Haylage, Slowing them down- Horsehage

[Horsekaren]

I am transitioning my horse from adlib wet hay to Horsehage blue. He usually has 1/2 - 3/4 of a small bale of hay over night in winter. Needless to say he loves it!!! The bag states it should last a 500kg horse 4 days, this would be 1.5 sections a day which is such a small amount!

Last night i tried mixing the haylage with soaked hay but all the soaked hay was left at the bottom of the net. He gobbles through it within hour or two hours in a haylage net tied in his hay cube.

I hate the thought of him not having anything to eat all night

My question is, how can i slow him down? has anyone used martsnets?
Because he has been eating it so quickly im finding myself giving him more and i've noticed his belly has got ever so slightly bigger

 

[ester]

as still unshod look at nibbleze nets that you leave on the floor. Because it is free on the floor there is nothing for them to pull against to remove the hay/once the net becomes loose it doesn't push up on the sides. Even with the larger (40mm) holes it slows mine down but they do small holes as well. - I used to put one large large holed net in, and a small small holed net in case that ran out.

Regardless of what the bag says you should usually be feeding by weight more haylage than hay because of the moisture content.

 

[milliepops]

Regardless of what the bag says you should usually be feeding by weight more haylage than hay because of the moisture content.

agreed, which makes horsehage incredibly expensive IME if you have average sized horses (rather than minis!) I've occasionally used it if I'm going away as one of mine goes off her food and I needed different things to tempt her. But I couldn't afford to feed it at home as a regular thing, I'd get though bags and bags in a week.

Why are you swapping from soaked hay OP?

 

[TotalMadgeness]

I've tried everything - martsnets, haygrazers the lot but I found soaking the haylage is the only thing that slows them down! Weirdly enough... ?? I also find oat straw is a lifesaver as you can give them a nice big net of this with their haylage and they just nibble on it when they've finished the haylage.

 

[SEL]

Double net it? Slows my olympic champion speed eater down a bit. I soak hay though so she can have extra.

 

[Chinchilla]

Double net it and split into two or three nets in different corners of the stable.

Though if I were you I'd stick with the soaked hay, much cheaper

 

[Horsekaren]

I'm swapping because of his asthma. Since introducing it he is eating every bit of haylage i offer and he has showed no signs of coughing or sneezing despite coming in for the last couple of weeks at night
I started soaking his hay last year but it was so hit and miss, sometimes he would eat a bale in a night other nights he would just nibble so i was throwing so much away. The hay was costing me about £3.50 a day so if he had half a bag of Horsehage (which i think is far too much) i wouldnt be to worse off. I'm hoping come September when the farmers have their meadow haylage ready i can save a few pennies there.

I guess i'm trying to preempt all of the issues we had last winter and try and combat them before winter hits.

The floor feeder nets sound good but i worry he would get tangled plus his entire stable is bedded it would just go all over the place.

 

[milliepops]

it might be too much calorie wise but not for his fibre intake esp as the grass dies off in the winter. Just something to think about.

 

[ester]

How would he get tangled? They are designed so that they cannot get tangled in them. I wouldn't use them if there were much of a risk of entanglement!

I don't find it makes that much mess either, it is either in the net or eaten. The whole point is that they do end up moving it round the stable with them and mine are fully bedded. The only drawback is that it occasionally gets a water dunking - though this was probably mostly related to F's teeth issues. It is much much tidier than feeding without a net which I now have to do.

 

[criso]

The hay was costing me about £3.50 a day so if he had half a bag of Horsehage (which i think is far too much)

.

When my horse needed Horsehage Timothy haylage due to skin allergies, I was easily getting through 1/2 bale a day. That was for a 16.2 tb in light work but a good doer. In winter when it was a bigger part of the overall forage though atm I am finding I am getting through more forage with very little grass out there.

I used small holed haynets to slow down and during the day made up 4 or 5 little ones that I asked to get put in at intervals to spread it out.

 

[Horsekaren]

How would he get tangled? They are designed so that they cannot get tangled in them. I wouldn't use them if there were much of a risk of entanglement!

I don't find it makes that much mess either, it is either in the net or eaten. The whole point is that they do end up moving it round the stable with them and mine are fully bedded. The only drawback is that it occasionally gets a water dunking - though this was probably mostly related to F's teeth issues. It is much much tidier than feeding without a net which I now have to do.

i was looking at them on the Martsnet site and it has next to the floor nets "use at own risk" so i was a bit concerned. I'm going to order the nibble net, see how it goes on the floor if not i can stuff it in the haycube

As for how would he get tangled, im sure he would find away.. i can imagine him rolling on it in winter with a rug on and it will be stuck to his side... better yet he might use it as a pillow

Only on the weekend did he get up to mischief, my feed and tack room backs onto his stable, i walked past the door said good morning and proceeded to make his feed only to find he had popped a panel out of his stable thats been there for years. i didnt see the hole until his head was right behind me lol

 

[ester]

lol at his face in the last one!

 

[Nepenthe]

A bale of Horsehage generally weighs about 20kg. As haylage contains a lot more moisture than hay, a lot of the weight is water. If your horse is 500kg, therefore, he should be getting AT LEAST hAlf a bale per day, and really more like 2/3.

I feed a lot of different forages, and I'd suggest you equate a section of haylage to a section of hay.

 

[ihatework]

A bale of Horsehage generally weighs about 20kg. As haylage contains a lot more moisture than hay, a lot of the weight is water. If your horse is 500kg, therefore, he should be getting AT LEAST hAlf a bale per day, and really more like 2/3.

I feed a lot of different forages, and I'd suggest you equate a section of haylage to a section of hay.

Only if it’s the horses sole source of food.
For a horse that is also at grass, and maybe also on hard feed that needs to be taken into account.

I’m feeding green horsehage at the moment and find you get 6 slices in 20kg, so 3.3kg per slice. It compacts down significantly and once shaken out a slice I’d say is more volume than an equivalent hay slice.

My big horse isn’t a big forage eater (handily) so gets one slice during day and doesn’t guzzle it all at once. But he also gets 2 decent hard feeds and at least 12h on grass.

There are definitely more economical ways of feeding haylage, but there appears to be little in the way of availability at the moment.

OP I’d go the small hole pillow route for yours. My last horse was a piglet and it’s a right pain.

 

[asmp]

Are you not near a Moles? They do a high fibre own brand haylage which is much cheaper plus another local make, which is cheaper still.

 

[meleeka]

I use Martsnets slow feeders and they work a treat. I have ones to hang up, the floor feeder type (the string is elastic with a clamp and not tied into a loop. It’s would be prettty impossible to get a foot in the top when it’s done up) and even a whole bale net. My boy will eat around half a small bale of hay a night. When he got into the hayshed he ate two whole bales overnight so that shows how much is slows him down. I always give him a small normal net as well to satisfy his hunger but he’s a lot happier being able to have ad-lib.

 

[BlackRider]

try the Shires Greedyfeeder nets - they're cheaper than marts nets (from memory)

Also see if you can get a locally made small bale timothy, I'm paying £6.50 a bale which is a bit cheaper than horsehage.

I feed abt 10lbs over night (but he's a 14h fell), and have a 2nd net with hay in, which he can nibble on if the gets really hungry.

 

[paddi22]

I get the small bays of hatlagedelivered and i use tiny holded nets for them . For two horses in work (out during the day) i go through a bale a day. It saves wastage and it means they dont get trampled into beds.

 

[Red-1]

My horse needed restricting this year, for a while she was off grass altogether, on soaked haylage, using a Shires Greedy Feeder medium size. Soaking it made it last a lot longer. Especially as it bulked up and became harder to pull through the net. Also, I think the bulked up soaked haylage also made her feel fuller.

While off grass altogether (but in daily ridden work) she was having 6 nets a day, 10lb in each net, 2 of those were overnight (in 2 nets to make it easier to drain/hang when wet!), so fed 5 X a day. That was dry weight, not wet. The frequent nets were so she could go a short period without, as in up to an hour.

She has lost weight beautifully. It has been a pain to soak haylage, but now she is at target weight we are on 50% soaked and 50% dry, next week we will be back to dry. She is also back up to 2 hrs on grass a day, which is making it cheaper as most days now she only needs 4 nets (2 of which are still at night).

Having said that, for some of the time she was on: 20 minutes grass, 1hr40 in, 20 minutes grass, 1hr 40 in...etc. I was up and down all day long! We are now on 1 hr morning and 1 hr evening to grass, which is considerably easier!

The only issue I now have is that her girth is now too long!!!

 

[Surbie]

Love that second picture, he looks so pleased with himself!!

If you go for the Shires Greedyfeeders and your horse in strong & clever, keep lots of baling twine for mending the holes he will make. And look for them often. Mine has 2 sections of hay to last him while in, fluffed out into 2 nets and I am regularly restitching them.

 

[buzyizzy]

When my chap has a lammi attack, which he hasn't had for ages now, I used to feed the Blue horsehage ad lib off the floor. After 36 hours he slowed down and his intake was reduced. Mixing it with the Timothy horsehage also slows them down, at least it did with him.
Don't worry about the bigger tummy, he will adjust.

 

[meleeka]

When my chap has a lammi attack, which he hasn't had for ages now, I used to feed the Blue horsehage ad lib off the floor. After 36 hours he slowed down and his intake was reduced. Mixing it with the Timothy horsehage also slows them down, at least it did with him.
Don't worry about the bigger tummy, he will adjust.

I’d have thought that was quite a dangerous gamble for a pony who already has acute laminitis.

 

[Chinchilla]

I’d have thought that was quite a dangerous gamble for a pony who already has acute laminitis.

Why? Horsehage is partially fermented which uses up sugars I thought? Though not sure ad libbing is wise?

 

[meleeka]

Why? Horsehage is partially fermented which uses up sugars I thought? Though not sure ad libbing is wise?

That was what I meant. Even accounting for lower sugars that’s potentially a lot of haylage to consume in three days until they may or may not adjust. Reducing sugar intake to a minimum is surely the first thing you do for a laminitic?

I’d love my ponies to self regulate. However I’m not prepared for the risk of bringing on laminitis while they adjust. My cob ate two whole bales of hay overnight when he broke into the hay store once, so that’s potentially 12 bales of hay in 3 days if he was truly ad-lib!

 

[Chinchilla]

That was what I meant. Even accounting for lower sugars that’s potentially a lot of haylage to consume in three days until they may or may not adjust. Reducing sugar intake to a minimum is surely the first thing you do for a laminitic?

I’d love my ponies to self regulate. However I’m not prepared for the risk of bringing on laminitis while they adjust. My cob ate two whole bales of hay overnight when he broke into the hay store once, so that’s potentially 12 bales of hay in 3 days if he was truly ad-lib!

Oh no OK I misunderstood, I thought you were saying haylage wasn't a good idea. My bad sorry!! neither of my 2 fatties self regulate so yeah, restrict the laminitic/metabolic horses, always.

 

[laura_nash]

When I fed my greedy good doer horsehage (same reason as you - breathing issues) I gave him a little amount in a small large-holed net, the rest of his weighed ration in a nibble net type thing on the floor (he's also unshod) and a trug of oat straw chaff. The logic was that he could stuff the small net first and then had the patience to eat from the net on the floor without trying to wrench out big chunks or losing his temper with it. Finally the oat straw was there so he always had something to chew on. It worked pretty well at the time.