That ain’t hay

Yesterday’s idioms are in serious need of an update. In childhood days, often I heard my parents observe that the price of a cheap item was “just peanuts” or “chicken feed”. Today, it costs serious change to supply peanuts to the blue jays and chicken feed has become relatively expensive.

My personal favourite, based on nearly a lifetime of experience, is the old expression that the dollar value of a pricey item “ain’t hay”, the implication being that hay could be purchased for next to little or nothing. When I bought my first horse, in 1964, that old idiom had a ring of truth. I bought wire grass hay for just 25 cents a bale. A ten-cent a bale delivery charge applied. I found this arrangement quite satisfactory and when the price increased slightly a year or two later I still considered it a bargain. However, things slowly began to change with the arrival of the Wellington mushroom plant in the late ’60s becoming a factor in the selling price of hay.

For several years, large quantities of hay were purchased by the plant and understandably local farmers were pleased with this new market. Horse owners, however, suddenly found hay a little more expensive and sometimes harder to find. Fortunately, my supplier of the day, North Marysburgh farmer Gordon Norton, had a slightly different take on the situation than most. He told me that he preferred to see hay sold to feed livestock rather than used to grow mushrooms. He continued to deliver quality hay to me at the fairgrounds barns for a number of years. In time, the mushroom plant, which closed late last year, discontinued its purchase of massive quantities of hay.

The introduction of large, round bales of hay was to became a game-changer over time. More and more farmers moved to this new system, but small, square bales still remained relatively easy to find. A number of older farmers remained with the original way of doing things. The price of hay increased and no longer was “that ain’t hay” a figure of speech. The days of 25-cent hay were long gone. Fewer farmers were willing to deliver, even for a price, and for a number of years I bought a year’s supply of feed at the time of first cut and had a wagon load delivered, with the farmer supplying a hay elevator. It was my job to recruit the labour needed to stack the bales in the barn, a task not always easily accomplished. It was hot work and applicants for this chore were few. Most who did take the job did not return another year.

At one time, I owned six horses and seven donkeys, but as their numbers thinned owing to illness and old age I no longer needed large quantities of hay. My husband and our neighbour, Don VanMeer, regularly picked up small loads with our half-ton from several different farmers. This system worked well for many years. Eventually, the neighbour from whom I had been buying my hay kindly agreed to deliver it.

This proved an ideal solution, until this spring when he, too, decided against small square bales. It was then that I discovered that small bales had become scarcer than the proverbial hens’ teeth. With no new supplier and just a dozen bales of hay left in my barn I turned to social media to find a source of feed. Much to my relief, I received a solid lead and found a new supplier in Hay Bay, a fitting location given the commodity being sought. Last weekend, a wagon load of hay was delivered to my barn—a year’s supply for its only occupant, Duke, a 31- year-old Quarter Horse. It was a happy reminder of the good old days when I used to buy as many as 1,200 bales every year.

The price of hay no longer is just peanuts. Today it sells for $6 to $8 or more a bale, plus delivery charges. Small square bales are no longer readily sourced. I find it difficult to believe that once I paid just 25 cents a bale and could buy it locally from any number of Prince Edward County farmers. Given the advanced age of my only remaining horse, this year, I well may have bought hay for the last time. It was a bittersweet experience as I recalled my first horse, my first load of hay and the old, outdated idiom “that ain’t hay.”