hay replacers

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herondell

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what with the price of hay now has anyone considered feeding any of these ? im looking into feeding it aswell as hay this year but which one.

there
fast fibre ( allen and page )
ready fibre mash ( rowen barbary )
fibre plus nuggets ( badminton )
not sure what else is on the market.
 
I would only use a hay replacer if I literally couldn't source any hay at all, or if it was costing in excess of about £8 a bale, as otherwise using these hay replacer products will actually cost you more money than the hay itself! (Another possible situation is the veteran with poor teeth who can't actually eat hay.) I do feel some of the manufacturers of these products are being a bit misleading with some of their advertising that suggests that these products might work out cheaper than hay.

Having said that, I do feed Fast Fibre to my horses, but not to replace hay, just as a quick soak alternative to High Fibre Cubes as a daily bucket feed. I like it because it is very low sugar/low starch, soaks quickly and the horses seem to think it is OK.
 
I've fed all of these at different times, and for various reasons but not to replace hay really. To be honest it would work out a lot more expensive to feed these instead of hay even though hay prices have gone up. I would only use them as replacers if I couldn't get hay at all.

Lol TGM snap!
 
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sorry didnt explain myself,im not wanting to feed this and not hay i want something to give them that is fibre to fill them abit more, will still give them there hay and haylage .i did feed fast fibre last year aswell with my horses other hard feeds.
i like the look of the rowan barbary spoke to them today ,they said to give the ready mash that has all the vits and min in and just that ,they said it can be fed along side other feeds too.
hay my way is already £6 a bale and is talk of going up to £10 and with 5 horses thats a lot of money hence looking into the ready mash.
 
kay id try to get unmollased sugar beet and mix that with fibre cubes/pencils and chaff if it were me.unmollased sugar beet it all fibre so good for keeping them warm internally.
for any that need a bit more condition id swap the fibre cubes for conditioning cubes or just add conditioning cubes as well.

i fed this last winter when mine were living unrugged on a very exposed field with little/no shelter and they all did well on it.

bog standard unmollased beet is also a lot cheaper than speedibeet,fast fibre etc.

for chaff i used graze on half and half with molli chaff as again its cheap and being winter i wasnt worried about them getting a bit of sugar.

used fast fibre in past and liked it but it almost twice the price of normal sugarbeet.
 
there on hi fi original ,frogpool conditioning cubes and unmollased sugarbeet now. most hold there weight ok but bally and poppy drop over winter .tia is on hi fi and baileys outshine now as she is going out this winter showing.see how they go as may put them on another conditioning cube or may try the ready mash.also there going on the haylage you normaly have aswell as hay. i did like the just grass they use to have.
think i will see how they go on what there having for a while.
 
Im currently feeding fast fibre with their supplements in. Plus a seperate bucket of dengie hi fi lite. And planning on adding another bucket of the dreid grass stuff. This is to replace a small amount of hay so that my stash of hay will last a few weeks longer into the winter.

I dont see how anything can replace the hay in times of time taken to eat and fibre provided but I think high fibre feeds can be fed alonside to help make hay last a little longer.
 
i'm aiming on keeping mine out longer (earlier in the morning later at night) to cut down on the amount of haylage they eat, i have also started giving a scoop of hifi lite and a bit of alfabeet at bed time and give them a bit less haylage
 
Simple Systems feeding is a good way of giving your horse lots and lots of fibre. Depending on what you feed you can give trugs of the stuff along with hay or haylage to keep your horse with more to eat through the night. We used to feed this to our horses until the local feed merchant which stocked it closed down.
 
4x4 said:
Yes Mike but there isn't any about a reasonable price. (Plus some of us are fieeding horses with hay allergies).
Click to expand...

It depends what you mean by a reasonable price! If you are paying six pounds a small bale, then hay still works out cheaper than, say, Fast Fibre or HiFi Lite. However, if the price did reach the astronomical amount of ten pounds a small bale then it would be worth investigating the use of replacers!

However, if you are feeding a horse which can't actually eat hay for any reason, then hay replacers are a costly but useful option.
 
Thanks TGM, thats exactly what I meant. Obviously if your horse cant eat hay it is an entirely different matter. Sadly a lot of hay alergies are due to feeding inferior hay . At £6 a 20kg bale is still good value for money.
 
i have decided on fast fibre again along with the new Dengie Alfa-A molasses free,if they start to drop a bit of weight then im going to ad calm and condition aswell as there hay and haylage.they have been back on the fast fibre for about 4 days and seem a bit more contented.hay is going up and up around my way as some round bales ar £50 already,
i have got someone making me some hay boxes big enough for 2 horses and i will put there hay and haylage in that this winter so hay dont blow away in the wind.
 
i dont skimp on hay mine have always had ad lib hay but as prices are going up and up im just thinking of other ways than putting 3 round hay bales out a week this winter.
 
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