How much hay is enough please?

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FionaM12

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Okay, please forgive me that this is such a basic question but it's puzzling me. I bought Mollie in June, so until now she's been almost entirely grass fed. I last owned a horse in the 1970s and for health reasons had no contact again with horses until now. So I'm more or less a beginner again!

Mollie (see picture taken quite recently) is in pretty good nick, a bit grass fat, 17 years old, 14.2 and does only a little gentle work. She lives out in summer (just coming in for a few hours most days). Now she's in at night, and soon she'll (sadly) be in 24/7, no winter turnout to save YO's fields.

A horsey friend noticed Mollie eats her hay very fast and suggested I use two haylage nets (smaller holes), one inside the other to slow her down. Otherwise she'd eat it very quickly and stand there with nothing left to eat.

When I bring her in at night, I give her as much hay as I can cram into a medium-sized doubled-up haylage net.

Last night I gave her her hay at 6pm, then, worried about the fact that she won't be fed again until 7am, gave a second net alongside the first! I then had a sneaky look at other liveries' overnight forage, and they seemed to have a fraction of the amount Mollie had - one small net each. Both Mollie's (doubled up, so 4 really) nets were empty this morning.

Am I taking the notion of "ad-lib" hay too literally? It seems she'll eat whatever I throw at her but I'm not sure I can afford to be that generous! I was taught, back in the olden days, that a horse shouldn't be left with an empty stomach for long. I simply can't remember how much hay I fed my old horse (similar size and build) 35 years ago.

Any tips? How many bales a week/what weight of hay would you expect a horse Mollie's size to eat if in 24/7?

Thank you for your patience if you've read all this. :)
 
vI'd give her 3 leaves of hay in a haylage net. if its all gone by morning then give her more. I think a small holed net is the way forward,it stops them gobbling it all up in the first 3 hours then standing all night with nothing. I expect 3 leaves of hay will be enough. I feed to appetite,ie ad lib unless they are fatties in which caseI reduce the amount by 1/3 and put it in small holed net so it lasts them through the night. ETA if shes going to be in 24/7 then 6 to 8 leaves of hay a day,something like 2/3 of a small bale a day [5 to 6 bales a week.].hope this helps.
Can you not get some sort of turnout? even a couple of hours helps horses shouldnt be in all the time.
 
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Horsesforever1 said:
I'd give her 3 leaves of hay in a haylage net.
Click to expand...

But that can vary greatly depending on the hay. You are far better doing it by weight, I have a spring balance thing that is really useful.

Do you have any idea what Mollie weighs? I'm fairly useless with guessing anything that's not a tb but about 500kg? Absolute minimum she should get is 1.5% of bodyweight daily (to reduce weight, about 2% to maintain). I weightape weekly to check if my boy is remaining at a constant weight.

Ad lib is the best for the horse, but if her weight increases then you could think about soaking it before feeding to reduce the energy content. Double or triple netting in haylage nets can work well too :) You could also mix with a decent oat straw as that is lo-cal.
 
The average horse requires 8 - 10 kg forage a day, which will also include any hard feed and grass consumed (or not in your case!).

We have a spring balance weighing scale and each section of our hay weighs 2kg, so in theory your mare would need between 4 - 5 section's a day, but this may vary if she is a good doer, what work she is in, how she is rugged and how much hard feed is given.

Hope that makes sense!
 
Thanks everyone, that's very helpful.

As for turnout, I'm at the mercy of the YO. Other livery owners tell me that he lets them turn out when the ground is firm for a while some days. Also there are one or two scrappy bits of paddocks round the farm which aren't much used but horses can forage a little on while people are mucking out etc. Other than that they're indoors from about Nov to March.

I'm loath to move Mollie as it took her so long to settle. However I'll see how she and I cope with this winter. The place she's at is very near to my house and cheap but I haven't yet experienced a winter there. We shall see.
 
Can be a piece of string but on average about 18-24 kg. So 9 2kg slices up to 12 of them. NB edited to add some slices in haybales are odd sizes and twice as big as others, 2kg slice is a normal one about four inches wide but best to weigh it as small margin of error over a winter is a lot of extra hay!

(Can you tell my pony is on diet - have the spring balance, the hifilite measuring bucket, the weightape, the lot!)

I use small/double holed nets and soaked hay (12 hours optimal to reduce sugars by 25%-30%), but also at night put about 3 little heaps of HifiLite around the stable on the ground.Sorting through the bed (prob wouldnt work with straw bed) keeps her much more occupied for longer than the hay, however well I knot it up to make it last. I do include the Hifilite in her daily 8.75kg overal feed allowance tho.

Hay on average (fairly ordinary meadow hay not rich ryegrass)is apparently about 9mj/kg, so soaking might take it to 6 or 7. HifiLite is about 8 so not too much higher.
 
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I got one of these for a tenner, much better than the little gold metal ones that just have etched in measurements you cant see in the stable. Very good as you can select from a range of max weights and divisions to exactly suit.

Came very quickly too. And the hook is just the right size to hold comfortably and to hook on haynet

http://www.ourweigh.co.uk/spring-balances/salter-brecknell-super-samson.html
 
Really think spring balance is the way to go. Over last winter, I was feeding haynets that to me seemed average in size and after all "it's only hay". One of my horses came out of winter fat, which took maybe two months to lose, and when I actually worked out the exact quantities he should have been on I was clearly over - feeding him (albeit only with hay). So, adlib is great in theory but in reality .......
 
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