MarketsFarm — With the holiday season come and gone, feed grain buyers were getting back into the swing of things at the start of 2023, according to one trader.
“I think January will probably fill up pretty quickly as we’re in the first week of January and we’ve been booked into January for a bit,” said Erin Harakal, trade manager at Agfinity Inc. at Stony Plain, Alta. “I think the next little bit, things will kind of hang in where they’re at until everyone figures out what they’re needing.”
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Harakal added that feed barley was trading at a range of $425-$435 per tonne ($9.25-$9.47 per bushel) in Lethbridge. The high-delivered bid for feed barley in Alberta was $9.75/bu. as of Wednesday, according to Prairie Ag Hotwire, down four cents from one month earlier.
Corn shipments from the U.S. entering feedlots have put a ceiling on feed barley prices, according to Harakal, but other grains are still being used.
“I think most feedlots still want to feed with barley but there are a few that have been bringing corn in, as well,” she said, adding that oats have also been used due to lower prices. “It’s an option that has been readily available this year for a lot of (feedlots), but a lot of them still want to use barley.”
The high-delivered bid for Saskatchewan feed barley was $8/bu., steady from last month, while that of Manitoba feed barley was $7.82/bu., down 18 cents from one month earlier, according to Prairie Ag Hotwire.
As for feed wheat, the high-delivered bid in Alberta was $12.38/bu., down 27 cents from last month. In Saskatchewan, it lost 50 cents compared to the start of December, to $11.25/bu. In Manitoba, the high-delivered bid for feed wheat was $10.67/bu., falling 33 cents from one month ago.
— Adam Peleshaty reports for MarketsFarm from Stonewall, Man.
