Umm.... my sugarbeet is frozen

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MosMum

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.... shall I just break it up and feed it anyway??? Seems like it might upset some tummies, being this cold! Shall I add some boiling water, drain all excess water and then feed?

Do I really have to keep a huge vat of sugarbeet soaking in my kitchen from now on so it doesn't freeze??
 
I got to the yard the other morning and mine was "crispy" shall we say.....I fed it anyway - stirred in with the rest of the feed and they were fine. However since then, I've been bringing the beet home in a bucket and doing it with hot water at home....I have a large feed bucket of beet sitting on the kitchen table, much to my OH's horror!
 
I have haynet lollies :) Been putting boiling water over them to thaw. Might end up having to soak them at home - in the garage not the kitchen :)
 
I find that if I soak my beet in a bucket of warm water, then place it inside one of the feed bins with feed packed up the side of it, then normally it stays insulated enough not to freeze. Mine was definitely OK this morning!
 
We put lids on out soaked sugar beet buckets last year and buried them in the muck heap with a big stick sticking our so we knew where it was buried. Didn't freeze once, lovely and warm in there! :D
 
Frozen sugarbeet can cause colic :( so personally I wouldn't feed it. When we had the big freeze last year I stopped feeding it altogether because I couldn't store it anywhere (apart from the house which might not have been popular:p) where it wouldn't freeze. But then it was -13 at night :)
 
Boiling or hot water will freeze faster then cold water.

It might be good to buy some speedibeet so you can soak it at the yard before it has a chance to freeze or keep your soaked sugarbeet in the house?
 
sorry silly Q coming up (and sorry to hijack thread) but is there any other benefits to feeding sugar beet than energy suply? Never fed it before, as mums horse hated it and shes been put off feeding it ever since, but it could be useful for my chap (unless it causes them to put on alot of weight)
 
Thanks guys, I was guessing frozen it might cause colic, as we had a water heater in each water feeder in Montana so the horses wouldn't drink below a certain temp. Mine have running water in their field and I don't want to pay to heat it :P

I guess I can accept that my kitchen shall host a vat of soggy mush on Christmas day and for the next 4 months, since our manure heap isn't deep enough yet ;)
 
bigboyrocky said:
sorry silly Q coming up (and sorry to hijack thread) but is there any other benefits to feeding sugar beet than energy suply? Never fed it before, as mums horse hated it and shes been put off feeding it ever since, but it could be useful for my chap (unless it causes them to put on alot of weight)
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Yes lots. 9-11% protein, 6g/kg of Calcium. (Horse Nutrition Bible, Ruth Bishop)

Good source of fibre and makes a palatable feed. Reduced liklihood of choke when mixed with dry chaff. If you are concerned about too much energy, buy non-molassed and feed it very wet in small quantities.
 
No energy is good :) Just want something that will provide a fair amount of energy without causing huge weight gain, but then thats quite tricky considering energy=calories!
 
Rollin said:
Yes lots. 9-11% protein, 6g/kg of Calcium. (Horse Nutrition Bible, Ruth Bishop)

Good source of fibre and makes a palatable feed. Reduced liklihood of choke when mixed with dry chaff. If you are concerned about too much energy, buy non-molassed and feed it very wet in small quantities.
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I think you might have the protein level wrong / rather high.Its primary advantage is the fibre available for hind gut digestion . Its a usefull feed.
 
Rollin said:
Yes lots. 9-11% protein, 6g/kg of Calcium. (Horse Nutrition Bible, Ruth Bishop)

Good source of fibre and makes a palatable feed. Reduced liklihood of choke when mixed with dry chaff. If you are concerned about too much energy, buy non-molassed and feed it very wet in small quantities.
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What page? Same book (2003 ed) lists it as 13% fibre, 23% sugar. Doesn't give protein as far as I can see? That's also for mollassed - doesn't give an unmollassed figure.
Frape (2004) gives the protein figures of 30% crude protein, 3% digestible crude protein.
 
Kokopelli said:
Boiling or hot water will freeze faster then cold water.
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Just to be pedantic, that is not absolutely correct. It is true that hot water MAY sometimes freeze faster than cold water under certain conditions. But you can't categorically say it always will! This link explains:

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=is-it-true-that-hot-water

As for the protein content of beet, Sarah Pilliner's 'Practical Feeding of Horses & Ponies' has it at 7% crude protein, but the manufacturer's analysis of Speedibeet is 10% protein, Equibeet states 8.2% protein and Kwikbeet 10% protein.
 
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