How long to wait before feeding this years hay ?

Beatrice5

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I am sure it's been asked a thousand time and did do a seach on hay but nothing came up :(

So my hay supplier has hay he baled 4 weeks ago can I feed it ? Have ordered last years haylage to start me off as this years only 8 weeks old. Dilemma :(
 
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Excellent - thank you.

Anything I need to look out for to indicate to the contray. Obviously if it was musty and mouldy I wouldn't feed but any other tips advice appreciated as not fed such fresh hay before.
 
Mix it in with the old hay for as long as you can, minimum 1 week preferably over 2 weeks, gradually changing over to the new, starting with a very small amount and building up the amount. I had to feed my new hay after about 4 weeks this year as I had just about run out.

Don't just suddenly present them with a haynet full of different hay one day.
 
I was told that you don't feed new hay until christmas.....

But I feed haylage so what do I know!? Even with haylage, I never feed new haylage until at least 8 weeks after wrapping.
 
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