Meaning if the weather is crappy and the horses are stalled 24 hours a day, how many times does your barn or you yourself throw hay? My current barn is only feeding morning and late afternoon/early evening so twice a day. My horse is losing weight and is starting to look like hell. This summer has been hot, the pastures have burned up, no round bales in the pastures and no extra hay to compensate. Couple that with rising hay prices, it’s been hell. My previous barn fed 4 times a day for the stalled horses, morning noon evening and again at night walk around. I’m trying to see if this expectation is out of line.
At our previous boarding barn, they were fed twice a day. Nothing changed if they had to stay in all day. Chances are the owner would have to pay extra for the additional feedings. Everything was priced individually. How long have you been at this barn? You could inquire about additional feedings. Is there anything in the contract? Good luck!
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Ours get grain/hay 3 times a day on normal days (when they have turnout). If it is raining and no turnout, they have hay all day so it is thrown as often as necessary.
3 regardless of turnout or not
Most barns I’ve been at vary about how many times they give hay during the day due to whether or not their was someone around who could do it. However every barn I’ve been at has put hay out in either flakes or round bales out of there wasn’t any grass. At one barn that had a horse that couldn’t eat hay they would change her field with the seasons. One year they left her in the big field too long and the other mares started looking like crap. Owners complained and things were quickly changed.
Perhaps the more salient question for you to ask is how MUCH are they feeding, and what is the quality of hay. I don’t think there’s any point in trying to define whether they’re wrong or not – just focus on the fact that this setup is not working for your horse, and work together to find solutions. And give notice and leave if you can’t find a solution.
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4 whether they are outside for the day or inside. Breakfast (1 flake) lunch (1 sometimes 2) , supper (2-4) and night check(1-2).
i have been to barns where they only feed twice a day buts it’s been something like 2 flakes and 6 flakes.
P.
Every barn is different. Some hay 2x a day, some hay 3x a day, some hay 4x a day, some toss hay continuously throughout the day one flake at a time as needed. There is no set standard.
Whether your expectation is out of line depends on the barn and what you signed up for with your boarding contract. If the norm for the barn is to hay 2x a day and that is what the contract says, they are fulfilling their end. If you want/need something different, ask if they can accommodate you and be prepared to pay extra.
My barn throws hay 2x a day normally (3 flakes AM, 3 PM). If the horses are in all day, they may get hay midday (2-3 flakes). 6 flakes/day wasn’t enough for my hard keeper WB, so I worked out an arrangement to purchase additional hay of my own and store it at the barn so he could have hay free choice.
That’s understandably not always possible, but it’s worth having a conversation with the BO to see what your options might be.
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This might be my option. I am going to pick up 2 bales of alfalfa for 2 flakes for afternoon lunch.
We do 2-3x a day, BUT the amount varies on the horse. For instance, my horse is a hard keeper and gets half a bale in the morning and half a bale around 4, with about 2-3 hours of turnout in the morning. We try to keep him eating at all times. Other horse that are easy may get 2-3 flakes morning and more in the afternoon so they are occupied over night.
^^^ This.
My lazy barn worker only feeds hay once every two days. But she stuffs a huge slow feed net full of hay so the horses always have hay in front of them.
Concur with Palm Beach and HH. You feed to need. Most barns around here are on an a.m./p.m. schedule. When we boarded other people’s horses we did that. But if there was a “special needs” horse we addressed those needs. If they were to require us to expend additional time and money then the owner got surcharged for that extra service. IMO that’s fair.
Talk to your BO/BM. If what you’re seeing is obvious then they can and should see it, too.
Good luck as you go forward.
G.
Hay (2 flakes) before breakfast (7ish), hay at noon (1 flake), hay at 4 PM (1 or 2 flakes, depending on whether there is hay left from the morning, as my horse is outside most of the afternoon stuffing his face with grass). Then 2 flakes at night check, usually about 8 or 9 PM.
“Grain” after hay in the morning and after night check. I write “grain” as my Irish sport horse clearly has learned to photosynthesize, and only gets some ration balancer. Otherwise he gets too fat.
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I hay when horses are in during the day 3-4 times a day or fill slow feeder hay nets for the times when I cannot be there to throw hay. If they are in for 24 hours or more, I still do the 3-4 times during the day but I go back at around 10:30/11 and throw hay again for over night. During winter I do this as well. My horses stay out more with cooler weather I tend to feed hay 4-5 times a day with throwing hay in the pastures for them around 11.
This is how I feel it should be. I don’t feel like a horses digestion is supposed to be fed every 12 hours. I’m going to take care of this today.
A flake of orchard grass hay (3-5 lbs per flake) four times a day (crack of dawn, noon-ish, 4-ish, and 10-ish). Plus, handfuls here and there whenever any one of the horses is looking particularly cute and convinces anyone that he is starving to death. Plus, two hours on morning grass. Ration balancer at breakfast and dinner.
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Most barns around here feed either twice or three times daily. The nicer barns tend to do 3x, and it is usually one flake for each feeding (flakes are generally 4 to 7 lbs each depending on the hay). If you want more, you pay more. Turnout is generally NO round bales - we don’t use those anywhere in CA.
I would not board somewhere that feeds twice daily unless the horses are out with feed in a pasture during the day - horses need to eat more often then that for their own health.
Average horse needs 1 to 2% of its body weight in forage - and for most working horses, it is closer to 2%, so that would be about 20 pounds daily or 3 large flakes.
If your horse is losing weight, it needs more food - talk to the barn manager and see what the policy is - can you BUY hay for your horse and have them feed, or PAY for more hay, or will you need to come by once a day and feed your own hay? Or if you have a bucket of pellets put out, will they feed that to your horse?
My barn feeds 3x/day - breakfast/lunch/dinner. Any grain or supplements is fed alongside those meals. ~June - Nov they are turned out on pasture for some of the day (2-4 hours, weather/bugs/footing permitting).
Most horses teeter on portly, particularly now that we only have second cut available to them, and the barn caters the amount of hay in each feeding to the individual horse. My calorie-black-hole TB gets a giant portion, whereas her QHx paddock neighbour gets a pretty light flake.
I prefer my horse to have hay as close to 24/7 as possible, so I buy my own and put it in bale-size slow-feed nets. She keeps weight on just fine with what the barn provides, I just think it’s better for the belly to be full most of the time. Many barns have a degree of flexibility - so long as you, the owner, are willing to put in the work required (or pay for it).
I’m really surprised at the number of people who hay multiple times a day instead of putting hay in nets once a 24 hour cycle.
