Haylage

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helly86

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Hiya,

My horse can't have haylage, he goes loopy and i've just been to yard and he's been given haylage rather than hay. I currently have someone riding him as I can't due to health (also reason for him being on full livery :-( )

Now, I've had words with YM who is putting him back on hay but does anyone know how long it takes for haylage to get out of his system, or for the sugars to get out.

Can't have someone else riding him while his sugared up and want to have an educated idea of when he can be ridden again.

Hope that makes sense??

Cheers.x
 
Won't be the haylage hun. What do you mean sugared up? It will be some other reason - think Occam's razor, aka the zebra theory. The definition of "common" things is because they're the most common. So if you are walking down a country lane in the UK and hear hoofbeats behind you, you expect it to be a horse, not a zebra. Don't look for obscure reasons for something, it will be the most common. Most common reason for horses suddenly acting oddly when ridden is pain.
 
Ours go a bit loopy when they first get on it.

They love it though and I think it's good for them - could you not cut his hard feed down and leave him on the heylage?
 
Haylage usually has a lower sugar content than hay made from similar grasses, this is due to the sugar being fermented in the ensiling process - see this quote from Dengie about the results of their forage analysis:

"So far in 2007, the forage analysed by us for our customers showed that the average sugar content of hay was 10.5% whereas haylage is 9.8%. It would normally be expected to see haylage with a significantly lower sugar content than hay as the sugar should be fermented during the ensiling process. However, there seems to be a tendency to create drier haylages which may be compromising sugar fermentation as can be seen from our analysis; all the haylages with sugar values over 10% had a dry matter in excess of 65% whereas haylage would normally be expected to be 50-60% dry matter."

I suppose it is possible that the haylage at your yard is pure rye-grass and the hay is made from lower sugar grasses, but as others said you may need to look at other factors in your management.
 
I must say there seems to be quite a lot of people who think that haylage causes there horse to go loopy. I wouldn't have thought it was the haylage have you just increased or changed any of the hard feed? I would have though 48 hours would have passed through. Why not lunge for the exercise and to help get rid of excess energy.
grin.gif
 
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