High straw prices in Scotland are pulling straw from across the UK and the continent. Speaking to Farmers Journal Scotland, straw merchant from Gloucestershire, Philip Judge, said that “there’s a bit of panic buying going on. So far we have taken 14 boatloads from France. It’s high quality, long, bright straw from the continent, but stocks in France are down 25% on the year. We are sending about 30 loads of straw a week up to Scotland, 800 to 1,000 tonnes. A lot of it is coming from Essex”.

Prices of straw at Carlisle on Monday saw big, square bales of barley straw selling for £123/t, which is a 30% increase on last year.

Meanwhile, round bales were trading for £36/each. At Thainstone last Friday, round bales were trading for between £14 and £16 each.

Merchants are quoting £150/t for straw delivered to southern Scotland, £165 in the northeast and £175 in the Highlands.

Farmers from Orkney are struggling to get shipments of straw to the islands.

After the wettest June on record and subsequent near-continuous rainfall, the straw crop has decreased in yield and quality.

Some of the Scottish herd was housed four to six weeks early, particularly in the southwest, which has put added pressure on fodder and straw requirements.

Canada imports

There is anecdotal evidence of hay being imported from Canada.

As revealed by Farmers Journal Scotland last week, the Scottish cattle herd is at its lowest in over 60 years. It has little prospect of rising, with the increasing costs of inputs and early housing.

“A dry winter and dry spring were followed by the fifth wettest summer on record, and September and October were very close to average,” a spokesperson for the UK Met Office said. “It was the wettest June on record.”

Table 1 shows the result of a dry spring but a wet summer and over all rainfall averages across Scotland.