Round hay bales in my muddy swimming pools

[slumdog]

So I have muddy swimming pools where I'm pretty sure fields used to be a long long time ago. The gang are in at night but out in the day but there's not much for them to eat now, I've been haying with little square bales but it doesn't take long before they've eaten it. I was wondering if I would be better off getting a big round bales and leaving one in the field but not sure if I'll just end up with a soggy, muddy, mouldy mess! How's everyone else coping?

Roll on summer

 

[Auslander]

My hay man has refused to sell me round bales unless i have a ring feeder, as he says they will just get wasted. I buy 6ft rectangular bales, which last 4 horses about a week - much cheaper than small bales.

 

[Archangel]

I used to feed big round bales in the field. There are advantages, especially in the snow as they can just munch away all day and sleep on the spilled stuff.

A lot gets wasted without a feeder even with my 'try a little harder' approach to eating the last bits. My vet ticked on at me about the risks of bales not eaten promptly that get repeated rainfall on them, I am thinking botulism but can't remember exactly *red face*

The clearing up used to get me down as well, a mass of soggy wasted hay to burn (I was on very dry sandy soil then so no mud). You only need one joker to wreck a bale, one of mine used it as a trampoline *sigh*. I did have more success with a feeder but then again the trampolining horse used to remove the feeder (how I do not know, probably best I didn't see that).

On wet ground I probably wouldn't do it at all. At the moment I am using massive tub (water tank size) and stuff them full twice a day. This is working out well. The tubs are about a metre across probably more and cost £17 from the feed shop.

 

[Apercrumbie]

Unless you have a feeder you will just waste an astronomical amount of hay. We've been using water troughs to keep ours out of the mud - saves us a fortune.

 

[winchester]

We use round bales of wrapped hay or haylage. We take all the wrapping off but leave the wrapping at the bottom (i.e. cut round the edge) so it doesnt soak the water up from the mud, and then put the ring feeder on it - works a treat

 

[honetpot]

I use a ring feeder and part of a hockey net to cover it rope threaded though the bars, http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/A-pair-of...370989412556?pt=UK_Hockey&hash=item5660b130cc
best £20 I have ever spent, last year even with a ring feeder they where wasting so much.
One year I put out a round bale, was advised to leave it on its side so the water ran off, naughty small pony ate out the middle until it collapsed then lay across like a sofa to eat. I took four days for 3 ponies to trash a £25 bale.

 

[Annagain]

I saw an amazing homemade contraption the other day. Can't remember if it was on here or on Facebook (I think it was Facebook). It was a plastic barrel attached upside down to a fence with some sort of bracket so the bottom (the open end) was about waist height. It had an open hay net hooked onto lots of little hooks at the bottom. The barrel was filled with a bale of hay which would stay dry as the closed end of the barrell forms a roof and it would slowly be pulled down into the nets as the horse ate. Saves a lot of wastage and you could put a load along a fence line thereby avoiding them all standing in the same place.

Was it on here? I'll look back through my facebook feed and see if I can post a link. It was genius

 

[_GG_]

My girls are on round bales on mud. Actually, I spread the last part of the bales to make a dry place for them to stand when eating. I tie ratchet straps around the middle and bottom and remove the string. The straps are safe for the girls but keep the bale together and they eat down through the middle. Without the straps, removing the string would mean they unravel and are wasted in the mud within a day or two. With the straps, they last at least a week and that is ad lib for two big horses.

 

[mirage]

The water trough idea is just what I was looking for! Thanks.I have got 2 huge tubs instead that I can use.I definitely need something because new boy has been rolling in knobberpony's hay pile and squishing it into the mud,then he saunters off to eat his.

I hate pulling sodden hay out of the mud.

 

[JanetGeorge]

The easiest thing to feed without waste and without containers is square bale haylage. I dump a bale in the field, cut two long 'windows' in the top side and cut the string. A few days later I collect the plastic and the string and there is minimal waste.

 

[Ibblebibble]

I've used pallet crates from buildbase (think they get tiles and suchlike delivered in them) as hay feeders before on really wet ground, I carried hay into the field in a builders tonne bag as you can get more in one of them than in a wheelbarrow and empty it into the feeder. I still use builders bags to carry hay around but don't need to use the crates as the land is not as wet as where i was previously.

 

[NeverSayNever]

i use a wooden tattie box and put a couple of small square bales in at a time, works really well.