Small Farm Grain Storage

I have been looking into grain storage solutions for small to medium sized farms. The day is long gone from our area where we had public storage for grains. The closest public elevator is in Navasota, Texas 102 miles away. Obviously, transportation costs would destroy any profit we might realize. If one wishes to take advantage of off season pricing, the best solution is some kind of on farm storage.

A 10,000 bushel grain bin will cost upwards of $32,000 to install. As look at larger bin capacities, the economy of scale becomes apparent, dropping costs to around 30 cents a bushel from $2 plus for smaller bins. A fixed grain bin will be exposed to property taxes as well.

This brings us to farmers like me who must lease land, often far from my base. Erecting storage bins on these properties is not an option. Grain Bagging, a concept that found its way to these shores about 10 years ago and now beginning to gain acceptance on a large scale, is an attractive option.

Grain Bagging is the storage of grain on well drained slightly sloping ground inside a giant plastic bag. The bags are 3 layer polyethylene tube 9 to 12 feet in diameter depending on the system, and up to 500 feet long. They are air tight and moisture proof. It is an excellent short term storage solution. They require fewer machines and personnel and eliminates trips to the elevator. With a bagger and un-loader a farmer  can store his grain in the field where he harvested, sell the grain in the off season when commodity prices are stronger, and load the buyers trucks from his field saving transport and storage costs. He would not have to postpone harvest for available storage space or trucking availability. The grain bags are not fixed structures, so he would not be taxed.

Most of these machines include a bag pickup system that rolls the used bag up for easy disposal or recycling. The bags are not, however, reusable as the un-loader cuts the bag open as it unloads the grain. Tractor requirements for the larger systems are high, 100 horsepower. Renn markets a unit that uses a 10 foot diameter bag and requires 50 horsepower which makes it ideal for a small to medium sized operation. The bags cost from $1100 for smaller 250 foot bag to $2500 for a large 500 foot bag.  The savings, in most cases, work out well. You would have to pencil it out for your particular operation. There is a danger of the bags getting ripped open by wildlife or vandals and what I hear there is no fool proof method to keep them out once they discover what is in them. All you can do is harden the target.

If you can harvest and store the grain on site, buying time to sell the crop, having transportation then paid by the buyer, you most likely will come out ahead. If we go with this type of system, that would be our plan.

Plenty to think about over the next month or two. I suspect we will continue to operate on a smaller scale for the time being. We may never become that kind of farm. I am not sure that I want to at this point.