Eddie: Despite Difficult Growing Year, Demand Remains High

Andrew Eddie, Vice President of Washington State Hay Growers, says 2021 has been a mixed year for local growers.

“Tonnage pretty good with the high heat, for irrigated guys the tonnage has been good, for the dryland growers, alfalfa and timothy and things like that, they struggled a lot," Eddied said. "Wheat even struggled.  Everything kind of took a little hit with it being 100+ degrees for pretty much about a month.”

Eddie added some dryland growers that typically report three tons per acre during harvest were as low as one ton this season. However, the news hasn't been all bad. Demand, he noted, has been pretty decent.

“Exporters are still buying up quite a bit, domestic market is quite strong, feeder hay is going for quite  bit because there is not a lot of it around.  And most people who have cattle or things like that, their pastures aren’t going to be producing as much as they thought so they are going to need a lot more hay.”

Because of dry conditions in Idaho and Montana, Eddie said there’s already a lot of Washington hay on the road.

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