how much to feed? mollichaff as hay replacement

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talie2rose

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hi i am thinking about changing my pony over to mollichaff instead of hay as hay has been quite poor and she is coughing, tried haylage and she didnt like it. Just wondering how much i should be feeding her, i normally give her 2 slices/wads of hay a night she is a 13.2 nf 28 years old, weighing roughly 300kg

thanks
 
I think that Dengie recommend weight for weight with HiFi Lite as a hay replacement. HiFi Lite is low in sugar, unlike many mollichaffs which are blended with molasses, so that would be a point to take into consideration. Do you soak her hay? That might be worth trying first, although if the hay is mouldy rather than just dusty, then an alterative would be better.

 
I wouldn't like to say as i'm not familiar with that feed. One thing to remember though is that you should change her over gradually, so if you start with what you have and introduce the new feeding regime slowly, then you can introduce Dengie at the same time. Pony would probably be upset if you were to take away her haynet over night!!

Have just had a look at the Mollichaff site and the Veteran chaff can be fed as a hay replacer too, so I guess you would just have to weigh up the costs.
 
yes i agree at the moment im giving her 1 slice of soaked hay and about 3 large scoops of chaff, just want to make sure that she is getting the right amount of forage, thanks for your help
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A large scoop holds about 300g of HiFi, so 3 would be no more than 1kg. Best thing is to weigh the amount of hay that you normally give her, then weigh the chaff to make up for the lost slice of hay. You can get a measuring bucket from Dengie to make life easier when replacing the hay ration.
 
If your pony doesn't need to lose weight then she needs 2 - 2.5% of her ideal bodyweight in total per day, ideally as fibre based as possible. So between 6kgs and 7.5kgs in total taking into account grass in the day, any other bucket feed etc.

The minimum you should ever feed is 1.5% of their bodyweight in feed when you are wanting them to lose weight.
 
Have you had your ponys teeth checked in the last 6 months? She may have gone off eating hay/haylage because she cant eat it, not because she doesnt want to. Many older horses struggle to eat long fibre like hay but manage with short chopped fibre. If you havnt had her teeth looked at then i would do that asap.
 
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