HAVE YOUR SAY: What strategies have you used to cut input costs?
Farmers Forum staff
WOODSTOCK—Farmers Forum was at the Outdoor Farm show in Woodstock last month and asked farmers, “What strategies have you used to cut input costs on the farm?” There were a wide variety of answers from introducing automated feeding to tightening a grip of fertilizer use. One farmer said his strategy was to complain about tariffs to his local MP.
Melissa Grispen
“Try and fix everything yourself. That’s probably the best thing that you can do because if you need something fixed, it always costs you way more than it actually should.”
Melissa Grispen
Chicken broiler producer
Burgessville, Ont.
Earl Elgie
“Less tillage, and we grow a lot of cover crops to mitigate resistant weeds. We use livestock manure, mushroom compost, organic amendments. But you’ve got to do the math on them, too.”
Earl Elgie
Vegetable and crop farmer
Dresden, Ont.
Jayson Crawford
“I think a lot of guys sink themselves in a ton of debt and then … your business runs into trouble. Just be like the tortoise, not the hare. I don’t have any payments on any equipment. I’m very fortunate that way. I don’t have any hired help. I try to do everything myself, with my father, of course. But yeah, just go slow. And my grandmother always said, ‘Use it up, wear it out, make it do, or do without.’ ”
Jayson Crawford
Dairy farmer
Caledon, Ont.
Tim Prior
“We’ve rotationally grazed for 35 years. So that’s our strategy. It’s like cutting a lawn. (The cattle) are on it for a day. You move them off, and then that grass starts to regrow again for the next 30 days, and then it gives you good forage to start again. The high price of diesel doesn’t affect us as a ‘grass farmer.’ We’re basically opening and shutting the gate and the cattle move on to another paddock. It’s easy management.”
Tim Prior
Beef producer
Brussels, Ont.
Justin Robinson
“We transitioned to an automatic feeding system … and we kind of allocated those savings to other areas of the farm. By automating it, we were able to save about three hours a day on our feeding schedule. On top of the time savings, we also started saving money on our (feed) inputs. The system allows each ingredient to be added precisely, so we weren’t consistently over- or under-shooting an ingredient by a few kilos with every mix.”
Justin Robinson
Dairy farmer
Winchester, Ont.
Armand Barrette
“We just used a drone that sprays corn. We hired a young guy who came with the whole unit and did 50 acres for us in about 45 minutes, at $9 an acre. It’s cheaper than owning a $700,000 sprayer machine. This thing is doing the same thing, only it doesn’t matter if the field is wet or dry. The guy that owned the drone said he had about $100,000 invested. And we’ve been no-tilling for, oh, 25 years now.”
Armand Barrette
Crop farmer
Tilbury, Ont.
Josh Canfield
“Precision application would be one of the key improvements, and then knowing how you’re applying it, with soil sampling, making sure you’re putting on the right rate at the right timing. We put some biosolids on too. That helps. And manure. We put on a little bit of manure and then lowered our fertilizer.”
Josh Canfield
Crop farmer
Woodstock, Ont.
“I complained to my MP that the tariffs imposed on Russian fertilizer were actually penalizing us and not them. That was one thing.”
Mark Vanberkel
Crop farmer
Strathroy, Ont.
Mark Reusser
“That’s a hard question to answer because farmers have no power to cut input costs. I mean, I can use less fertilizer. Does that help me? I’m going to have less yield. I think farmers struggle with this a lot. My costs are fuel, fertilizer, chemicals, machinery. Every one of those is beyond my control. I think it just makes you a whole lot more careful. You make sure you’re not wasting anything. It makes you have second thoughts about going to drive into town to get a part now or wait ’til I need something else.”
Mark Reusser
Crop farmer, OFA director
Waterloo Region, Ont.
Jason Ball
“You try and do less passes to burn less fuel, and we’re looking at no-till more now. Recreational tillage is gone.”
Jason Ball
Crop farmer
Strathroy, Ont.
Clarence Pronk
“We’re forever trying to increase the revenue. Are we trying to outrun (rising input costs)? I guess we are in a way. Sometimes you invest more to make more. We haven’t stopped investing, trying to drive revenue up.”
Clarence Pronk
Poultry and crop farmer
Arthur, Ont.
Gerrit Vandebelt
“Shop around and price out more (suppliers) for everything — fertilizer, everything. But on the other hand, if you have 10 years experience with (a vendor) and you trust each other, that is a good thing too.”
Gerrit Vandebelt
Dairy farmer
Tillsonburg, Ont.
Ryan O’Shea
“We’re transitioning to feeding more corn silage this year. But other than that, I stay the course … keep the milk flowing. That’s the name of the game.”
Ryan O’Shea
Goat dairy farmer
Middlesex County, Ont.
Josh Moffat
“Paying more attention to forward contracting. That’s been a big thing. I’m trying to risk-mitigate with the markets but also risk-mitigating with purchases such as fertilizer. So cost-averaging is something that’s been a big big tool of mine, just to try to be in a good position. That would probably be my number one right now. Whereas before we would sit back and we’d wait to sell in February or stick to the plan — buy all your inputs in the spring. We’re looking at that differently now.”
Josh Moffat
Crop farmer
St. Mary’s, Ont.
