Yearly Hay Usage

[fredsaid2]

How many bales per week are you feeding per horse?

Can you break it down by seasons? Say May - Sep for 22 weeks and Oct - Apr for 30 weeks, assuming you have sufficient summer pasture.

Do you stall, in half/out half throughout the year or 24/7 turnout and are you feeding easy or hard keepers?

tks!

 

[Pasofever]

I just did that...feed the same year round I used 1500 bales last year...# of horses varried through the year though to the tune of $4900

 

[Four*Leaf*Farm]

Well... this past winter (approx Oct.-April)I was feeding 2-3 bales per day for 4 horses. One is an easy keeper, one is senior and picky and the other two are TB and WB- less than easy keepers. The hay I had was local first cut mix, very poor quality until I found more out of town hay, that was a brome mix. I had 8 - 80lb bales of alfalfa from the year before and fed everyone a flake each with the other hay, twice a day. I did not increase grain for anyone but my easy keeper and that was gradually from a handful to almost a scoup from Jan. to March. Since then she is the fatso again and is getting less and less.
They were stalled every night.
Since the grass has come up, (April- and if we have no drought- Sept.) we have been throwing just under a bale of hay a day depending on if they finish the other stuff. I have local orchard hay that is very nice. About 40lbs each. They are out more now that the weather is nicer and only come in when it's really rainy or lightening or extremely hot and buggy.

 

[Pasofever]

I have smaller horses and easy keepers..I feed 1 bale per 2 horses/day and grain...worm every 8 weeks on the dot..

 

[DQ2B]

3 horses (plus one mini over the winter) fed 3 bales per day average. Haven't fed any hay in 4 weeks now since the pasture has come up. Horses are all out 24/7, small amount of grain once per day. Got 376 bales delivered last August and unless we have another drought I should have no problems with my remaining hay lasting until August of this year.

 

[Robin]

I have always planned 100 bales of hay per horse for the year. Summer they eat less hay because they are out on grass 12-hours. That seems to work out good to cover the days you feed more hay.

 

[Tazgirl]

I have the small bales (35lbs) I use one per day per horse.

 

[Phyxius]

I feed hay pretty much free choice. My bales come from two main sources...one has normal size bales about #40. One has large bales about #70. I feed about a bale and a half a day on a normal day of the big bales and 2 bales a day of a small bales. I also have some mixed timothy/alfalfa that the mare and foal get at night in addition to their normal hay. Over the weekend I fed too much and had to go clean out the hay out of the fields as my guys are quite picky and won't eat day "old" hay.

So, depending on how many of each weight bale I get I'll go through about 550 - 800 bales in one year. So, taking an average price and and average number of bales I'll spend about $4000 on hay this year for my guys. (More as the baby grows.)

 

[Pasofever]

1-2 % of the horses weight in hay per day is the guidlines..

 

[ElliesMom]

my fat mare is the easiest keeper ever. I could feed her 2 flakes of hay 1 am and one PM and a scoop of grain at each feed and she wont loose weight!
But I feel guilty a lot doing that and feed 3-4 flakes a day and 2 scoop grain.

I go through about 100 bales a year with her. so about 600$ a year hay then grain 30 a month x 12 $360.

Love my big ol mare!

Fear getting another horse cause they probably wont be as easy.

 

[SouthernMdRocks]

How many bales per week are you feeding per horse?

Can you break it down by seasons? Say May - Sep for 22 weeks and Oct - Apr for 30 weeks, assuming you have sufficient summer pasture.

Do you stall, in half/out half throughout the year or 24/7 turnout and are you feeding easy or hard keepers?

tks!

Approx 3640 bales per year...

 

[Sparks]

May - Sept.
1/4 bale per day per avg. horse. Providing the pasture is good. I fed more outside and earlier than normal last year because of the drought.

Oct. - April
1/2 to 3/4 bale per day avg. horse. Sometimes up to a bale a day in the coldest weather.

I feed as much as they'll eat. I'll cut back if they start wasting it.

 

[flarenuphope]

We are just now are down to are last 3 round bales.We had 5 horses on it, they have run ins so they can eat when ever. They are about 600+ pounds. We stored 56 back in late August, which was off of are 200 acre field, which we usually have 4 cuttings, and last year we only had two. We also stored 250 sqaure bales, about 45 pounds each, one horse would eat a bale in about 3 days, it depends on how heavy. We have about 50 bales left over, but we also used about 100 to feed are other horses when we couldnt put a round bale out.