Forage With the Right Storage
By Charlie Poling of Mars Horsecare US
As a source of nutrition for livestock, hay offers numerous advantages. It can be made from many different crops and when protected from the weather it can be stored and preserved with little nutrient loss; package sizes and shapes can vary greatly, and harvesting, storage, and feeding can vary from being baled by hand or completely mechanized. When supplemented, hay can often meet the nutrient needs of many classes of livestock. But how should you select the best forage for your horses?
Depending on your horse’s job, his requirements for forage will be different. For instance, how do you decide whether to feed a grass or a legume? Lets weigh the benefits of both. Grasses commonly fed to horses include timothy, orchardgrass, bromegrass, tall fescue, and Kentucky bluegrass. In general, grass hays are lower in protein compared to legume hays. They also can be low in calcium and phosphorus. Grass hays are usually easier to harvest than legume hays without them becoming dusty, and they are nutritionally sound for most mature horses. Legumes that are commonly used for horses are alfalfa, red clover, ladino clover, and birdsfoot treefoil. Legume hays on the other hand are generally higher in protein compared to the grass hays. They are also higher in minerals, but have an incorrect ratio of calcium to phosphorus. As a result of the high protein, they are very desirable in the ration of growing animals, but the calcium-phosphorus ratio must be balanced to prevent bone abnormalities.
There are a couple of things to keep in mind when selecting types of hay and their quality. Lets start with simple visuals to score your hay. Does it look soft? Does it smell fresh? Is it leafy? Is it green or brownish? All of these clues are going to help you find the best hay possible for your animals. Hay should be sampled at the time of purchase for a better indication of the quantity of dry matter as well as the quality oif the hay in general. By considering the stage of maturity of the crop when it was harvested, you will be able to indicate quality. If the hay has large coarse stems and seed heads along with blooms present than you know that the plant was not cut at the right stage. This is going to mean fewer nutrients available to your animal and may not be as palatable. A lot of leaves and few to no seed heads will be the ticket. The leaves contain more digestible energy and protein than a bale full of stems would provide. The leafiness is going to decrease as the plant matures, leaving a visual for you to buy by.
Texture is going to be the next biggest thing, and finding the right size stem could be an indication of how palatable the hay is going to be for your horses. Look for a smaller more flexible stem to please your horses diet. Check the hay out with all your senses, think touch, sight, and smell. Look for insects, weeds, trash, and mixtures of grass/ legume so you know exactly what your horse is ingesting. Next get your nose up to the bale and smell, if it is musty or has a moldy odor just walk away, no matter what the price. This means that the hay was not cured or stored in the right conditions and there is mold present. The smell of new mown hay is the standard by which hay odor is going to be judged. Mildew, and mustiness usually are the result from weather damage or insufficient drying before baling - indicating a lower quality of hay. And remember — it may be more than just you turning up your nose at these bales; your animals will do the same and may not even eat it. A bright colored hay generally indicates that the vitamin and protein levels are going to be higher than a dark brown color. That dark brown color may indicate that the sun has caused heat damage and may not be able to provide vital nutrients. Color is not necessarily the best quality indicator when choosing hay but is one of the many tests that your hay needs to pass before purchasing.
Now lets talk about how hay can be baled. First the most popular methods are either round bales, or small square bales. Both are convenient in their own ways. Round bales are great to take outside and put into feeders, but bad to store. The shape of a “round” bale makes this selection difficult to store in the barn. It also looses quality once it is put out; especially with out a feeder and it usually ends up becoming wasted. This could also be a great place for mold to grow, so make sure that you are looking at it daily and checking out the quality. Square bales come in small, medium, and large sizes and depending on what your storage plan is, decide on which is going to be best for your barn. Small bales are great for in- barn storage and can be stacked easily; large bales on the other hand need machinery to be moved. Before purchase, make sure that you have a way of moving and storing this type of bale. Larger bales are easy to stack, but do take up a significant amount of space. Once stacked make it a point of rearranging all your leftover hay before each new shipment is stacked, you end up feeding newer hay first and leaving the old stuff to grow more aged and nutrient washed-out. Pull old bales to the front or side before stacking in new hay, and feed them first before starting on the fresher supply, this is also a great idea to use for your grain bins. Hay can also be cubed. Cubes are another way of providing forage to your horses, they are easy to store, and are low in waste though they are more expensive. Horses will tend to eat more in a cube, but giving the processing they won’t end up with a hay belly and often have less fecal output. These could also be useful when an older horse is having difficulty chewing.
Once you have selected your hay the next big question is where are you going to store it? Do you have a pull barn, hayloft, or backyard barn; does your hay sit outside? Is your hay covered by tarps or shrink-wrap? Depending on what type of bale you get, the storage is going to significantly differ from one to another. Storing hay inside a building results in minimal Dry Matter losses of 1-5%. Hay should be stored inside to reduce the exposure to moisture. Bales will absorb moisture from the soil if left outside on the ground yielding the highest Dry Matter losses, so be sure and protect your investment by keeping it safe from all weather condition.
Remember — forage should be the basis of your feeding program and understanding the differences between various forages and storage options will help you keep your horse healthy.
