</font><font color="blue" class="small">( I can only agree completely with Kyle_in_Tex and CrazyMike. To do haying you need to want to work a lot, pay a lot for equipment, and cover lots and lots of acres to make your investment back. Of course, this allows you time to enjoy your AC cab and sunglasses! /forums/images/graemlins/cool.gif )</font>
Hmmmm.....
For the last three years, I have paid someone to cut, rake and bale my hay. I ended up paying about $3K for the 3000 bales off my property every year.
In the end, finding someone else to do my hay three times a year became too unreliable (they are full time farmers, and have their own land to care for), and I decided to buy my own equipment.
Cutter, rake, baler, two wagons, a 16' elevator and the tractor all total was less than $9,000. Is it new equipment? Of course not. Add another zero on there if you want all new. /forums/images/graemlins/shocked.gif Personally, I don't believe it is beyond anyones capability to grow and harvest hay. Average people with average skills (and without the extensive resources available on the Internet) have been planting, growing and harvesting crops of all kinds for a long, long time.
I am estimating that my annual cost per bale will be around $0.20 (fuel, maintenance, baling twine, beer, pizza). With the average price of horse quality hay in my area being $3.50 - $4.00, I am saving between $3.30 and $3.80 per bale. To purchase openly the same 3000 bales I can grow, costs $10,500 - $12,000. I am saving $9,900 - $11,400 each year by doing it myself vs. buying it. I am saving $2,400 each year vs. paying someone. A four year payback doesn't seem all that long to me. /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif