Winter hay costs /usage... 2 horses living out?

ShadowFlame

ShadowFlame

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I'm trying to pull some figures out of thin air here, current yard includes hay in the price and we use what we will, so I'm a tad lost!

2 horses living out for the winter, for argument's sake, a 15hh arab and a 14.2hh cob. How many bales per week would you expect to go through (small or large, throw some ideas at me!), and how much would you expect to be paying?

Much appreciated :)
 
If ad lib I would say 1 large round bale of haylage will last 10 to 14 days. I cut my own this year but last year I paid £25 per bale
 
My bigger horses will eat about one small bale each a day, adlib, prob a bit more. They get nothing else and are allowed as much as they want. My fatty cob would have eaten the same, if allowed, but would have ended up like a whale on legs!

If your cob's a real fatty I'd budget for half a bale (big heavu solid ones) a day split into two meals. If he or the arab are less good doers I'd allow 3/4 of a bale each. That's with no grass at all. If there's grass then it'd be as little as half a bale between them just to fill their tummy. It also depends on if you hard feed. Then they'll only need enough hay to keep them occupied rather than for calories.

For large round bales my guys will eat one in 7-10days. Fat cob would have been rationed over 3weeks.

It does very much depend on how heavy and densely packed the hay is. Some are like bricks, others you can lift with a finger.

How much they cost does vary with area. It'll hopefully be cheaper than last year but not by much. At least there's more hay avalible this year. Ours are about £5-6 a small bale and £40 a large. I feed large haylege at £30 a bale. There's no way I could afford to feed small hay bales! (That'd be £70 a week at least!)
 
Food for thought... thank you. Amymay, it's on the agenda, yes. We have a couple of options, trying to work out which would be the most viable before making the jump, though. One yard allows them out year round, but one of the conditions of being there is that you buy hay from them, at £5 per small bale. If we're talking (potentially) a bale a day per horse, the cost is going to be obscene... that's what I'm trying to work out!
 
I have two 14.2s. They are in at night. They eat one large 4 string (not the huge 6 string) bale of hay every two weeks on average over the year. The field is pretty bare and I have to feed hay in the field a couple of times a week on average over the winter.

ETA
They would eat far more if allowed to but would also get fat, they don't know when to stop. They eat a fair bit of straw when in as I bed on straw and don't ration it. Would get through more hay if I bedded on something else.
 
ShadowFlame said:
Food for thought... thank you. Amymay, it's on the agenda, yes. We have a couple of options, trying to work out which would be the most viable before making the jump, though. One yard allows them out year round, but one of the conditions of being there is that you buy hay from them, at £5 per small bale. If we're talking (potentially) a bale a day per horse, the cost is going to be obscene... that's what I'm trying to work out!
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Oooo expensive. Especially as I'd expect them to eat more than a bale each per day.
 
I have two, a 14.2 & 14.3, during winter they are stabled at night with hay ( not ad lib) and out from 6am - 6pm approx. with hay in field. A large bale of hay lasts me about 10 days and costs £25 (not the really big bales)
 
Oooo expensive. Especially as I'd expect them to eat more than a bale each per day.
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That's what I'm thinking... wasn't sure if I was overshooting the mark by saying a bale per day. In that case we're better off going for the more expensive yard that allows you to source your own. Sounds like big bales are the only real option, if we budget for 3 per month that should be sufficient, maybe less if there's enough grass on offer?
 
It would depend how much grazing they have - if they're out 24/7 in a decent sized field that's not overstocked then on a bale of hay a day your cob will soon be a whale!
 
ShadowFlame said:
That's what I'm thinking... wasn't sure if I was overshooting the mark by saying a bale per day. In that case we're better off going for the more expensive yard that allows you to source your own. Sounds like big bales are the only real option, if we budget for 3 per month that should be sufficient, maybe less if there's enough grass on offer?
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3 large rounds a month sounds about right. Small sqaure is a very expensive way to feed hay esp if that's all you're allowed to buy.
 
I have budgeted £500 for 15.2 heavy cob & 15.2 Arab. Working on the assumption that their saved grass will last until mid December then 5 months worth of haylage more or less ad lib taking us to mid May. This is big bale haylage @£25 each, lasting 7 - 10 days. Last year they went over budget because winter went on and on and on and on.
 
Living out with good grass for 2 15.2/15.3 TB/types mine had a bale a day as standard, when it got really cold (which was most of Feb & March we went up to 1.5-2 with bags and bags of hard feed. if you budget one a day for 3 months = 90 + 30 to play with for the colder days that should be the bulk of it. This doesn't take into account Nov/Dec or Apr/May on the other side when I was also haying at night. x.
 
It totally depends on the grazing. I have 4 living out with two large fields to use and I only feed hay when there's snow on the ground and as we're coming out of winter when the grass has had it to supplement the little grazing that was left. Therefore, I used 20 bales in total last year for all 4.
 
Ditto TheMule, mine lived out all year round ( only had a field and shelter), they came out of summer with good covering, so I waited until the ground froze or snow fell before I fed them hay, then it was a very large armful each morning and evening plus a small breakfast of chop and vits until the grass started growing again.Obviously if the snow is persistent then i gave them a bit more but I found they nuzzled in the ground and ate under the snow! They came out of winter looking sleek, ready for the spring flush. If youre feeding ad lib, go for approx one large round bale every 6/8 weeks, £35 I paid last year :)
 
Do you how much they are eating at the moment? You could weigh your normal net and then work it out. A small bale that you can lift is about 22kg.
I have 3 14.2's and they had a small bale of hay a day between them plus barley straw to nibble on and still came out of winter well covered. I would expect a 2 thirds of a bale for your two a day
 
We have 5 horses on our yard, all m/w's from 15.2 to 16.3 and they go through a large round haylage bale a week in winter which we get for £30 a go (we split it 5 ways so haylage costs me £6 a week for my boy).
They are out during the day and in at night with adlib haylage, we also feed some haylage in the field when they get really bare.
 
As TheMule and Micky say, it depends on the grazing. Our winter field is about 16 acres so they don't get hay until after Christmas, unless it snows first or there's a heavy frost in the morning. Last year for a 16.1 good doer and an 18 month old standing at 15.3 I got through 25 small bales at £4 each (might have been 20, can't quite remember). Mind you the bales were very loose packed so if they'd been decent ones we'd have used less.
 
Nudibranch said:
As TheMule and Micky say, it depends on the grazing. Our winter field is about 16 acres so they don't get hay until after Christmas, unless it snows first or there's a heavy frost in the morning. Last year for a 16.1 good doer and an 18 month old standing at 15.3 I got through 25 small bales at £4 each (might have been 20, can't quite remember). Mind you the bales were very loose packed so if they'd been decent ones we'd have used less.
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I said it first! Nobody listens to me, I think I'll go eat worms... :( :p
 
tedmunster don't cry, if its any consolation that happens to me all the time, I shan't eat worms though, chocolate tastes better!! :-)
 
Last winter I had 16.2hh MW IDXTB, 14hh and 11.1hh sec A out 24/7 and went through a round every 4-5 days adlib, hay has actually gone up in price here for some reason, I was £30 for a round of haylage and £35 for a round of hay, hay is £40 a round this year so I am going to have to have a long think about feeding this yr.
 
I had a 16.2 TB and a 13.2 cob living out last year for 3 months, they went through a round bale a week. However they were on 1.5 acres.
 
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Last year I had two 16.1 TBs, one 14.2ISH and one 17hh ISH out 24/7 on 9 acres. We were feeding round bale hay and a round bale was lasting about 6 days until we came into March, when the bitter wind killed off all the grass. At that point, we were feeding a round bale about every 4 days. Last years round bales were extortionate up here - £45 per bale. Haylage was a little cheaper, but we have two of the four who can't eat it for stomach and bad teeth reasons :(

This year, I have sourced very nice quality small bales at a very good price, and will feed them until they run out, then hope that the round bale prices are slightly better than last year!
 
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