hay or haylage?

All of mine have haylage, except one that is laminitic he gets soaked hay. I find big bale haylage economical for feeding as I have 7or8 to feed over the winter, it also means no soaking, this is difficult in freezing weather.
I have had no horses cough since changing to haylage and they are bedded on straw.
 
I feed haylage. BH isn't the best doer and on hay I have to feed hard feed. Ad lib haylage and he glows all winter (he'll eat a lot more haylage than he will hay which helps). It's easier to store too. I always have hay though and put hay in fields rather than haylage as O can't bring myself to chuck beautiful haylage in the mud!
 
Mine have always been on hay.

tried the old mare on haylage 1 winter when she dropped a lot of weight, but she didnt agree with it, couldn't chew it and slobbered a lot, she loved the taste, but chocked very easily on it.

I have also given soaked hay for a good doer, was really good except the time consumption :)
 
My horse would probably much prefer haylage but vet warned me that haylage can play havoc with the digestive system and that she hates it so I don't feed it..
 
monkeybum13 said:
Haylage is still a 'modern feed' to me!
Click to expand...

:D I came back to horses after a 30+ year absence and when I heard someone mention haylage I thought it was some sort of modern way of taliking about hay. Some of the young folk I know add "age" onto words, eg a quiz becomes a quizzage.... :D:D

Mollie does fine on hay, so following the principle of "if it ain't broke don't fix it", I haven't tried her on haylage.
 
I switched to haylage 5 years ago when i had two in that coughed on hay, i find haylage so much more convenient than soaking hay.

It is also much easier to make, we'd cut a field for hay but the weather forecast changed so we baled as haylage as you only need about three dry days :-)

It also seems to be of more consistent quality than hay & i also believe that we can feed more as it has a higher water content and weighs more. However, when the fields were covered with snow & i was feeding in fields twice a day, i mixed stalky hay 50/50 with haylage, not sure why but it did slow them down searching through for the haylage which was all they really wanted to eat.

I would introduce it slowly as it can cause upset stomachs if you just swap overnight.
 
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