this is probably a stupid question. but my mare received alfalfa hay at my old barn, and is receiving it at her layup barn too… she loves it and im going to continue feeding her it at the barn she is going to next.
im not sure how easy it will be to find a quality provider of alfalfa around here, but i know its pretty easy to to find some cubes… is there a significant difference in feeding flakes over cubes?
Cubes need to be soaked so it’s hard to impossible to feed more than a couple of pounds a day. Alfalfa hay can be fed at any quantity just like any hay.
her hay has to be wet anyways… nutritionally is there much difference?
Nutritionally it’s all the same, all else equal. Any given cutting of alfalfa hay can be higher, or lower quality, even within the realm of horse quality (which is “lower” quality than dairy quality), ranging from very stemmy with few leaves, to very leafy and yummy. Brand name alf cubes tend to be good quality alfalfa, I’d watch out for “back yard” stuff that is more likely to be the hay that wasn’t good enough to feed as hay.
The problem is if you’re feeding significant amounts, and it’s the big hard cubes that need to be soaked.
There are some cubes that are smaller and/or softer that break up very easily, so don’t HAVE to be soaked, but may still pose a choke risk if not.
Cubes, whether soaked or not, take less time to chew, so 10lb of alfalfa cubes take less time to eat than 10lb of hay, and with the less chewing time, there’s less saliva production which means less stomach acid buffering. This means they’re better for supplementing forage, rather than replacing some of the regular hay, when at all possible. So if you provide all the grass hay she’ll eat, she can then have soaked cubes (or pellets) as additional food/calories
wetting hay isn’t the same as soaking cubes. Most cubes are hard, and require several hours to soak down to the point they break apart all the way through.
Alfalfa pellets mush pretty easily in water.
A bag of alfalfa pellets runs about $20 for 40lbs around here. So not cheap.
Agree with JB… nutritionally, not usually, as the alfalfa cubes manufactured by reputable feed dealers are generally high quality - around 19-20 percent protein which is equivalent to high quality alfalfa hay. You should be able to check protein levels on the bag of cubes. Depending on the cutting of alfalfa, the cubes could be slightly higher protein content than hay. Depends on the hay. Alfalfa cubes also count as rough forage where as pellets do not. So you get the same forage benefits as hay with cubes. No, cubes do not last as long as hay but alfalfa will still encourage more saliva production, even if less so than alfalfa hay. I also always soak cubes to prevent choke and encourage hydration.
For some reason, my horses do not like soaked cubes- not that I would ever feed them out of the bag. I feed alfalfa when it is available and appropriate. I had reason to buy a bag of cubes to try on a horse, and he said forget it, so I carried my big plastic pan of cubes out to another paddock, and they said forget it, also. I soaked them for a few hours, until they were soft, and a cool day, so they should have been tasty.
YMMV
Unfortunately, pellets are not long stem forage like cubes. I’m not saying they aren’t useful as a feed, but they are not a hay replacement.
WE never soak alphalpha cubes, never had problèms and neither all thé people i Know do that. I did not know that you have to soak them. My horses love them
I have one that does not either. I was determined to make him eat them and kept putting them in his stall. One day, he pooped on them. I got the message! LOL!! I was actually unaware that they do not last as long as hay. I thought the opposite. Thanks!
I would try cubes to see if she is a fan. Mine are fine as long as I don’t over soak to mush.
You can buy the compressed bales of alfalfa, they are well liked.
I have never soaked cubes either; I have fed them to supplement grass hay for 25 years and have soaked nary a cube. Never had a problem.
thanks everyone - i found someone locally i think that i may be able to find bales from.
even though i have been riding my whole life i dont have that much knowledge on equine nutrition and would really like to polish up my education on this… are there are books that you would all recommend as accepted by all for general information on diet/nutrition for horses?
Feed your horse like a horse by Julia Getty.
I had one choke like a mother on a cube that was too dense to break up even when soaked. I prefer hay but its hard to get in coastal SC
I’ve never had to soak cubes for more than like 10 minutes for them to be well broken down all the way through. Where are you getting your cubes from, dang 
There is a lot of free information online provided by colleges and universities on equine nutrition that you can google and access. Google scholar is also another good resource if you are looking for peer reviewed or scientifically backed articles on a particular subject.
Until you have a choker. I’ve had to soak for years because mine will choke on thin air practically, but someone across the aisle had been feeding dry for months when suddenly boom, a choke. Ugh. They are now also feeding them soaked. It’s a pain for sure, but for horses that choke, it’s absolutely mandatory.
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