Glacier FarmMedia | MarketsFarm – As the harvest in southern Alberta presses on, a broker said that is one of the factors pulling feed prices lower in the region.
Darcy Haley, vice-president of Ag Value Brokers in Lethbridge, added that lower cattle numbers in feedlots, plentiful amounts of grass for cattle to graze and a lacklustre export market also weighed on feed prices.
Haley said he recently sold feed barley for C$260 per tonne for September-October delivery. He quoted prices of C$265/tonne for November-December delivery and C$270 January-February-March.
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Feed wheat was priced at C$260/tonne for September-October delivery and C$265 for October-November-December.
In speaking with farmers, Haley said dryland barley yields were 80 to 90 bushels per acre, with wheat at about 50000 and durum around 45.
“For us, that’s a bumper crop,” he said, noting upwards of seven inches of rain over southern Alberta saved this year’s crops.
“Harvest was expected to start during the first or second week of August. There it is, the last week of August and we’re just starting to scratch the surface,” Haley said.
With the availability of grass, he said that will delay the fall run of cattle heading to auction, perhaps into October.
In turn, that won’t generate any increased demand for feed grains until then or even November. During the coming few months, Haley expects feed prices for barley and wheat to drop below C$250/tonne, which is where they bottomed out last year.
Prices for feed barley and wheat across western Canada were mostly steady to lower during the week ended Aug. 28, reported Prairie Ag Hotwire.
Alberta saw the biggest decline in feed barley at 22 cents, which brought them to C$4.50 to C$5.99 per bushel delivered. Barley dipped four cents in Saskatchewan at C$4.50 to C$4.75/bu and nudged up two cents at C$4.25 to C$4.59.
As for feed wheat, the was a 27-cent drop in Alberta with the provincewide range at C$5.44 to C$7.62/bu. delivered. Saskatchewan and Manitoba were unchanged with C$6.88/bu. in Saskatchewan and C$6.40 to C$7.00 in Manitoba.
