Originally Posted by R Leo

...start with a large one.



First of all, we don't do our own hay, we buy it...more efficient for us to keep grazing pastures rather than take them out of production for hay. And, to answer your question, we purchase both round and square. Rounds for the cows, traditional squares for the horse.

There's nothing romantic about square bales. They're nothing but work and the hotter it is, the heavier they get.

A horse would eat until it fell over dead so we ration hay to the nag and her donkey-pal Hillary. I bought 400 nice squares a few years ago for a song and have been feeding them to the equines since then. A couple of 3-4" flakes off of the bale is a day's ration for them when they're just standing around in the paddock. Working, the horse would need more.

With the drought here in Tejas, cow hay has gone through the roof. A 1200lb round bale is going for over $110 now and that's hay of debatable value. A month ago, I bought some improved coastal bermudagrass hay from a friend for $85/bale and it tested barely more than 6% crude protein. Cow hay should be 11-12% since with cows, anything less than about 6.5% CP and you have to supplement with protein.

With that behind me, and I'm having to supply protein supplement anyway, I decided to buy what's called 'corn stover'...the leaves and stalks left after the combines harvest the corn cobs. In times like we're having, the corn farmers will have contractors come in to cut and bale the stover on shares. I'm getting it for $65/bale (1400# bales) delivered, $52.50/bale if I haul it.

Stover is about 5.5%CP.

We've already started feeding hay with a demand of around 5 bales/wk so I bought 175 bales to get us through to April and then some.

$11k of feed and no end to the drought in sight, Berry Hill Farm pasture raised beef could be a pricy item next year.