Hay feeder example

[4horses]

My most recent project was building new hay feeders. My old one the horses had pushed and pulled and broke every screw. It was leaning so crooked I’m surprised it didn’t blow over. I disassembled the old one and rebuilt it. I built one hay feeder for the front pasture and one for the back.

If you decide to make one make sure you don’t make the front too tall for your tailgate to come down, and the sides need to be about even with/below the horses chest. If you build the sides too tall the horses push on the walls to reach the hay on the bottom when it gets low.

Here are pictures

[clanter]

since wind is a concern adding hurricane clips would tie the roof rafters to the frame

[4horses]

This just has a tarp roof for now. I may eventually put a real roof on it.

[colorfan]

Great job!

[DiamondJubilee]

Looks great!!

We were going to make ours out of wood as well (my husband is a carpenter) but all of my ponies are major beavers (youngstock) and it would just not last. We would have to clad all the wood with metal (posts, sides - everything) and the cost just wasn’t worth it. So we went with all plastic Hay Optimizers and I just love them. Same idea as what you made, it just has netting that goes across the top of the feeder and over the hay. So its a slow feeder as well. They are amazing and I’m so glad I purchased them this year. Huge hay saver!

[JumpWithPanache]

Very nice! Building one of these is definitely on my short list of summer projects since we’re building our farm. Did you use any sort of pallet for the floor to keep the bale off the ground directly?