Trickle feeding....Greedy feeder in 2 hours!

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Cakey Face

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My Gypsy cob will be changing yards soon and staying in overnight. My main concern is her being without hay!
She can finish a greedy feeder in 2 hours flat. Can anybody recommend other ways or a different type of net that has worked for their greedy cobs!
Thanks
 
Is she getting enough hay in kgs to begin with? Mine eat out of a haybar and get a bit over their 2.5% bodyweight ratio and theres no way it would be possible for them to eat that in under 2 hours...
 
Unless you have particularly good grass, I generally count grass as a non-entity in the winter :) My horse is 500kg, 2.5% of his bodyweight is 12.5kg which = the total amount of feed he should be getting per day.

He is in medium work and in good condition so 20% (2.5kg) of his daily feed is hard feed, leaving 80% forage of 10kg in hay per night!
 
Mine also razes hay, so has a slow feeder net from martsnets and I've also arranged a forage top up of straw to ensure she has something to nibble overnight.

She arrived overweight, so is on a 1.5% ratio as advised by our vet. This doesn't amount to a great deal so the straw as a hay supplement (or part replacer) helps to avoid hunger while controlling her sugar intake.
 
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Try giving some of the forage ration as straw, means they can keep chewing but won't be adding too much in the way of calories. And soak the hay, and up the exercise.
 
Mine can finish the smallest holed Marts nets in under 2 hours as well. He now has a wheelie bin full of older hay and straw mixed together. He eats it slowly as he sorts through looking for hay, and when thats gone he picks at the straw. Hes eating about 4 to 5kgs of hay overnight whereas he would eat that in 2 hours previously.
 
As for tips to slow them down - I wouldn't. My fatty (though not a fatty anymore) was fed on straw- he would get a net of hay for calories, but also a net of straw so he never had an empty belly.
 
I tried many small holed haynets with my horse and yes they slowed it down but to the extent where there was quite a lot left in the net in the morning and now my trainer said they have lost weight so gone back to the shires small holed haynet and make two up one for 5 - 9 o'clock and one for the rest of the night.
 
Cortez said:
??? Works pretty well for mine, and there isn't any TB in them (have weighed on a weighbridge and the tape was accurate to within +/- 10kgs on all of them).
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Really? What do you have? I suppose for finer breeds it would be more accurate than for cobs...
 
EQUIDAE said:
Really? What do you have? I suppose for finer breeds it would be more accurate than for cobs...
Click to expand...

Ah, cobs......well, yes they are often a bit "off the scale" aren't they. I have Spanish horses, inclined to be tubby good doers but definitely "light horses" in shape.
 
I have just bought 3 martsnet slow feeder nets for my gypsy cob-and he can't get any hay out of them! He had his full breakfast net left at lunchtime...had to resort back to normal nets
 
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