Soaking hay in winter

[Casey76]

how do you do it?

I'm running out of ideas to get T comfortable, and the only real change over the past 6 weeks is that I've had to stop soaking the hay (no outside water, double digit minus temps etc).

At the moment she is eating loads (approx 15kg hay over the course of 24h, plus 1kg dry weight Agrobs weisencobs soaked, 250g micronized linseed plus regular supps), is losing weight (has gone from 445 to 437kg on a tape in a week), is rugged up to the eyeballs (350g during the day and 450g overnight) for an unclipped pony, and she is still showing signs of discomfort/pain.

I've asked my YO if he would allow me to get the hay tested, even if I have to randomly pick from a wide range of bales to try and get an "average." If it does prove to be high in NSC, I'll have to look into commercially produced haylage - which I'm really not looking forward to :/

pic from this morning

 

[Merlod]

Last winter I soaked hay and it was a pain. This year I have steamed and it has been so much easier and kept the cough away! I don't have a fancy steamer; I just put slices in an old marksway haylage bag and pour over one kettle per slice and then put another bag over the top to let it steam!

 

[Micky]

Hate to say it but sounds like you're going to have to go back to soaking hay somehow....I fill a big container up with warm water and take it up every morning to soak his nibs hay, it's a pain and he sometimes ends up with ice forming on top by time I come to hang and drain it but it keeps him sound..what about filling from water trough? Is that an option? Is she on prascend? Is she ppid? If yes, maybe up the pills by a quarter of a tablet?

 

[be positive]

I suspect the pain is as much due to not moving so much because it is so cold as the diet change, the PSSM mare here is on haylage and the only time she seemed uncomfortable was when the temperature dropped overnight unexpectedly, upping the rugs has been enough for her to be fine, I have no idea what she would be like in the weather you have if she was not able to be really well exercised almost every day, standing around eating hay from the net will not help could you spread it about so she at least moves a bit more?

No idea about soaking, steaming will not reduce the sugars but maybe a kettle or two poured over would help if it was left most of the day covered up so at least it is partly submerged.

 

[twiggy2]

The only suggestion is soak it at home

 

[Tyssandi]

how do you do it?

I'm running out of ideas to get T comfortable, and the only real change over the past 6 weeks is that I've had to stop soaking the hay (no outside water, double digit minus temps etc).

At the moment she is eating loads (approx 15kg hay over the course of 24h, plus 1kg dry weight Agrobs weisencobs soaked, 250g micronized linseed plus regular supps), is losing weight (has gone from 445 to 437kg on a tape in a week), is rugged up to the eyeballs (350g during the day and 450g overnight) for an unclipped pony, and she is still showing signs of discomfort/pain.

I've asked my YO if he would allow me to get the hay tested, even if I have to randomly pick from a wide range of bales to try and get an "average." If it does prove to be high in NSC, I'll have to look into commercially produced haylage - which I'm really not looking forward to :/

pic from this morning

https://www.powertoolsdirect.com/fa...1kA1ltOlYOQlm1XWTN-w6KMHCfickeMe9QaAtrK8P8HAQ
I use a plasters bath for some



a hay bath for some

http://horse-care-and-advice.weebly.com/

and use the hammerline wheelbarrows which hold water and fill barrow up with hay
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Haemmerlin...045854&sr=8-7&keywords=haemmerlin+wheelbarrow

 

[Casey76]

I suspect the pain is as much due to not moving so much because it is so cold as the diet change, the PSSM mare here is on haylage and the only time she seemed uncomfortable was when the temperature dropped overnight unexpectedly, upping the rugs has been enough for her to be fine, I have no idea what she would be like in the weather you have if she was not able to be really well exercised almost every day, standing around eating hay from the net will not help could you spread it about so she at least moves a bit more?

No idea about soaking, steaming will not reduce the sugars but maybe a kettle or two poured over would help if it was left most of the day covered up so at least it is partly submerged.

Hi BP, I am really not supposed to have hay in the field at all, the only reason I get away with it is because it's in a net, and I do the filling and distributing - despite that I'm also supposed to have it hanging from something, but I only have one suitable fence post (electric rope on the inside of the posts), which is at the gate.

Having the hay in two big slowfeeder nets, spread far from each other means that both T and Blitz spend the day walking round as they constantly change nets, or rather T chases B off his net and he has to swap until she decides she needs a change again. I do find the nets in completely different places in the filed to where I initially drop them, as they kick them around etc, so they are probably moving around more than some of the other horses.

Exercise is a tricky thing at the moment, as it's dark both ends of the day I'm at the yard. Yesterday half of our school was treated with magnesium chloride, but today we have snow forecast all day, and all next week the temps are approx. -15C over night with highs of -5/3 during the day, so I'm not sure if it will defrost enough for it to be usable.

Unfortunately even if I had the facilities to soak at home, I have been without mains water for 3 days as my pipes are frozen (a regular occurrence during winter!)

I could ask the vet if I could do a bute trial, but I honestly think that is a slippery slope

 

[be positive]

As a YO I don't get this idea if turning out with no hay, yes it helps keep the field tidy but if there is no grass what are they supposed to do while they are outside, it seems that what you are doing is working to keep them moving about and that is all you can do, if exercising her is not possible I don't think there is much more you can do until the weather improves as from my understanding that is almost as important as getting the diet right, they need to get rid of the build up of lactic acid every day otherwise it will remain and I would think get a little worse day on day.
Ours was on bute for some time, for an unrelated condition, I have no idea if it helped but we weaned her off it very slowly and had no issue doing so, it may be worth a try or up her vit e and see if that helps, these type of conditions are still relatively new so managing is trial and error to an extent, luckily ours does not seem too bad and we haven't had a cold spell yet.

 

[Tyssandi]

As a YO I don't get this idea if turning out with no hay, yes it helps keep the field tidy but if there is no grass what are they supposed to do while they are outside.

Speaking for our place we have never put hay in the fields, as it makes a mess and the way we manage the fields there is very short time where is grass really low as we rotate them and even now they have moved into a field where there is grass to eat now as they moved into it 2 weeks ago. How ever the bottom half is lami risk and they have hay brick in the morning each which make less mess. I should point out that ours are part livery + DIY so they are out less hours than grass kept.


I have been in many diy yards when I was one and the trenches and ruts and trodden in hay made the fields awful and when the hay racks moved or nets moved , another part was trashed. It barely had recovered when the horses moved back in when spring came. We have always had feedback that our grass is one of the best around so not changing it. When all the fields are worn and the horses want to come in early, at the owners request they come in early and have hay bricks, or they buy extra hay.

 

[be positive]

Speaking for our place we have never put hay in the fields, as it makes a mess and the way we manage the fields there is very short time where grass really low as we rotate them and even now they have moved into a field where there is grass to eat now as they moved into it 2 weeks ago. How ever the bottom half is lami risk and they have hay brick in the morning each which make less mess. I should point out that ours are part livery so they are out less hours than grass kept.

That's fine yours have grass and are well supervised, the poor OP is turning out onto frozen fields covered in snow so they have no access to grass, as long as they have some grass most are perfectly happy, mine get hay if it is frozen when they are turned out and can come in early if they look bored or like yesterday when it was relentless rain they were in by 3pm and very happy to do so.

 

[milliepops]

yes i think being out on frozen ground in those temps would be pretty miserable with no hay in the field. We aren't allowed to hay outdoors at my yard so mine only do half days outside now but at least it's a lot milder.

Anyway, back to the OP - if you have running water at the yard I found swapping to a haycube really took the annoyance and difficulty out of soaking hay. The new ones have an improved design with bigger wheels and are easier to pull along.

 

[Casey76]

Thanks for the idea of the haycube, unfortunately I don't think it would fit through the door into the only source of running water we have on the yard :/

 

[milliepops]

damn. I used to fill mine with buckets before i got a hosepipe, does take a while tho

 

[Casey76]

damn. I used to fill mine with buckets before i got a hosepipe, does take a while tho

In summer it wouldn't be an issue as we have a hose outside for showering etc, but in winter everything gets shut down to prevent the pipes from bursting during freezes.

 

[SEL]

Can you book a kettle on the yard? A haynet in a trug with a few kettles of boiled water would take some of the sugar out.

When mine first struggled with the sugars in grass the vets told me to increase the oil because it creates insulin resistance and stops the sugars building in the muscle. It didn't work for S - too much of a good doer - but given the temperatures you've got, extra oil might be worth thinking about.

 

[my bfg]

Can you soak indoors? When I had my lami prone girl on a yard with limited water in winter (hose froze but I insulated the tap) I soaked her hay in the shed I used as a feed room by filling a tub with water via buckets and then hung the nets from a string on a beam with the tub under them to catch the water

 

[tinycharlie]

I soak mine now as charlie had a cough,I put hay in a flexi bucket, add water, drain the water after its soaked for anything between half an hour and overnight and then feed the hay from the bucket, we can do this in the barn , don't know if that helps at all x

 

[SEL]

Its threads like this which make me glad to be in the UK with our unpredictable but usually warm weather. When we had those 2 days of -8 the other week my kwik beet froze solid, the yard kettle froze solid, the pipes burst in the toilet and in my field and I had to jump on the water trough to break the ice!

So I made up the kwik beet at home much to my OH's horror and took in a flask of coffee. I can't imagine the horror on my 2 fatties faces if they had to endure turnout in snow. One of them is too young to remember a winter with really decent snow & the Ardennes has told me he wants to come back as a pampered thoroughbred in his next life.....

 

[Casey76]

Yeah, it's going to be miserable next week:

to top it off, my water pipe cracked just after the main stop cock in the house, so I got up this morning to a flooded basement and garage

 

[Oswestry Horse]

Even easier method is a wallpaper steamer (put on timer) connected to a Ketter cushion box (You will have to drill hole in bottom of box for steamer hose) You will also have to create a metal grill for the bottom of the box to keep the hay off the floor. Cost is about £60 and lasts for years.