Ocean freight costs about $30 a short ton (0.91 metric tons) to send hay to Asia from Los Angeles, compared with $53 to truck the crop from southern California to the center of the state, according to Greg Braun, the president of Border Valley Trading LLC, a Brawley, California-based exporter. Prices for alfalfa, the most common variety, surged 62 percent in a year and reached a record $186 a ton in July, government data show.

Shipping lines hauling Asian goods to the U.S. are failing to fill boxes on the return journey, driving down costs for the containers used to carry bales of hay. That imbalance is contributing to the biggest U.S. trade deficit in almost three years and threatening earnings for dairies and cattle feedlots that the government had expected would help the U.S. agriculture industry generate record farm income of $94.7 billion this year.

“The hay and alfalfa shortage will get worse before it improves,” said Tom Barcellos, 56, who owns the 800-cow T-Bar Dairy in Porterville, California and farms 800 acres of hay. “So much of the hay is going into the export market that it takes hay away from California dairies.”

High-quality alfalfa hay fed to dairy cows in California, the biggest milk producer, cost $320 a ton last week, compared with $220 to $260 last year, Barcellos said. Corn is 63 percent more expensive than a year ago on the Chicago Board of Trade. Even after milk prices nearly doubled in two years, farmers are still spending 65 percent of the value of their output on feed. The ratio needs to be closer to 50 percent for them to be profitable, Barcellos said.

Here's more..

The past three decades have seen both dairy production and consumption in China soar, averaging a 12.8 percent annual growth rate since 2000. This boom in both production and consumption has had critical consequences for both Chinese small dairy producers and consumers as the power of a few large dairy processors and fierce competition among smaller processors “on the fringe” have shaped the dairy value chain. Government policy is a key factor in understanding the ongoing transformation of the dairy sector in China: there appears to be a strong belief that economies of scale and the industrialization of production practices will lead to an adequate and safe dairy supply. It also presents growing challenges for the government given rising costs of feed and fodder, and the desire to support domestic dairy firms in a globalizing sector. China’s self-sufficiency in milk production has been declining rapidly in the past years. However, China’s dairy consumption is expected to increase 38 percent by 2022. Dairy imports are therefore expected to rise by 20 percent with 82 percent of those imports being skim or whole milk powder.

 - See more at: http://www.iatp.org/documents/china%E2%80%99s-dairy-dilemma-the-evolution-and-future-trends-of-china%E2%80%99s-dairy-industry#sthash.ZLzeFdpz.dpuf

So I tend to agree with khall below..

It just feels like the real reason our soybean stocks end up at "pipeline" every year is because after everyone else gets whatever they want, China buys whatever it can get its hands on. Maybe this is the year we finally fill the dragon's belly and we actually do end with 450mil bu., but my humble opinion is that it's equally as likely (50/50) that they just buy whatever they can get their hands on, whatever we can get shoved through an already congested logistical system, and again push our ending stocks quite low. 

I'm going to get long beans at some point.. maybe not today.. but we're headed to $12 or $13 bucks.. Imho.. My nephew agrees.. China is taking EVERYTHING that isn't nailed down.. from the left coast.. and it's only growing.. They have sent TEAMS of buyers.. "Got any inventory?"  Want to sell it..? Want to sell your farm..?  House..?  Car..??

It's CRAZY!!!