Hay prices in Saskatchewan are going up as producers see a poor crop ahead.
Last week there were reports of hay going for more than $100 a ton. The 10-year average for alfalfa hay is $61 a ton, said provincial forage specialist Michel Tremblay.
So far, prices are not climbing in Manitoba or Alberta, but that could change if the dry weather continues.
“People are laying in supplies,” Tremblay said. “Producers have found themselves short the last couple of years.”
There is no carryover of supply after cold winters in 1997 and 1996 and a below-average yield last year. And with some cattle producers feeding hay right now in an attempt to preserve dry pastures, the limited supply is in demand.
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“In the last 15 to 20 years these are some of the highest prices we’ve ever seen,” Tremblay said.
Prices haven’t kept pace with the cost of production so high prices are good news for people with hay to sell, he added.
“If we get six inches of rain in the next six weeks we’ll more or less be able to recover. If we don’t, then it’s going to be a seller’s market.”
Gordon Hutton, forage specialist with Alberta Agriculture in Airdrie, said hay prices in that province depend largely on the dryland crop in the Barrhead area northwest of Edmonton.
“It’s very inexpensive, about $30 to $40 a ton,” he said. “That hay supply has dried up. Prices could really jump.”
But Hutton doesn’t think prices will go through the roof. Alberta hay prices generally range from $75 to $90 a ton, with higher quality alfalfa going for $90 or more.
Hay buyer Kent Warnica, of Wilbur Ellis in Lethbridge, said he last bought round bales of good quality, 18-percent-protein alfalfa at $60 a ton, picked up at the farm.
“Right now nobody is buying,” Warnica said, because there was good supply and a warm winter. “The last three years there was no carryover. Now a lot of farmers still have half their supply sitting there. Anybody that could afford to sit on it is.”
In Manitoba, extension agrologist Roy Arnott said he has heard of very little hay changing hands.
“A lot of guys still have reasonable hay supplies with good carryover and straw,” he said from Killarney.
