haylage question

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kendra2705

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Our hay has run out and our YO is now selling haylage, (big black bales) can anyone enlighten me as in all my years of being in this game ive only ever fed hay and horse hage that you buy in the feed shop as a treet. My question is what are the advantages / disadvantages, the only thing i know is that it is younger grass and you feed less than hay and pref mix the two to start , if the horses love it then i think that may be better ??????????? any and all your views please
 
I feed half and half and find it works well for me, my friend, who has a 25 year old Anglo Arab, started feed the same about 4 weeks ago as her horse had dropped a lot of weight and he's looking massively better for it, I personal feed it as I don't like feeding huge amounts of short feed and find my horse does far better on it but I think it's down to the individual horse and what suits one may not be right for another, I also find haylage more reliable quality wise than hay after spending £'s last year on hay that my horse wouldn't eat, the one thing that drives me mad with it though is getting it out of the bag ! So if anyone has some tips to make that easier please let me know
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Haylage has a higher nutritional value than hay. It is better for horses with respiratory problems as it has no dust spores. You don't feed less than hay as it contains more water than hay. Therfore you feed more. It has been known to make some horses fizzy, and cause diarrhea.
 
I always feed it to my big horse as he won't eat hay, plus he'd need hay soaking and he needs weight putting on during winter, me and 2 other girls shared a bale last winter, it cost us £1 a day per horse for a big alfa bag full each.

I always fed my baby (well 16hh and 2 1/2!) `soaked hay as he's a fatty but wanted him to have ad lib forage. However this year my boys were out in the same field with no others so instead of bringing them in overnight from about October I fed them hayledge at night. I think this gave baby a taste for the good stuff as when I brought them in beg Dec he wouldn't eat hay- dry soaked or steamed from 3 different suppliers, so some nights had nothing. After 5 nights of this I just fed him the hayledge, he's still a little round but has no rug on and hardly any hard food so I dont mind.

Its actually worked out better though as 1 bale £28 is lasting my 2 up to 3 weeks- ad lib, also no messing about soaking stuff!
 
It definitely has worked well for me & my horse but we've not been doing much over the last 3/4 weeks due to work & weather, I've only been able to ride about 2/3 times a week instead of 5 times and I possibly would up short feed if I'd been doing more but still nothing like last winter before I started feeding haylage, I pay £4.10 for a 18/20Kilo bag and it works out cheaper for me as well, I also think horse enjoys it more too
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To answer your question I would feed less short feed but again depends on individual horse, hope this helps
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Haylage has a higher nutritional value than hay but take care because it is wetter than hay so if you try to feed by weight alone, you need to feed MORE weight of haylage than you would hay!
 
Haylage has a greater concentration of water than hay, as a general rule about 35% for haylage to 15% for hay, so you should feed more haylage than hay.

The problem with the energy and protein difference between the two is that you need to know the nutritional value of both. When was your orignial hay harvested and what kind of grass did it come from? Ditto for the haylage.

To give you an example, the people I buy haylage from do to different types. One is at 8-11% protein and 9-11 MJ/kg energy, while the other is second cut grass so 7-9% protein and 7-9% MJ/kg which is a massive difference.

Ideally introduce any change gradually by mixing both old and new feed for a while.
 
Ditto most of the advice above.

Assuming the haylage is made from similar grasses and harvested at the same time as the hay you have been using, then you would use the same VOLUME of haylage as you would hay. So if you feed one large stuffed net of hay a night, you would feed one large stuffed net of haylage a night, obviously introduced gradually. However, that large net of haylage would actually WEIGH more than the net of hay because of the water content.

More nutrition is usually retained in haylage than hay, so you can probably cut back a bit on any hard feed you give. Both hay and haylage vary a lot in nutrition levels according to the types of grasses used and time of year it is cut - so if your supplier can give you an analysis that can be helpful. For example, High Fibre Horsehage has a similar calorie count to average hay, whereas their Rye Grass version has more calories than average hay. The High Fibre one is obviously therefore more suitable for a good doer.
 
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