We are selling out anything we have that eats hay. Three horses, a milk cow, and a mule. Our land just can't support them on it's own and we have to feed hay all winter and supplement with hay in the summer. We were just informed that next year the man we have been buying hay from is almost doubling the price and i can't blame him! his fuel alone has almost doubled along with the added price of fertilizer has gone up. I added it up in a month already we spend more on the animals food than we do our own!! I will really miss our horses and our cow but we just can't afford them anymore! We will keep our chickens and ducks and a couple of geese but that will be about it. Anyone else in this situation? Be nice if wages went up with the fuel, then maybe we'd be able to keep 'em!
We HAD 7 horses and now we are down to 4 because of the price of hay. And we haul it ourselves. We pick it out of the field ourselves, too. But we were literally spending 4K-5K a year in hay. This year we will spend half that. And we feed year round too. If it gets much higher, guess I'll have to sell a kid!
SO SORRY - We are starting to worry ourselves. The cost of chicken feed has gone up $4.00 a bag for me and bedding has gone up $2.00 a bag. Gas for hubby to go to work is awful - he has a 45 min trip both ways. Our taxes have gone up "NY" Our groceries bill costs me about 25.00 more a week for the same amount. Our heating bill is the worst though. It has almost doubled. :-( I see Several Businesses in town have gone bust this week. There is even going to be another increase in postage in May. Only a penny on a stamp but the Priority and Express are also rising. Our Monthly bills have gone up $300.00 a month and no raise. I could go on but its to depressing :-( Just like most people We cut back on socializing, We don't go out to dinner any more, And I do all my errands and shoping in One trip to town. The only thing that surprises me about this post is I have not seen many more like it yet, I think we are all putting on a good fight and trying to stay positive.
We do pasture maintenance and the price of fertilizer has gone through the roof!! It's because of the natural gas that it takes to make it. Also, the drought here has really hurt everybody with the hay. It's been hard to come by. Most of the land around here is dryland and we've not had enough water in years to get it to go very well. It takes 29 acres of dryland pasture in good condition to provide enough food for 1 horse for 1 year. But remember, the Government keeps telling us there is no inflation.
Quote:I am in Arkansas as well. Horse prices are bad right now. Tell me about your horses and mule, mabe I could help you sell.
Well I for one am hurting on the feed bill as well. We are selling out of the horses. It's sad too, best I've had in 20 years! We will try to hang onto the cattle as we have pasture. We are selling out of the Milk goats too, if anyone is interested! But like the other said it would be nice if our wages went up too, to help with bills! not feed heck just our light bill and our own food bill. Oh hum. too depressing K
I've only worked 1 wk since Oct 5, We've been making it on unemployment, savings & creativity. My son is a hay broker here in So Ca & he has been telling me of the problems here about the shortage we have. & we also have alot of horses being sold, last wk at the auction they were as low as $25. But thats better that a friend who was stubburn & would not sell his horse for less than $900 well it only took him 18 months to sell him at $90 a month feed, he came & told me all proud that he got $900 till I told him how much it cost him to hold out. not too bright especialy since I had to point this out to him. lol So $25 is a better deal looking at it this way
I wish you were closer. We have finally been getting rain here in E. TN, so it looks like we will have hay this year! BUt again, the rising fuel/fertilizer costs will keep the prices higher than they used to be. 2 years ago, before the drought, we were paying between $10 and $15 for an 1100lbs round bale of mixed grass hay. This winter, we had to ship it in from Louisiana and the last batch was $87 a roll! And that is cheaper than some places!! Horses are still going for nothing around here, although some are starting to look better. I never saw so many poor starving horses. People couldn't FIND hay to buy, much less AFFORD it! Not everybody has the money to ship it in by the semi load or the space to store it if they did, so people with a couple of horses were in a bind. And they couldn't sell them, because nobody was buying at ANY price. We did get several that people brought by, begging us to buy them so they didn't have to take them to an auction where they would probaby go for slaughter.
Quote:He should be proud, he cared more about the horse, at 900.00 his horse didn't go to slaughter. At 25.00, that's where they were headed.