I've had to resort to using a haynet :(

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bertin12

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My boy likes to eat through his hay at a stupid speed, and i dont like the idea of him having nothing to eat for the rest of the night. (hes in from around 5.30pm- 8am)
i like to feed from the floor because its meant to be better for them as its how they would naturally eat, but because he eats it so fast ive had to get a haynet to slow him down. he is a very good doer so dont like to give him too much, and i cant give him ad lib as it would end up costing me so much!
so ive gone and got a hay net with small holes, hopefully this will slow him down a tad
 
You could make his hay last longer by mixing it with good quality oat/barley straw, or give him more but soak it, so that he will no put on more weight. I agree with you. I hate haynets as they can be so dangerous and I will only feed from the floor/haybar in order to encourage the correct muscle development.
Neither do I like to see horses standing in for hours with nothing available to eat.
 
Pearlsasinger said:
You could make his hay last longer by mixing it with good quality oat/barley straw, or give him more but soak it, so that he will no put on more weight. I agree with you. I hate haynets as they can be so dangerous and I will only feed from the floor/haybar in order to encourage the correct muscle development.
Neither do I like to see horses standing in for hours with nothing available to eat.
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Be careful with Barley Straw as it can be quite high in starch! If your horse is a good doer, you could use a mixture of hay and barley straw and also some soaked hay in a separate net - this will be much less tasty and he will be more picky about eating it (hopefully!).
 
I have a haybar which is always empty because my boy is a guzzler! So have had to use haynets for a long time now.
 
My mare is terrible for guzzling her hay within an hour or two. I started out by feeding her a big pile of hay on her bedroom floor at night but I popped back one night a couple of hours later and it was all gone, so started using a small mesh haynet stuffed full to the brim. To be honest, I don't think it has made a huge difference to her - although it probably drags it out another hour or so. She comes in at 8-9pm and goes out around 10-11am.
I don't know about anyone else on here with similar guzzling type horses, but does anyone get hassle off other people at the yard for 'not providing their horse with enough hay to last the entire night'?!!! It really infuriates me because my horse gets about 9kg of hay at night after a day in the field with a big pile of hay, and she gets chaff and fibre nuts morning and night too. She's 16.3 and in light work, and prone to weight gain. I have had a woman on the yard go hysterical at me because my horse finishes her 9kg of hay within a couple of hours and on one particular occassion she went mental because she thought I had left my horse with NO HAY whatsoever just because the empty haynet was hanging outside of the door - I had broken my finger and couldn't fill the haynet so tipped it all on the floor instead!! Grrrrrr, these people anger me so much!!!
 
Oh I also got my girl a decahedron which has nearly a kg of chopped carrots in every night in the hope that would slow things down with regards the hay situ. Unfortunately she has figured out a method of emptying the ball within ten mins and then whinnies at me for a refill (which she doesn't get!) so that didn't work and now I've set a rod for my own back because it costs me a fortune in carrots every week! :(
 
I would only do this if your horse is unshod, but have you thought of hay pillows? Basically you take the string out of a small hole haynet and use a karabiner clip to close it, then they can eat out of a haynet, on the floor! :D
Wouldnt risk it with a shod horse as could get haynet wedged between shoe and foot, maybe?
 
Mine has a haybar..she chucks her hay everywhere & sniffs the best stuff & refuses to eat the stuff she doesnt like the look of....now she has half haybar & a haynet....we shall see in the morn what she thinks of the idea
 
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