Fast fibre feeders

lauraanddolly

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I am currently trying to work out a new diet for my 15hh nf x tb mare, she is always a good weight, sometimes too good! she gets baileys lo cal 500g and falcon feeds hi fi light, half a stubbs scoop, and her joint supplement.
Due to hours being reduced at work, im struggling a little so am trying to find out if i can save any pennies!
I have noticed a few people on the yard are feeding fast fibre on its own, would it provide everything needed for my mare? - she is in light work atm.
Looked on allen and page website but im not any clearer as to whether the fast fibre needs anything added to it?
 
I'd be tempted just to feed enough of The chaff or fast fibre so she can take her supplement. If she's only in light work and is a good doer, forage should be plenty.
 
I feed fast fibre to everything! My yard is full of eventers - TB types, they have 3/4 stubbs scoop of RD once a day with ad lib hay and boy they are a bit fat! When back in work I just add some veteran vitality. FF is a complete feed, if your mare is a gooder she won't need anything else and they love it :)
 
Okay, I've been looking at the numbers - how much I would feed and cost etc and its seems I won't be any better off with the fast fibre. I'm going round in circles and confusing myself now!
I'm tempted to do a recommend me a diet post - but I know how much everyone hates those!
On a plus note I borrowed a small amount of fast fibre to try her with tonight and she did seem to love it!
So do I replace the baileys lo cal with the fast fibre or something else ? She will keep getting chaff, well at least until that runs out, seems to last me forever.
 
My good doer got very bored with FF, very quickly. She scoffed it to start with, then would only eat it mixed with chaff - now won't touch it at all :(

She looks better on the lo-cal than anything else so I stick with that and a low calorie chaff (I feed Topchop Lite).

Not knocking FF, but it didn't work out for us and was false economy as was chucking most of it out.
 
Mine was on FF and done well on it but she did start to get bored of it after a while. I'm going to try her on Simple Systems to see what shes like on that.
 
I just got an email from allen and page as I asked them what feed they'd recommend for my mare, they said fast fibre can be fed alone or with chaff, they recommend dengie hi-fi molasses free. Very tempted to change her onto that, just waiting for a sample to come to test it. The email said the chaff is just to make them chew more and helps dental heath, it isn't completely necessary. :)
 
I feed my very good doer on Bailey's lo-cal balancer, fast fibre and fibergy.
The amount of fast fibre I give him goes up and down depending on how much work he's doing and how cold it is! He's doing a mixture of hacking and schooling at the moment, about 8 hours spread over 5 days, as we have the first show of the season coming up. It's fairly warm so he's getting a stubbs scoop of FF, 2 mugs of lo-cal and a scoop of fibergy, split over 2 feeds and 9kg hay in his stable overnight (no hay in field during the day). He got the same during the very cold snap even though he was doing less work (ice!). If it stays warm and, for some reason, he does less work, I reduce the fast fibre.
During the summer, he gets a mug of lo-cal, half scoop of fibergy and a handful of FF to dampen it down.
What I'm trying to say is, he always gets a full, seasonal, ration of balancer as that will give him the vits and mins. If he got a full ration of fast fibre, that gives him the full quota of vits and mins, he would be as fat as a house and we'd be going through a bag every 5 days!
 
My boys have a small scoop of fast fibre t which I add their vitamin and mineral supplements. I've also got a bag of the hi if molasses free but they don't seem fussed about that a the moment so im saving it!!
 
After doing the maths again! I think ive decided if it aint broke dont fix it!
The lo cal works for us and has biotin in so as im taking her back shoes off next month it seems silly to stop feeding it and feed fast fibre and a hoof supplement, when the intial objective was cost cutting!
On a different note, superted, i noticed you are an iow person too!
 
All 4 of ours have FF and love it! Mix it with a bit of chaff (Dengie Hi-Fi Lite) just to fill it out a bit, add some variety, texture etc. They are all turned out 24/7 but the grass is very sparse and so they have a lot of hay and then the FF (also good for any supplements). They've had it for some time and are never bored of it. You can also warm it up in the winter if you like. They all look well on this. :)
 
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