Intro and your thoughts please...

[jamesrm87]

Hi All,

Long term viewer but new user here! Based near Winkleigh, Devon.

Recently bought a house with 37 acres (all pasture). Previously owned by a horsey family but not into that (they scare me). They owned for 20 years and never used a single chemical so the grass is pretty 'organic' and its growing like crazy. Have topped the grass a couple times to keep tidy but have now just invested in some pretty expensive new machines: Valtra T194, Kuhn 10ft mower conditioner, Kuhn tedder, Fendt rake, Fendt round baler (fixed 4ft) and Kuhn wrapper - the idea being that I can produce some wrapped bales to sell on from our own land (we have no animals) and then start contracting for others around Devon. Might buy some more land as there is a bit about around here.

A few questions for anyone that has nothing better to do on a Sunday!....
- Rough price for wrapped bales currently?
- Enough demand if I bought another 80-100 acres for producing EVEN MORE?

Any advice greatly appreciated - and I'll get some photos up this week!

Thank you
James

 

[jamesrm87]

I forgot to ask:
- Any other machinery I can/should buy that would aid our proposition as 'contractors'? I have a large post knocker and tracked chipper on the way also! (I forgot!).

 

[7610 super q]

Don't know about Devon, but West Wales is hopeless. Facebook is littered with numpties selling last years stuff for £15 / bale. There seems to be a glass ceiling at £25/ bale. I tried making hay / haylage for horsey folks for 5 years and gave up. I spent £3500 on a tedder, and bitterly regret that. The amount you must have spent raises my eyebrows to the point of no return....
Good luck, but for goodness sake see how you get on with 37 acres before buying more land / equipment.

 

[cows sh#t me to tears]

Please tell us you have previous farming experience and are not a total cashed up noob or I fear this wont end well.

 

[Slippery Slope]

Your going to wish you never asked......!

 

[ImLost]

I think you have all the gear you need now mate. It's probably best you start buying others stuff now. I'll send a list over shortly.


P. S. I'll make sure it's all expensive.

 

[jamesrm87]

Thanks all so far - this is the first land we've owned but have worked on a beef farm for many years - so grassland management and processes are not new to me - lots of farmer/farm owner friends and acquaintances across North/Mid-Devon so fairly well connected.
Yes went a little crazy on the machinery but all 'business' aside, I wanted nice kit and lucky enough to be able to afford it so why not...
Of course not expecting a return purely from selling grass on a mere 37 acres - but nice new kit will hopefully help establish a contracting business here with 'less' downtime and a little more reliability (and support from the manufacturers/dealer in the form of warranty etc.) - and if it doesn't - then that doesn't really matter.

 

[Highland Mule]

The question we’re all wanting to know. How many numbers were on your lottery win?

 

[grainboy]

All I can say is good luck, !!
but surely there was something better to do with your money, you’ll be on a hiding to nothing.

 

[grainboy]

Did your farming friends and connections, not give you any advice ??

 

[jamesrm87]

The question we’re all wanting to know. How many numbers were on your lottery win?

I didn't win the lottery and I certainly wasn't born into any money - just to be clear! I grew up in North Devon in a council house in a small farming village, went to school then local college, decided University was not for me (sick of irrelevant education/educators)! Established three tech companies one after the other over a period of about 15 years - two went down the pan and the last did well enough to sell and have a little spare cash to buy tractors!

 

[ImLost]

Starting a contracting business makes a tiny bit more sense.

 

[7610 super q]

There's some that do it really well, and make good money... @Goweresque , @sleepy , but I reached the conclusion that you really needed your own stock to feed those surplus / torn / iffy bales to make it work.
And selling fodder to horsey folks is a lot like trying to sell snow to an Eskimo who's cat has just died.

 

[Highland Mule]

I didn't win the lottery and I certainly wasn't born into any money - just to be clear! I grew up in North Devon in a council house in a small farming village, went to school then local college, decided University was not for me (sick of irrelevant education/educators)! Established three tech companies one after the other over a period of about 15 years - two went down the pan and the last did well enough to sell and have a little spare cash to buy tractors!

Well done on that one !

 

[jamesrm87]

Did your farming friends and connections, not give you any advice ??

Fair comment - I am/have been collecting advice from all sources - spoken to enough locally to have confidence buying the kit - was interested in some wider opinions.

 

[Tarw Coch]

My initial thoughts are that after 20 years of horses it ain’t going to make the best of silage without a bit of improvement, probably spraying, possibly reseeding although having just seen you’ve got a bit of experience in grassland you’ll have some idea yourself.

Breaking into contracting isn’t necessarily easy, most of us will have some sort of long term relationship with contractors and don’t change on a whim, on a busy time you may well pick up work when existing contractors can’t keep up with demand as well as the odd customer who for some reason is looking for change but beware that some of the ones on the lookout for someone new are the ones that existing contractors don’t want, the hassle and bad payers.

It would seem you have plenty of finances behind you, my thoughts are that there are better ways to invest your money than producing fodder and contracting, but if your pockets are deep enough and it’s what you want to do then why not.

 

[Formatted]

Surely trolling? That is £300,000 worth of machinery when you could have paid a contractor to make bales to sell or even better, just sold cutting rights.

 

[Formatted]

Or did you con some poor bank manager who is going to get a shock in 6 months?

 

[ImLost]

Surely trolling? That is £300,000 worth of machinery when you could have paid a contractor to make bales to sell or even better, just sold cutting rights.

and
I actually feel like having a quiet little cry. If I could afford all that, I certainly wouldn't have spent the money on it. I could have built a profitable, sustainable business pretty quickly with that much cash.

 

[Pilatus]

Joking aside there is a 2250 acre farm to rent by tender in Kent if you are interested, in doing a bit of farming.