Hay is for Horses

I love stacking hay. Most people aren't big fans, because it pretty much involves repetitious manual labor, but I have to say that it's one of my favorite farm chores. During the spring and early fall, we get deliveries of grass hay, alfalfa, and straw to the campus farm, hundreds of bales at a time. We use a hay elevator to move bales from the ground to the hayloft, where we make massive stacks of hay. The goal is to stockpile enough by the end of fall to make it through the winter. I'm not sure why I love doing it so much; partially it's the smell- grass hay smells lovely and sweet- and partially I just honestly like doing hard work sometimes, because it's good to be reminded every now and again how strong you are.

We got a delivery of 300 bales of grass hay last Monday, and the farmer who sold us the hay told us that he was expecting to get up to $12/bale later in the summer. To put that $12/bale in perspective, consider this: not too terribly long ago, hay was going for about $2-3/bale. At $2.50/bale, 300 bales would cost us $750; but at $12/bale, that would be $3600. Now, like I've said before, I don't know much about economics, but that is clearly a huge problem. Our farm is small- eight horses, 15-45 sheep depending on the time of year, one dairy cow, four steers, and the occasional pig- and not profit-driven, but most farms aren't like ours, and they're going to be deeply impacted by this.

Prices are up due to a combination of factors, including last year's drought and the rising cost of diesel fuels used to fuel the trucks that transport hay. But it's not the causes I want to focus on this time, it's the effects. Throughout the US, livestock owners are struggling to feed their animals, particularly horses. Malnourished horses are being seized by rescue organizations at much higher rates than usual: the US Equine Rescue League took in 186 animals last year, double their usual amount. Meanwhile, some horse owners who can't afford to feed their animals are shipping them to slaughterhouses in Canada and Mexico when there isn't room for them at rescue centers (horse slaughter for human consumption is illegal in the US). As awful as that sounds, it's probably better than letting them languish and die of starvation in the fields, which is also going on. It makes me so angry when animals have to pay like this for problems humans are responsible for.