Ponies in the snow and ? about round bales..

[LC orps]

Quote:
realy want to watch out for moldy spots

 

[chickenzoo]

I have found if I use 3 - 4 corral panels that the horses can stick their heads through, it works better than a hay ring, especially with the mini's. I make hay mangers also for them to go into to keep it dry. Never had too much issues with round bales, and unless you are on a hill I've never had one roll, although it's possible with light weight rolls but once the horses start tearing in it pretty much cocks itself. LOL. They sure are hard to roll into the pasture, especially the lop sided ones... hehe

 

[dewey]

Both square and round bales each run the same risk of animal parts since animal parts happen when the hay is cut, regardless of whether it'll be round or square -- when free feeding any bale shape in that type of quanity there's little opportunity to inspect. Round bales keep more of the hay protected and have no greater losses than square bales if round bales are properly stored. What I'm familiar with is round bales free-fed when there's a couple of hundred to several hundred head, so there's little waste. Otherwise, feeding only a few head and with the bale left to the elements, more can be lost than (safely) consumed.
We've never had one get away but machinery's tipped over with them when moving them from the fields.

As for rolling, Pappy says never put a 3000 pound wheel uphill of anything valuable.