Southwest Missouri Hay Auction

A break in the extreme heat arrived in time for this month's hay auction. The weather was simply amazing for the first week of Aug. Locally as well as most of the southern third of the state would certainly welcome a rain following the last couple weeks of extreme heat. Conditions are still much better than typical for Aug. but there is some burning of pastures and crops in this area of the state now. Another great crowd on hand for a heavy supply of hay. The overall supply of hay in the state is at a surplus as well and it's very unlikely and just flat scary to think how bad conditions would have to turn or how deep snow would have to get to feed it all out this coming feeding season. The biggest issue is with quality. Much of the hay is just in the fair to good range at best and hay truly getting in the higher grades is much more difficult to find. Much of the better-quality hay offered at the auction came with a lot of free miles of freight. Given the size of the offering the market did quite well and prices were better than many expected. The fair to good quality hay was a bit cheaper but good and above hay was mostly steady. Of the total offerings 1033 or 20% were round bales and 3861 or 73% was square bales. Typically, the square bales have been offered in bundles, however this month near 1000 bales were loose and buyer interest was extremely limited on those offerings. Once math was done the fair to good quality grass round bales figured mostly 50-100 per ton, with some fair hay mostly twine bales just under 50 per ton, some good quality round bales of grass mostly 100-125 ton. Some round bales of Alfalfa mostly good quality 150-200 per ton. Large square bales of grasses good to premium 125-175 with a few lots right at 200 per ton. Large squares of alfalfa good to premium quality figured to 200-230. The very tip top quality grass or alfalfa hay present at some of the previous auctions wasn't seen this month.