Feeding ad lib hay....

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Mongoose11

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Does anyone really do this? Ad lib means unlimited right? I would love for my horse to be fed this way despite the fact that it would be expensive but can I realistically do it?

She is very greedy and prone to gaining weight (I'm not really thick I promise - I know hay will make her gain weight) BUT someone I was talking to said that even a fatty greedy cob that they had in their care was 'taught' to ad lib itself without completely gorging itself.

So - for 8 years she was alone in 8 acres and was very fat. Then she went to someone as a ridden companion for a laminitic and she had sporadic turnout (out every day but for a couple of hours then in for the afternoon - then out again).

At the moment she is occasionally out 24 hours in a 2/3 acre paddock grazed by her and four others but most of the time she is out for 12 hours and in for 12 hours. When she comes in she has a trickle net that she will turn to in the wee hours and a normal net with 1-2 wedges in it which she eats first. The trickle net only allows her to eat about another half a wedge and then she gives up on it.

I would love to be able to give her ad lib hay - is there any way it could work? Or am I being REALLY stupid? She will just get fat right?

ETA - I currently use a tricklenet but I want to adlib - clearly I am mental!
 
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I feed my horses, not the ponies, ad lib during the winter when they are in they have constant access to haylage and most very quickly realise that it is not going to run out and they do stop gorging.
The way you are feeding yours is pretty much ad lib in the sense that it is there for her to eat but because it is harder work she chooses to not finish what is in the trickle net, if she was really hungry she would eat it all, so I would continue as you are but in the winter increase the quantity if she needs more.
 
be positive said:
if she was really hungry she would eat it all, so I would continue as you are but in the winter increase the quantity if she needs more.
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I just thought that she was being mega lazy - it is REALLY hard for her to get it out of the ticklenet once the first third has been eaten. The thing is her normal net takes her until about 8pm to eat if I am lucky and then she has the tricklenet to pick at for another couple of hours and then nothing.

Ideally I want her to have a huge hay pile and for to eat all night if she wants to....
 
Last year when we just had my tb and welsh x Arab out together and then stabled at night, I fed ad lib hay - literally piles of the stuff as much as they could eat.

Now We have my new cob in with them and my friends cob x, and there's no way those two could have ad lib at the moment (although in winter they will)
 
Just to add - I found when my boys had ad lib hay they would regulate their consumption of hay and just eat what they needed. There was always loads left in the morning (I did put piles in!) but they clearly knew they had as ,much as they wanted so ate as and when they needed to.

I'm too scared to try that approach with my cob who really does seem to live on fresh air! I think if she had ad lib she'd eat the lot until she popped!
 
maxapple said:
Just to add - I found when my boys had ad lib hay they would regulate their consumption of hay and just eat what they needed. There was always loads left in the morning (I did put piles in!) but they clearly knew they had as ,much as they wanted so ate as and when they needed to.

I'm too scared to try that approach with my cob who really does seem to live on fresh air! I think if she had ad lib she'd eat the lot until she popped!
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This would be my aim - to allow her to regulate and perhpas get her out of her greediness? I am afraid to try it incase she does eat and eat until she pops!
 
If we want weight gain, then all ours get put on ad lib haylage.

Any time other than that, they're on ad-lib hay all year round anyway. Don't find hay puts too much extra weight on them to be fair. We just have them on normal standard hay. Only time they did put weight on more on hay, was when we got higher protein racehorse stuff. If you're worried about weight gain, just get less protein hay :)
 
ChristmasSparkles said:
If we want weight gain, then all ours get put on ad lib haylage.

Any time other than that, they're on ad-lib hay all year round anyway. Don't find hay puts too much extra weight on them to be fair. We just have them on normal standard hay. Only time they did put weight on more on hay, was when we got higher protein racehorse stuff. If you're worried about weight gain, just get less protein hay :)
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Ok - so cue stupid question number 2. How do I know if it would be a low protein hay? Can I rely on the supplier to tell me this or can I tell without an analysis?

Do you fill a hay bar? Huge pile on the floor? Big bales in a yard? More info please CS! :)

ETA - pretty sure you don't have haybars - just realised you are the lady with many many hairies!
 
Ad-lib hay is a given in all the text books, but in real life very few horses will stay at an optimum weight if allowed to stuff themselves. I fed ad lib for years, and it was Ok when we had young, growing horses, but once I had mature horses in light work we got fatties very quickly. I think the best formula is 1.5% - 2% of the horses weight in forage + whatever hard feed is REQUIRED (and most leisure horses don't actually require any). Most horses are OVERFED - lots.
 
The protein level should not affect the amount of weight gain, it is the sugars that add excess calories, hence why many people soak hay to remove same for overweight horses.
 
Thank you Cortez. I think I will start by upping her hay by half and seeing what that does for her weight. I should also invest in a weigh hook. At a guess (from when I used to weight her hay) I would say she is probably having about 5kg of hay per night so she could have more according to the 1.5-2% guide. I need to get a tape on her but I would put her at about 550kg at the moment.
 
It was just a general observation from ours.
When they had higher protein hay, they got quite fat on it. When on the 'normal' hay, they stayed at a good, non-fluctuating weight. No other hard feed at that time, so hay was the only contributor to it. Couldn't tell you what was in it as far as sugars and proteins etc go, all we know, it was much higher protein that's all. :)

Billie - the ones that are in separate stables, have a mixture of nets and loose. Ones which run loose together in a barn, have it spread out in feeders. The one's in the field, have it in round feeders :)
 
The ponies in the early summer had a paddock with little grass, adlib hay (big bale in field with unlimited access) and both started to lose weight. - these 2 ponies put weight on easily.

If they have grass, they don't gorge themselves but they do eat too much. - put weight on easily.
If they have hay, they prefer to pick for grass and go to and from the hay, so they don't put weight on.
 
I have always fed my section D on adlib hay or haylage, at the moment he goes out at night and in during the day to a haybar full, he hardly ever finishes it all but when he does he just gets more put in. He is happy on it and is never hungry, he only eats as much as he needs to although this has turned him quite fussy with his haylage, now he doesn't eat it when its gone on the floor or on his bedding, SUCH a diva!!
 
All ours are pretty much on ad lib hay, except for the shetland in the summer because he needs to loose a few pounds- but even he gets ad lib in the winter as he's not rugged.
One of ours has to have ad-lib for his stomach, which is quite sensitive- he's a bit of a fatty now because of all the lush grass we've had, but on just hay in the winter he isn't fat. He has his in a small holed haynet so that it takes a bit of effort to get it out, but so that he can eat as much as he pleases (we have found a haynet so big I can fit inside it quite easily!)
The welsh cob has always had as much as he wants to eat and he's never been fat, even though when I got him he was too skinny through lack of hay in the winter. Although he rips haynets to shreds so has his on the floor, and more of it goes over the door or gets pooped on, than is actually eaten :(
There was a horse on our old yard who couldn't have ad-lib hay, or access to much grass because of a mouth ulcer and tooth problem- he's had it for ages and had always been hungry (they wondered why their cob wasn't fat :rolleyes: ) but it was an undiagnosed problem, eventually the concerned tooth fell out itself and he gorged himself so much he kept getting colic. So if you are going to ad-lib, increase it slowly!
Also, if you're worried about weight, soak the hay for a good few hours, and slowly increase it until there is only a little bit left in the mornings so you don't waste too much- thats what we do with the shetland and he's had steady weight loss constantly, since we got the little fatty last year :)
 
When my tb is stabled at night he will have 2 large gathers. He will always have some left over. Some nights lots some nights little. I consider this to be ad lib as he can eat whenever he wants an never runs out. When turned out its much harder as there are fatties in the field who gorge themselves so when it's gone its gone!
 
I used to feed ad lib hay and then ended up with my native who became fat on ad lib, even on low nutritional value hay. I never found that she self regulated and would stuff herself silly.

I find the best way to feed a very good doer is to control the quantity but to restrict the access so it takes longer to eat, which means the horse is effectively ad lib as it has constant access, but can't eat vast amounts in a short time.

In the wild a native would be browsing sparse poor quality forage, especially in winter, not left with heaps of hay and I try to replicate this. It doesn't mean she is hungry, but has to work harder for the food she gets.
 
mine have adlib haylage in depths of winter and no hard feed. My mare never gets overweight even though she is retired - just stays the same weight. My gelding puts on a little but not much - I only do adlib Dec to Feb - the key for me is to stop early enough !
 
Always give mine adlib over the winter in a sheep ring feeder and they are outside 24/7. Shetland doesn't get any hard feed, tbx got a lot of hard feed too. Shetland never got fat on it.

Bit different this year as two natives and I will be doing them adlib hay as well.

Technically soaked as its just out in the field. If its not getting cleared up quick enough I let sheep/cattle into it too. Not sure how it would work if you just had one horse eating it and it was outside. Probably need to cover it.
 
Sorry to buck the trend but I don't actually believe in ad lib hay, especially for stabled horses. I have tried it in the past and ended up with fat horses and empty pockets!

What I do is calculate their daily allowance according to condition and work load, then trickle feed it in small nets. However I do have the luxury of them living at home, and appreciate this may be impossible if a horse is on livery.
 
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Thanks for all of the advice here - I think I have a better understanding of 'ad-lib' now. I was thinking that it needed to be as much as they can/want to eat rather than a 'constant' supply. So I am going to up her supply gradually, keep finding ways to slow her eating but overall I would like her to have more forage over night. I will see how this affects her weight. I would like to avoid rugging her at night this winter as it rubbed out half of her lovely mane - but not sure I will be able to feed her enough to maintain her weight without rugging as her stable isn't in a barn so pretty chilly at times. Pretty sure rugging will be a new thread from me very soon!
 
My horses are fed adlib forage year round. They have a large round hay bale each in their stables and the same in the field too. (Big stables!) In the Summer they're adlib grass, they're never restricted. I don't feed hard feed. I do love having TB types instead of cobs, it is so much easier than having to worry about them being overweight.
 
You could feed good quality straw, less calories than hay. Your horse will not be impressed but if hungry will eat it. As long as you feed a decent vitamin/mineral supplement, there will be no need for your horses body to hang onto the straw too long desperately trying to extract nutrition from it, which can lead to impaction colic.
 
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