Green feed or grain?

[charliep]

Just a note to get everyone (including those in better areas) to include green feed in the decision mix when you are crop scouting. Look at the value of grain you will get off the crop (plus straw if you can bale) minus the cost of harvesting (maybe only at the variable cost level). This should provide the value of the crop that you could sell crop as green feed to a neighbor for.

Realizing that a lot of you don't like to sell straw (want the organic matter), baling straw is something else that needs to be looked at as well.

Realizing that the grain industry is also in trouble, taking appropriate steps to look after one of your most important customers - local livestock industry - is critical this year. Between imported corn and grain pulled from export markets, livestock energy and protein needs can be met. Fibre needs are the most critical.

Any other issues that need to thought about in this decision. Just to help me, rotary combines don't work with putting up straw?

[TOM4CWB]

Charlie,

On straw, it looks like 30/t in the windrow will be easy to acheive in a 100 mile radius of Edmonton, if anyone has wheat straw for sale, give me a call at 1-866-Tom4CWB toll free.

Rotor straw can be used, in processors, as well as for bedding it works ok, but there is less yeild compared to a conventional combine... maybe 50% if it is real dry when grain combined.

Normally rotary straw is not as desirable, but this year anything goes, as choice is not avaliable...

[melvill]

Tom, just curious and no experience with "rotor" straw. In your opinion, why isn't it as desirable as straw from conventional combines?

[rodbradshaw]

Rotary Straw
The only problem with rotary combined straw is the fact that you have to be right behind the combine or you can't bale it as well as straw from a conventional combine. We prefered rotary straw as we could spread it much easier.

[TOM4CWB]

Lee,

For some applications straw length is important, the longer the straw the better, ie. mushroom composting.

Certainly straw yield is much higher with a conventional, and therefore much easier to bale... many round balers won't start a bale on skimpy ground up straw, and therefore a big square baler needs to be used instead.

[cowman]

Rotary straw is a real pain. It is chewed up so much a lot of it falls through the belts and pickup on the baler. You have to use a lot more twine. It is so chopped up cows tend to bloat or get impacted if they eat too much. Avoid it if at all possible...unfortunately beggars can't be choosers in this drought.

[sewen]

At $30/ton on the ground this would put a round bale at approximately $60 to $70 per bale. Nothing like sticking it to your neighbour in their time of need.

[TOM4CWB]

Sewen,

I guess it is the rationing process it looks like $65-75/t in central AB could be reasonable, considering hay at $135/t.

Since there is about 2 big as you can get stuffed round bales in a tonne, this is $35/1100 lb. bale, which is not out of line at all considering all the extra work to get the bales this year...

I went to Taber tonite, looks like lots of poorer quality cow hay will be avaliable that has rain on it...

I couldn't believe the number of hay semis going north on 36, maybe a hundred on my trip I met or past!!!

[cowman]

I don't think $60/ton is unreasonable for straw this year. You might have to run the baler a mile to get one bale! Are you sticking it to your neighbor? Don't forget the grain farmer in the drought areas is not going to be getting rich on his grain this year. I doubt he will get his costs back. If $60/ton straw helps him break even is this so bad? No one forces you to pay this price. There are alternatives like selling your cows? I think a lot of people need to sit down and really do some deep soul searching. Look at it from a business sense and realize that the cow/calf business is a big time loser. If you can stand the loss(and maybe continue to stand the loss for a long time) then go for it, if that is your desire.
Another thing to consider is this: Say a farmer has some barley or might get a crop. The price is rising and he might just be able to break even or make a little profit. Then what happens...in comes the corn...end of the rising prices! It happened last fall and it's happening again. Is this fair? I know we need the corn if the feeding industry is to survive but make no mistake, it is at the expense of our feed grain producer. I have a friend who was in a very dry area last year. Poor yields but he had some decent barley. Needed about $3.50/bu. to break even due to the low yield. When the price got to about $3.20 in came the subsidized corn! The price pretty well stayed right there and he didn't break even. Now was that fair to him?

[sewen]

Sorry TOM4CWB got my numbers a bit mixed up there, must be the heat. 30 dollars a tonne on the ground plus the cost of baling this year would peg a bale at $25 to $30. Not quite as bad.

But I still don't think the concept of farmers helping farmers would be such a bad idea. Especially anyone with crop insurance who is covered for the crop could still sell his straw but maybe at resonable prices. The cattle industry in north central Alta & Sask has one or two feet in the grave maybe we should reach out and pull them out instead of throwing dirt on them.

[charliep]

sewen

I agree that we need to work cooperatively as an industry to get us through an ugly year. No one will profit from this one.

As a grain guy, I note the following.

Short term - High prices reflecting the feed shortage.

Medium term (1 to 2 years) - reduction of cow herd/reduced calf crop spring 2003 will significantly reduce barley consumption. We are likely to get into heifer retention mode and this will impact demand as well. There are other value added type markets for barley but not enough to replace the amount that would be consumed by these cattle. If barley acres increased next spring or the year after and mother nature cooperated to give good yields, western Canada would likely be in a situation of having to sell on the world market again.

Long term (3 plus years) - People that are at the end of their farming career will not get back into cattle. Those in the middle of their farming career will do a lot of head scratching and compare feeding cows to other off farm employment opportunities. It will take some time to build this cow herd again. At the same time, we have all the thunder clouds around the normal cattle cycle, increasing hog/chicken numbers, country of origin labeling enactment, health/food security issues, etc., etc. etc.

Within the realities of the current years drought situation, the more we can do to retain our cow herd the better. Others thoughts.

[TOM4CWB]

Sewen,

I couldn't agree more, for this is obviously not a bed of roses for anyone... and I do believe as was shown on CBC that farmers are infact doing exactly as you say they should...

Every field I cut for feed reduces my yield and makes our grain industry appear less reliable to the outside world. This in turn will increase world production of competitive grains, and hurt us when our production returns to normal, as our markets then have been fillied by someone else, and we will have to lower the price of our future grain production even more to get back the sales...

This is a complete disaster, and it will take years for the whole Ag economy to recover...

One can see why Sask. is shrinking and in the financial problems they are in, and why a historically a civilisation falls apart when this type of disaster happens...

[TOM4CWB]

Charliep I have been a little busy lately making my pickup reels on my headers into bat reels. Can you give me information on the crop in the USA and anyother spots in the world that are having a production problem at the present time.

[TOM4CWB]

Kernel,

I see Keho has duck foot fingers, what exactly did you do to your pickup fingers to fill them in???

[TOM4CWB]

Charlie,

I can't believe how badly barley has done in the last couple of weeks...

I looked at a neighbours field, and the barley plants averaged 7" tall with an average of 7 kernels per head, but only 2/3rds of the plants have heads that have not aborted.

I can't see how this field could average over 8bu/ac, if a person can go this low... and we have lots of rocks 4-6"... this will be a lost cause for both green feed and grain...

Most barley crops have turned white in the past week, where the wheat is turning golden, and seems to be handling the stress, especially now it has cooled off.

The better peas crops are 8-10" with 3-4pods per plant with an average of 3 peas per pod...

If a person could pull the plants out by the roots, it wouldn't be too bad, but it is not easy getting the forage harvesters to work well with such a small amount of material. The big newer self propelled machines have problems shooting it into the trucks when it is so light...