Can you feed fresh cut hay

Tiarella

Tiarella

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May sound like a stupid question!

But have a small bale of fresh cut hay and farmer at yard who normally supplies me hay said that'll give him colic and I shouldn't feed it to him. Not sure if he just is just saying it as I didn't buy hay off him this month or whether it's true - made me all worried now though!
 
You mean he was throwing some loose cut grass rather than hay in a bale which is maturing in a bale, also I assume they are also eating grass in a field, so this was a bit extra.
New hay generally makes horses scour a bit.
 
So shall I not feed any of this hay I have at the moment and try ask supplier for other older stuff? I sound so dim but I've always just been supplied hay straight from farmer where I keep my horse
 
You can feed fresh cut hay - but it isn't good practice to do so. It is very rich and can make them scour. If they bolt it, it can impact and cause colic. Also if you have a lami prone one the extra sugar will probably result in an attack.

Conventional wisdom is to leave hay 6 months before feeding.
 
Yep, rule is not to feed fresh cut hay. We've got a barn full of hay made 3 weeks ago, cant touch any of it so am still having to buy in old stuff to tide us over until we can. I was told 6 months is generally the rule. Your boss was probably chucking over freshly cut grass, if its literally JUST been cut a few minutes before then you can feed as its just grass but not once its been lying around and then baled.
 
I've fed it in the past, in hard years when I ran out before June. They don't get it ad-lib, though. In limited amounts, you should be fine. Do you have any old hay to mix with, or a fibre feed to bulk it out?
 
Well he would only get a very tiny amount anyway as he is in for a few hours a day and just a little bit in a small holed hay net in a haulage net so won't gauge it. I can easily just keep the new hay and store it or mix it with old hay. Thanks for your help! :)
 
It depends on how dry it was when baled- we had to feed our horse hay straight off the field one year (yo had run out of old stuff) and it was completely dry and not that green- our boy has a tendency to have an upset stomach but he was completely fine on it.
However some hay we bought straight off the field this year was baled quite quickly due to all the rain we've been having, and is very green so I won't be feeding it for a while.
Take a look at the hay, and if you can, compare it to some of last years hay- one of our suppliers leaves his hay to dry so well that it almost looks like last years hay, so is fine to eat straight away (the horses, I try not to eat the hay...) :)
 
I thought it was at least 6 weeks. Sometimes if you run out you have no option if you can't source any older stuff
 
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