Best Ways to Stretch Hay - Thinking Ahead

[kaya842]

Oh boy I messed up this year. I waited probably two months too long to lock in our hay (for a multitude of reasons - house shopping, finishing a graduate degree, etc). Now my normal Alf square bale guy is sold out for the next two cuttings if he gets two, I can’t find any round bales to speak of, and square bales are generally twice as much as I’ve ever paid. To add to things, there seem to be less options in general and even less who will deliver and we have no way to pick up. Oh and then even fewer who will store some for us - we can only store 200 or so squares and a few rounds (if I can find them!) at a time.

Cue the panicking.

I only have two horses, thankfully, but both seniors and one PPID (not IR but don’t want to up the grain if I don’t need to).

Should I plan on feeding hay cubes to supplement? Plan on portioning them to a set amount per day? I don’t love that idea as it increases my chores and I’m not sure how much I’d really “save” vs free choice in a net. Other ideas on where to look for hay other than Craigslist and FB Marketplace? Other general ideas/ thoughts/ commiseration?

TLDR: Need ideas on how to make what will likely be a smaller than usual hay supply last for two horses who get free choice (netted, in hay hut) hay 24/7/365. Grazing not an option.

[K_VanOlst]

@kaya842

Other ideas on where to look for hay other than Craigslist and FB Marketplace?

IIRC, you’re in the MO/IL area. Have you checked MDA’s hay directory?
https://apps.mda.mo.gov/HayDirectory

[K_VanOlst]

The University of Missouri also maintains a database: http://agebb.missouri.edu/haylst/vsale.php

[Calvincrowe]

Buy the best quality hay you can find. Feed it by weight. Use a method that minimizes waste. That’s how I stretch my hay. I have PPID geldings, so I go with tested hay (one is also IR). I also feed soaked beet pulp and low carb pelleted feed.

[SusanO]

Join a FB hay group in your area. I am in Alabama but I don’t feed bermuda hay and I get the best bang for my buck by going north to Tennessee to buy my hay. So I joined a Tennessee hay group and I have found a number of hay suppliers there. Many more growers and better hay than what is on CL. I think the better growers are skipping CL because of scammers and get better buyers on FB groups. My theory anyway.

[endlessclimb]

Rent a truck and go pick it up.

That’s your answer, if delivery is the hurdle.

[Foxglove]

I was in panic mode end of June --we’d had no rain since May and no one was getting a second cutting. I don’t feed hay until late OCT early NOV, but generally it is in the barn by then. Subsequently, two things happened: my DH who is a man of calm, said, “There will be hay. It may be expensive, but there will be hay.” (ahhh, at least my darlings won’t go hungry --I might, but they won’t). Next my hay guy (also my farrier) came by and told me that he had told his biggest client who buys 50% of his hay, that he will need to find another source --he said he did that because he knew it would be a lot harder for all his “little” hay customers (I buy 400 bales a year) to individually find hay, than one large operator to contract for a vast amount of hay.

And then it rained and now everyone is cutting hay like mad.

To your question --nibble net everything and weigh what you put in the nets.

[trubandloki]

Deep breath!
This will work out.

Is your regular hay supplier the type of person who will give you the name of someone else you might be able to buy from?

Last time I was short hay (my provider decided to plow under his hay field and plant something else and I did not know it until way into the season) I found a random person with hay by simply telling all my people that I needed to buy hay and if they heard of anyone selling what I was looking for to please let me know.
A friend found great hay at a good price by letting her farrier know she needed some hay. The farrier knew that a big barn had closed and knew the person who supplied them had lots of extra hay now and set my friend right up.

Though I will admit, I am shocked at the number of horse people who simply refused to share any information about where they got hay.

[K_VanOlst]

@trubandloki

Though I will admit, I am shocked at the number of horse people who simply refused to share any information about where they got hay.

My SO has definitely gotten on to me about sharing our guys number, particularly after he was barely able to fill our order thus year it’s really bad here this year. Hoping for enough rain to salvage a second cut.

[endlessclimb]

@trubandloki

Though I will admit, I am shocked at the number of horse people who simply refused to share any information about where they got hay.

I am this person sometimes, and sometimes not. It depends on who asked. If the person is reliable, pays cash etc then I’ll give info. If the person is going to be a pain in my hay guy’s butt in ANY way I will not share.

I consider it like a job referral - I don’t want a turd person or an unknown person saying to my hay guy “endless gave me your number”.

[beowulf]

I have always had a little of a paranoia about running out of hay. Some of it has been warranted – when your hay is supplied by local farmers, some of us live and die by the weather.

Grass is the ultimate hay extender, though I read grazing was not an option. There have been years I’ve segmented off parts of the grass in the driveway for the horses using round pen panels.

In addition to the suggestions above of buying the best quality hay you can afford and feeding it in a way that minimizes waste (for my guys, that’s in a hung hay net and I religiously pick up loose hay and stuff it in a new bag), most local feed stores will have ‘forage extender’ – hay stretcher, timothy cubes, alfalfa, etc. I always soak these.

I will readily give out the name and number of my square bale supplier, but I will never share who we get our rounds from. It is not personal – I just know from being in the haying business that my round bale supplier only has enough fields to support their own livestock and myself – and some years if weather is uncooperative, they only have enough for their own program. If I gave out their number, it might edge me out as a client and frankly, if I had to feed six horses off of square bales purchased from another farm I’d have hung up my spurs a long time ago.

[trubandloki]

@endlessclimb

I am this person sometimes, and sometimes not. It depends on who asked. If the person is reliable, pays cash etc then I’ll give info. If the person is going to be a pain in my hay guy’s butt in ANY way I will not share.

Yes, this is different than what I experienced.
Everyone knows I pay cash and heck, I will even make cookies and bring cold drinks as an extra incentive to do business with me.
(I am not talking about paying someone to stack in my barn either, I have never had anyone do that.)

Of course I do not want to give my hay guy’s name to someone who is difficult to deal with.

I am talking about normal people.
I figure if the hay guy can always do a good business then the hay guy is going to keep making hay, for me and for them.
When the hay guy ends up with half a barn of hay because some big client stopped having horses and no one will give out his name, then the hay guy stops making hay.

[endlessclimb]

I ask my hay guy if he needs to move any extra, or if he’s booked. The answer has gone both ways, or “well, I have alfalfa left but not grass” so I know if it’s even worthwhile to send anyone his way. But yeah, I am “stingy” in that I know a lot of people will kvetch to him about price, or show up late for their pickup, or expect him to load alone, or…

It’s got to be a 10/10 hay buyer to get the # off of me.

[Texarkana]

Most types of “bagged forage” like cubes, pellets, etc. are going to be more expensive pound per pound than actual hay. So it’s not any more economical to rely on them to make up any difference you aren’t feeding in hay.

Feeding in slow feed nets by weight is a good way to reduce waste.

I think some of the forage toys can be great boredom breakers while allowing some slow feeding. I have Amazing Grazes that I used to use for alfalfa cubes daily. But there are plenty of others on the market that can be used with pellets, cubes, or actual hay.

[LCDR]

In my area the two things many horse owners are not willing to share are hay sources and farrier’s names. Unless the source and name are given in a negative way.

Right or wrong, these are my hay stretching techniques developed during the pandemic.

I bought a hay scale. This is the Stark brand and is very accurate and consistent. It is currently $99.95 from both Amazon and from Walmart.

I feed on top of rubber mats under the barn overhang outside the stalls. The hay starts out in the tubs I weighed it in, but horses being horses much of it is flipped out. But before I feed, I use an electric blower to blow any dirt and dust off of the mats. That way if for some reason they leave scattered hay behind, it is on a clean surface so I sweep it up and re-use it the next time.

Next stretching technique, planning ahead I oversow forage type winter rye grass seed every fall as my coastal bermuda is becoming dormant. A month later I can markedly cut back on feeding hay as there is plenty of good forage throughout the winter. I live in a temperate climate so I am not fighting snow, however. Running the numbers, I spend as much to buy seed and fertilizer to have winter forage as I would spend to buy bales of hay, but the horses are moving around and grazing all winter instead of standing with their heads in a pile of hay.

[trubandloki]

@LCDR, I am jealous that your horses are willing to eat the hay from the mats and not leave a manure and urine mess behind.
My critters did not get the memo about not peeing on mats with no bedding.

[luvmyhackney]

I won’t share my new hay guys info, but my old hay guy was so happy when I recommended them. Pricey but gorgeous hay.

Ask in a Facebook farmers group, there is usually someone with decent hay that doesn’t have a buyer yet. Not sure where located but it’s been a very good hay year in western WV.

[kaya842]

@K_VanOlst Thank you for those resources! I had no idea they existed. I reached out to some leads from each, hopefully I’ll hear something back.

To those who say feed by weight - do you really save much vs free choice but netted? I already use nets on everything as one horse loves to waste as much hay as possible (thankfully between nets and my Hoover of a second horse we have nearly 0 waste) and the PPID horse is one of the ones that doesn’t need to lose weight. She’s not a hard keeper per say but I attribute that to the free choice hay, as when I boarded and she had limited hay she was definitely a harder keeper. I can weigh and put out nets each day, but want to ensure that the extra time is worthwhile.

Sharing hay guys’ numbers is quite taboo here but it’s certainly worth asking.

Re needing delivery - it’s not the truck so much that is the problem but the truck AND trailer that can fit/ handle a meaningful load of hay and make it up our driveway with the weight. Our hay guys with diesels have no issue, but our truck got stuck with an empty 2H BP we borrowed a few weeks ago. (The driveway is it’s own nightmare related thread, currently there is nothing I can do about it). It’s also not possible to load/ unload at the bottom of said beast driveway as we are on a bend on a busy road.

I have some potential leads after wading through scammers, old posts, and posts from people out of state or who can only deliver semi loads at a time.

Perhaps I’m being dramatic but I told my SO it’s almost easier to board when you have 1-3 maybe even 4 as it’s so hard to find care/ service/ product providers who want to or will deal with smaller farms like us (hay, shavings, vets, farriers, etc).

[Texarkana]

I think feeding by weight helps to some degree because it’s easy to over or under feed hay when you eyeball it.

I don’t weight every flake every time, but if I was rationing I might. Then you can do things like split flakes to put an exact amount in each net instead of just stuffing it full.

Nets prevent so much waste. I tire of using them. But to ration, I absolutely would use them.

I agree finding resources when you have a small herd can be super frustrating. Where I live now we have a lot of people who keep horses at home, so we have so many more options. But when I lived in other states, it was a nightmare at times. No one wanted to sell hay by anything less than a semi trailer full. Farriers didn’t want to come out for only 3 trims. And so on.

[K_VanOlst]

@kaya842

@K_VanOlst Thank you for those resources! I had no idea they existed. I reached out to some leads from each, hopefully I’ll hear something back.

You’re very welcome good luck!