How much haylage?

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Dizzydancer

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My horse is 16.2 MW cob, he is currently in 24/7, normally he has 2.5% bodyweight overnight (roughly 12hrs) he eats it all and is not overly greedy. He is now having 5% (25kg) of his bodyweight and finishing it in about 18hrs, YO giiving him extra, last night he had extra 4kg ontop (upping it to 30kg) of his normal and he had about 2 mouthfuls left this morning!
It was -15.5 at 6.30 this morning so he is obv eating more. Do you think this is too much?
 
Is he a good doer? If so I think this is too much tbh. Can you double net to slow him down a bit. Normally you would feed 2.5% total per 24 hours for a horse to maintain their weight. Even allowing for the extremities of the weather to give him double that could lead to a tubster when the cold snap is over.
 
He is a very poor doer! He is TBx ID but he gets the weight from the TB side unfortunately! He is not having any hard feed i probably should have added that in first too!! I think I will just have to manage him as he goes he was slightly underweight going into winter so that doesnt help, and he is very difficult to get weight back on, but due to being stuck in hard feed is out of window to add on weight this is the only way.
 
Haylege should always be fed ad lib - he shouldn't ever be without. So give him as much as he'll eat, and put it in small holed haynets if you are worried about weight gain.
 
If he is underweight then I would let him have as much as he will eat.

If he is overweight then I would ration it in some way - double-netting, giving a small net when he first comes in, then a larger one last thing at night etc.

If it is a rather wet haylage then remember that a lot of the weight will actually be water.
 
My TB is on ad lib halage, she looks good but saying that she is not a greedy horse. It all depends on the horse. My old mare would just eat until she burst so had to be fed accordingly.
 
Both my tbs living out in the snow are on 12.5kg haylage each per day and this is precisely 2.5% of their bodyweight. I feed 1 small bale of haylage per day. When the grass is on show again this will go down accordingly. They also get 3kgs hard feed each per day and do fine on this - so a litle more like 3% of their bodyweight in total which is more than enough for a poor doer IF the quality of what is fed is good enough!!

TBH 25kg a day for one horse is probably quite wasteful. Ad lib is a grand idea, but in the current financial climate I would prefer to feed as much as they need to maintain weight rather than as much as they can possibly stuff themselves with - my mare could eat her way through 30kg a day of haylage and would not put on any more weight than what she does eating 12.5kg - that's typical thoroughbred for you, she is not designed to be seriously bulky.

Why not top up the haylage with some alternate high quality fibre sources - grass pellets, alfa a oil, fast fibre and so on to help bulk him up with something a little more nutritious.
 
Thanks guys. It is quite wet so yes alot is water quantity i think. He is not a greedy horse so won't eat it just because its there, thats why i always like him to hvae plenty as if he does eat it then he is hungry.
As for financial climate it is hard but we have made plenty of haylage on our fields this year got enough to last the yard a year. So ad lib is an ok option for me. I think for now he can continue on this amount until we actually have grass.
RachelFerd he was having alfa a-oil & fast fibre until the weather turned as he gets too hyped up with being stabled 24/7 if he has this, eventhough its not much calories!
 
lucky you to be able to go ad lib then! I don't really have that option as the mare would eat me out of my home if I gave her the opportunity, and with my cheapest forage option being super-high-quality small bale haylage (bizarrely) they will only be given what they need. Both are looking well on it though (and the gelding is actually putting weight back on after dropping off a couple of months ago)

Part of the difference would be the quality though - if your haylage is very wet, the quantity you state does make more sense. My haylage is quite dry but nutritionally dense. I put little piles around the field to keep them moving around to eat it rather than standing still in the same place, makes it last longer and keeps them occupied - but they do also have grass to nibble on inbetween which also makes a difference.

Hay round here is £7.50 for a small bale, so ad lib would cost me something like £15+ a day if I fed them the full amount they could possibly eat!!!
 
Yes ino hay round here is also ridiculous price! Haylage is much cheaper locally!! Yes I think that is the problem last year he was on horsehage as we pnly baled hay, and he didnt have half the amount as it was soo expensive!!
 
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