Does anyone soak barley straw ?

[jgmbng]

As in the title really.

I need to get some weight of my Dales gelding so want to substitute some of his hay ration for straw.

He has COPD so I soak his hay (all day to get rid of a few calories as well) but would like to know if it would be OK to soak the straw for 1/2 hour for the COPD.

 

[Fjord]

I soak my mare's hay and last year soaked her barley straw as well. It was perfectly fine but I don't think she found it very palatable!

 

[loz9]

I haven't soaked, but have steamed altho my copd mare doesn't seem to like it so have started feeding her chopped oat straw in a bucket instead:
http://www.efeed.co.uk/products/horse-feed/chaff/oat-chaff
It is slightly dusty, but doesn't seem to affect her in the same way as a slice of straw would.