Here's a contentious issue....horse feed

[Rusty Hills Farm]

For many years I competed in cutting and sometimes reining, too. For the last about 25 years I have fed Omolene 200. No matter where I was when I bought it, it always has the same texture and my whole crew eats it readily. My scoop holds 3 lbs. Currently my stallion gets a scoop in the morning and another at night. My filly (just turned 2) gets the same. My appy (16+ hands and 1200 lbs) gets half a scoop morning and night. My 24-yr-old mare gets 5 scoops spread out across the day but actually consumes between 3-4. She has a bad knee and a weak hip from an old accident, so I baby her as much as I possibly can. She also gets condroitin/glucosamine. Everybody gets as much grass hay (bermuda grass) as they will consume without a horrendous amount of waste. I feed minerals free choice.

I am not standing the stallion any more nor competing with him, but when I was, he got a scoop and a half morning and night during breeding season/showing season.

Last summer I lost a mare to colic. I still do not know why she colicked. I never saw any warning signs. But that was the first case we had in well over 10-15 years, so maybe I missed something.

Anyhow, hope this is helpful.


Rusty

 

[EweSheep]

When I had my horses twenty years ago, Omalene 100 was the thing and my horses did well but it makes them "high". So I cut the rations down to half Omalene and half whole oats and that did very well.

Omalene prices went up, so I decided to go my own mix of feed, by one bag of oats with one coffee can of Calf Manna, mix them all up in the container. Then I got a broken refigerator to store all my feed in bulk. A horse friend of mine told me that she mixes her with mostly oats with pelleted complete horse ration so they will get a bit of everything and save some money. If the horses were not working, straight oats.

Fed mine grass hay mixed with alfalfa, not more than 30% alfalfa in the winter. Pasture grass thru the rest of the time.

 

[Hound]

They are working ranch horses with the exception of the youngster. They don't all work every day, but usually two to three days a week of hard work each. At the moment they only get hay if they are kept up, we rarely have enough snow to prevent grazing and have plenty of pasture. They stay quite fit even if not ridden as the pasture is so large and rough, the herd travels several miles each day coming in to water and going back out to graze. We never stall them.

Their new pasture will be different. At present we're in the high desert, but they will be on mountain pasture with meadows. I know the grasses are different but I do not know how they will compare nutritionally. The climate will average 25F cooler, and the altitude will be greater.

I'm wondering whether oats with Enrich 32 might be a good idea. They have and will continue to have mineral and salt.

 

[Akane]

If they are pasturing 24/7 the rest of the year I find here in Iowa with thick grass except for 4-6months out of the year that straight oats and alfalfa hay worked just fine over winter. They get no grain or hay and only minerals and 24/7 pasture from spring through fall. However recently we have gotten away from all grain. Horses really aren't designed to eat grain and it runs the risk of founder or colic along with weight gain. Now we are feeding BOSS (black oil sunflower seeds which are sold for wild birds) and it only takes cupfuls instead of scoopfuls to give the same calories with more vitamins and minerals than grain. They get up to half a scoop and even the hard keepers do great all winter long on that.

 

[chickenzoo]

I have always been confused about feeding oats. Every time I feed a feed that has it in it ( I buy a fresh milled feed locally and it has whole oats in it also), I see a lot of it passed in the manure... which makes me wonder where my money is going......

It helps feed the chickens and help motivate them to scratch poo, so I'm not really complaining too much.... LOL

 

[Hound]

I think what you are seeing is the hulls/husks. I find barley to be pretty indigestable/unpalatable. If I throw some sweet feed out for the chickens they won't touch the barley, and it is usually in my cow's manure.

 

[welsummerchicks]

You would be seeing hulls most of the time. It is pretty hard for anything to go all the way through that labyrinth and not get broken up, but occasionally you see hulls. If you see grains, the horse's teeth are not chewing properly or if he is bolting his feed.

 

[Lifesong Farm]

Mine stays FAT on a mineral block and grass hay that has about 15% alfalfa mixed in. Before I got the mineral block she would get 1lb of grain from a local feed mill a day for the minerals. 1 bag would last just over a month. My feed bill came out tp $50 a month because I buy round bales and fork out the hay. My goats are more expensive to feed than my mare.

 

[vmdanielsen]

Quote:
WSchicks,
What do you use for ration balancer? Also my halflinger lives in a grazing muzzle. I have found that to be very helpful. There is warning, that horses can not eat hay while wearing it....well, she can and does!
ginny

 

[Hound]

Well I called our soon to be local feedstore/mill this afternoon and it looks like oats or an oat-based mix is the way to go. Whole oats are $312 a ton, compared to the $450ish for their sweet feed. I think we may do an oats/corn/alfalfa pellet mix as that will be suitable for all of our livestock.