Home Forums Gear Horses and ATV's Burning through it

Threw a 3'x3'x8' bale in Sunday and a third of it is gone already. With the nights going down to negative temps those two are eating one every 7-8 days.

I hear ya mine are going through it pretty quick. Been much colder than usual here for us too.

After a snow, I'll run my snow plow around the pasture. When it starts to melt, they can get to grass a lot sooner. It saves quite a bit on hay.

I never did like feeding out a big bale by setting it out, too much waste, especially with horses. However, in super cold weather, I feed almost double the hay

They don't waste too much this time of year. Every last blade of grass will be cleaned up off the frozen ground.

Yep. Wasn't feeding much until recently and pastures were still growing...I know that's hard for y'all above the MD line to understand.....but really had to bump it up the past month.

My great uncle always said he didn't want any "hay burners" on his place. He was tight as bark on a tree.

A lot less waste with a slow-feeder net.



https://haychix.com/collections/round-bale

I have a friend who is a dealer in hayhuts. Work really well just expensive. I could use that net for my young horses but I could see my riding horses getting front shoes hung.

If you have the right set up lock the horses away from the big bale feeders for some part of the day. Might not help with waste but they won't eat as much. And I'll bet they'll still stay in good body condition.

I really don't feed any hay, but in the spring, summer, and fall they are pretty much locked in the corral for 1/2-3/4 of the day. They don't get as fat and don't burn through as much grass. And then by this time of year I still have lots of grass. This time of year I leave them out, but all they are getting is dormant grass and salt.

Everybody's place is different though and so is how much time they are willing to put into it. But there are usually a few things most can do to conserve pasture and hay, minimize waste, and keep horses fed without letting them get fat.

I'm not saying anyone's horses are fat, but I see 100 fat ones for every 1 that is underfed. At least with domestic horses.

[quote=Ralphie
I'm not saying anyone's horses are fat, but I see 100 fat ones for every 1 that is underfed. At least with domestic horses.[/quote]

Spot on Ralphie. Giving horses free choice feeding of all the hay they want to eat is usually way to much hay wasted and/fed when not needed.

The bale net above is not mine. It's a web pic. Here is mine.



Under cover because of the rain we get too much of. We can fence off the bale to control access and feeding rate. Seems to work.

Every three days for these guys. with three out 24/7 and 3 out on it during the day, we go through it pretty quick in this single digit to below zero weather. Have to check the trough daily as they drink a lot of water(which is good) with the hay.