Who feeds dry hay?

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goatbabies

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As in the title really.

I feed good quality dry hay, but with so much talk of soaking and steaming, and a few "Oh my god you feed it DRY?!" comments I thought I'd see if anyone else feeds dry? I don't feed haylage as it upsets my geldings stomach and gives him the runs, and instead of buying in hay for him and haylage for the rest of them I just feed dry hay to them all. They are all in good condition, no coughs or anything you might associate with dry hay that would make me think I should be soaking it...

So... anyone else? Am I a bad horse mum??
 
You only need to soak/steam hay if it's
a) bad quality
b) your horse/pony suffers from breathing difficulties
c) you need to extract nutrients from the hay

Most people I know, who have access to good quality hay, do not steam/soak it
 
Dry hay unless I want to knock the stuffing out of the nutritional value then its soaked. Being doing it for 30+ years and never had a pony/horse with COPD
 
Me!
:) in a net, a bucket or on the floor, always dry. Nobody on the yard soaks/steams.
I always thought you only needed to soak/steam to get rid of nutrients and for horses with respiratory issues
 
Mine are a nice weight and no breathing problems so why would I spend time and effort soaking? I try to do thing only when I understand the logic of why something is beneficial to my horses (and ignore fashion/ other people if they are insistant only their way is right)

PS even with 2/3 year old hay - if it's been well stored no need to soak. If my boys need a few less calories then I use older hay (have used three years old in the past) rather than have all the hastle of soaking, as age gets rid of the calories just as well as soaking
 
RosieTheRedNosedPony said:
I always thought you only needed to soak/steam to get rid of nutrients and for horses with respiratory issues
Click to expand...

That's what I thought, then I had a heated conversation with someone who was saying you need to steam/soak to AVOID respiratory issues... she wouldn't continue the discussion when I mentioned that I've always fed dry and never had a horse with a respiratory condition!
 
I feed dry, always have!

last winter i had some rubbish dusty stuff delivered for the last batch so i had to soak that! but its always been dry until then! currently feeding it dry!
 
Always have fed dry, last yard everyone fed soaked thought I was weird as I didn't but don't see why unless there's a problem or the hays really dusty which it isn't.
 
I've only even seen a few people feed soaked hay and I've never needed to soak or steam it.
I paid a lot of money for the nutrients in that hay, she can damn well get them eat!!!
 
peony said:
That's what I thought, then I had a heated conversation with someone who was saying you need to steam/soak to AVOID respiratory issues...
Click to expand...

If the hay was so dusty it would cause long term damage I'd like to think I'd notice myself (I always give it a quick sniff before I pop it in) or if it was a whole batch a little dusty I'd spot the boys starting to cough and stop feeding it. I get the odd bale that I think mice take a liking to (or the dog!) and so if I get one that doesn't smell nice and sweet it goes to my pigs (who are far less fussy!)
 
I feed dry hay on the floor.

She does have a net of haylage too though. I find the combination of both works well, she's getting the fibre she needs and I guess it's less boring for her.
 
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