Hay or Haylage - Which do you feed and why

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As the title suggests really!

I feed hay, because it works out a lot cheaper to buy in a round bale for £25, which will last for about 8 weeks, than to pay the YO £15 per week for unlimited haylage or buy it in bags for £6 each which only last about 3 or 4 days.

My questions is though, what reasons are there for me switching to haylage? It certainly smells delicious!
 
I feed haylage, i buy the big square bales £22.00 this lasts one 16.2hh tb about 12 days, she only has one feed a day 2 scoops light mix, alfa a beet pulp plus supplements and looks really fab, if she has hay only she drops of quick and needs tons of hard feed! she is ridden every day.
 
Haylage I buy a round bale for £15 and it feeds two horses and two shetlands for 10 days. Hay not very good quality up here and I couldnt be bothered with all that soaking malarky
 
I feed hay to my WB - buy the big round bales for £20 - because he eats a ridiculous amount and haylage sends him bonkers
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(oh, and he's fat enough lol)

I feed haylage to my TB because she doesn't 'heat up' and she needs extra weight. It is £6.50 per week for as much as I want.
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I would only change from one to another for the sake of calories (spark!), breathing, weight gain or condition

I have just been and bought for big money a few small bales of high fibre haylage for my horse who is on box rest with walking and doesn't like his hay, his weight has slightly dropped off. But I did cut his hard feed at the same time. Also I didn't want him to get wheezy due to being in.
 
Haylage - works out cheaper for us £15 bale lasts 8 days, on hay they'd get through at leat 1 x £3.50 bales a day.

Don't have to soak it which is a godsend at this time of year and we buy high fibre haylage rather than high energy - even fizzy mare that goes loopy on pasture mix/carrots/alfa oil is fine on it.
 
Hi

You need to look at the bigger picture, at first glance haylage looks more expensive but when you take into account the reduced amount of hard feed required, and the non financial benefits such as no time spent soaking, less dust, ability to store outside then it makes more sense

Regards

Mark
 
I feed hay purely because I have a native who puts weight on easily. I feed year old hay so it has less nutritional value and he can have it ad lib with a supplement to make up for any lack of goodness. I appreciate your comments on haylage markc but my horse would not do very well mentally if he was without for long periods or had reduced rations because of it being of better quality nutritionally. On that basis I would struggle both financially and with his weight!
 
I'm currently feeding hay that costs me £2.50 a standard bale but my boy's just not eating it
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Probably getting through just over a bale a week at the moment.

Considering moving to haylage when I move to my new yard but not sure how much they'll charge per week and I'm very worried about my boy going loopy loo on it!
 
I feed my natives adlib haylege in winter. We have a big bale put in the middle of the field and it takes a week for 5 of them to demolish one bale.

In summer all mine get haylege as there is no dust and i dont want anything getting a cough.
None of them have got fat but they dont get much in the way of hard feed either!
 
Haylage - horse has COPD and our hay was a bit variable in quality. Costs £5/week extra on top of our livery, and I give her as much as she will eat - BUT we've cut her hard feed back by half. She's an american quarter horse in full work.
Cobs in particular can go loopy on haylage - remember to cut the hard feed back!
 
I feed hay from a professional company (rather than from the local farmer) which is guaranteed quality.

I only feed in haynets in very windy weather, normally it's loose in the field. Always outdoors or under the canopy of the shelter in very wet weather.

I'd love to feed haylage but from past experience have decided...

1) It's too expensive for small bale haylage.
2) I have 3 horses, so large bale haylage would spoil before I managed to use it all
3) The horses eat it too quickly, even in a haylage net, leaving them to get bored and destructive.
4) I've had a lot of problems with small bale haylage recently, heavy mould and spoilt bales, which means I have to lug them back out the yard and back to the Country store for replacing.
5) Risks associated with haylage from spoilage. I've only found one brand of haylage that have had sufficiently strong wrapping...this was also the most expensive brand.
6) ...which is also part of 5, technically...Botulism.
 
Mabel has haylage at the moment because thats wghat is supplied with our livery but, i read, that it is harvested earlier in the year, when the plants are younger, so its water content is higher. Because the palnts are younger, they are more digestible, they have higher nutritional value =]
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Fed haylage for many years now. Most of the reasons have been mentioned such as a reduction in the hard feed necessary and no soaking time required.

That aside, once mine have been on haylage, they never seem interested in hay again so i just kinda stick to it
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I have always fed hay, cos we make our own. Would be wary of using haylage as have 1 pony with cushings, another who gets scatty on high energy food and a donkey. Only Murph would really be suitable for haylage I think and even then would end up getting too fat I think as he has 2 huge haynets at night during the winter.
 
Sam has hay because he is dieting, poor boy. Gets 2 slices which probably dosnt last much longer than it takes me to drive home, but he is looking well and has [more than ] energy for his job (hacking).
Haylage is cheaper where I keep him as it is made by the farmer and must admit looks jolly good stuff......
The hay i get is standard bales made by a yorkshire farmer so weighs a tonne and i get discount at £2.50 bale (cos i know him).
So - basically it is energy and weight control are the reasons i choose hay over haylage,
he is bonkers and fat on haylage!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
 
Haylage as that was what he was on when I bought him, so as he did fine on it, I didn't change. Our livery covers unlimited of hay, haylage and hard feed anyway.
 
Would like to feed haylage as I hate handling wet hay but:

. my Shetland pony would go pop
. my Welsh cob filly would probably follow suit soon after
. Dont' know anyone round here that sells big bale haylage
. Would have to have several delivered at a time and then be fenced off and then it would be just my luck that the crows would peck them all
. Some years ago I used do have small bale haylage delivered by a local feed merchant, 15 bales at a time. They seemed to damage most of them in transit and then refused to replace them and I ended up chucking a large % of it away. Gave up with that and gave up with them!!
 
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