you all.

Don't we hear this every year though?