How many pounds of alfalfa (whether dry or cubes) are you all feeding as a supplement to grass hay/concentrates? I’ve added soaked cubes to my guy’s regimen as a lunch to help build some muscle but unsure how much is enough to help.
My guy is on pasture 24/7 and is about 1100 lbs. He gets about 5 lbs of alfalfa pellets daily broken into 2 meals.
My 800# horse gets 2.25 pounds daily, split into three 3/4# meals; my 900# horse gets 3 pounds split into three 1# meals.
it takes whatever it takes for that horse, which is largely determined by what the rest of the diet (most notably the hay/grass) is providing.
But in general, if you’re looking to make a difference, it’s likely going to be in the 3-5lb range (which is a LOT of volume if you’re using soaked cubes).
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I was on the phone with vet tech scheduling a dental for my senior rehab project. We talked a bit about diet and she threw out soaked alfalfa cubes. I responded that horse in question is eating @15 lbs (if not more) of alfalfa hay daily and I am not soaking that many cubes. I’d have to put it in a water trough.
He’s chewing the baled hay fairly well now so no reason to do soaked cubes unless vet pulls all his teeth at the dental.
Can’t remember how much my mare had when she was getting pellets. She was about ~550 lb (9 month old weanling) and they were just some extra bits to go with her psyllium pellets.
For cubes, she is going to be getting roughly ~10 lb of dry cubes, which will then be wet, split into two meals per day, because that is what her new barn feeds (plus 1-2 flakes of grass hay throughout the day) She’s about 800 lb now. For a horse that isn’t trying to GAIN weight, I just replace the amount of hay they’re getting with cubes. For 1-2% of there bodyweight, she’d need 8-16 lb forage daily and she’s getting 10 from the cubes.
