Horsehage? can I feed it?

[RubysGold]

I have two horses, both need their weight closely monitoring (both are starting to lose the weight that they managed to sneak on at the end of summer when I relaxed a bit too much)
One is retired, the other is ridden as and when in winter due to dark nights and work he gets a bit of an easy time)

My old girl gets a cough whenever she eats hay, I wet it when I can, either with a hose or by soaking it, but right now I can't because of the freezing temperatures, on a concrete yard there is no way to safely soak hay

Obviously haylage bales are too large to use between two horses on restricted diet so I am considering using horsehage just while everything is frozen (and possibly long term if it proves better for Roos respiratory system)

 

[Highlands]

Steam your hay?

 

[ElleSkywalker]

I have fed the blue (high fibre) ones to mine including lammi prone ones. It's lovely stuff but not cheap compared to hay. None of them coughed on it however and compared to cost of a steamer you would be better go for the the horsehage in the short term

 

[cobgoblin]

Your feed store will probably have other sorts of small bale Haylage as well as Horsehage. Frankly I wouldn't recommend Horsehage after we found what looked like a t**d and loo paper in a bale! Totally gross.

 

[laura_nash]

I have fed both the high fibre and the timothy HorseHage and the timothy Devon Haylage to my good doer with respiratory problems and sugar sensitivity (cannot have normal haylage at all). The only downside I found is price, if I could have done I would have used them full time as so much easier than soaking, my horse loved it, didn't cough once and lost weight without getting grumpy.

 

[starryeyed]

Yes the blue/high fibre horsehage should be fine, it's safe for laminitis and good doers. We have been feeding it for years and luckily not experienced anything nasty inside - that sounds awfulcobgoblin!!

 

[chickeninabun]

Hey Rubysgold!! Long time since I've been on here and I see your post...
One of mine has a cough (mild COPD but vet said not). I tried soaking her hay but it wasn't good enough for her. So she has bagged haylage. I get mine from R&R, it's about £6.25 and lasts me about 4-5 days/nets but she's only a pony. It's made by Skerne Leys but I've also fed Equilage, which is another brand name. I think these local brands will be cheaper than HorseHage. Equilage is only £5.85 for a biggish bale, bigger than Skerne Leys, but I was getting Ryegrass which I didn't want as the sugars are too high in it, but I think they do a Hi-Fibre Ryegrass which is lower in sugar and a Timothy mix one too.

 

[_HP_]

I feed haylage to my good doers....if you have some analysed, you may find that a lot of haylage is actually lower calorie than a lot of hay.
I feed a local famers good quality haylage but have also used the blue horsehage .

 

[Supertrooper]

I feed the blue high fibre horsehage to my pony who I wanted to drop weight over the winter. I have no storage for hay and at least I knew what I was getting with the horsehage.

I weigh tape him weekly and he is dropping weight so I'm happy to keep him on this ATM

 

[Proud Wexford Hero]

I have two horses, both need their weight closely monitoring (both are starting to lose the weight that they managed to sneak on at the end of summer when I relaxed a bit too much)
One is retired, the other is ridden as and when in winter due to dark nights and work he gets a bit of an easy time)

My old girl gets a cough whenever she eats hay, I wet it when I can, either with a hose or by soaking it, but right now I can't because of the freezing temperatures, on a concrete yard there is no way to safely soak hay

Obviously haylage bales are too large to use between two horses on restricted diet so I am considering using horsehage just while everything is frozen (and possibly long term if it proves better for Roos respiratory system)

Have you thought about Equilage? They have 3 different types of haylage, and their bags are around the same(ish) size as a bale of hay. Cheaper than horsehage around here too. My boy didn't take to horsehage, and I had a few too many 'bad' bags of it 😊

 

[Supertrooper]

Just as an aside which is better to feed good doer's the blue high fibre or the purple timothy? When I asked Marksway they said both were fine even if you were aiming for weight loss and on looking at the analysis there's not much between them.....