Rule of thumb for number of horses per round bale

[Horse_Rider]

I’m curious if there’s a rule of thumb for the number of horses you expect to feed on a round bale. Assuming the horses are penned up or the grass is lacking, and they’ll all need to be on the round bale, is there a number that most people consider “appropriate?”

So, for example, I think of the cut off being one round bale has room to feed four horses - they have room to essentially eat off their own quarter, without having their hind ends too close to each other. If there are five or six horses, I feel like there’s a lot more fighting and jockeying for position and the low horses on the totem pole end up going hungry because there’s not room for them to safely get to the hay. Obviously, no field is the same, and I’m sure there are horses who can eat shoulder to shoulder with each other, and I’ve definitely seen fields where one horse doesn’t let anyone else eat off their bale while they’re on it. But, in general, average horses, average round bale, at what number of horses do you add another bale?

(I have no desire to be lectured on having too many horses in a field. These aren’t my hypothetical fields.)

[merrygoround]

Round bales come in sizes and weights and quality.

So there standard rule.

[Horse_Rider]

Let’s assume a round bale that fits in your typical round bale holder - approximately 4 to 5’ across is all I’ve ever seen fed around here. I don’t care about weight. Whether you’re getting something light at 800 pounds or trucking in something weighing 1500 pounds is more a question of “how long will it last in the field.” I’m specifically thinking “how much space does a horse need between himself and the next horse, and does that leave room for 3, 4, 5, 6 horses around the bale at one time.”

[sascha]

Depends on the group. 6 works fine in my horse’s group, but they come in at night and my horse is the peacekeeper. On occasion when mine is on stall rest, the tiny herd goes bonkers trying to re-shuffle the hierarchy. During those times, 4 or 5 on a round bale seems to be pushing it. That said, none are truly hungry and they are not counting on outdoor snacks for survival. YMMV.

Previous barn put out 2 bales each group of 8-10 retired broodies. That worked fine.

[MissusS]

The farm where I board has 7-8 (currently 7) OTTBs in a very large paddock with loads of grass to graze plus 2 round bales at any given time. The horses all eat one bale down, then move on to the other. In theory they could “divide and conquer” but they always eat together at the same one. Sometimes there are just a few at the bale while everyone else snoozes etc, sometimes they are all there chowing down together.

[joiedevie99]

4 sounds about right to me.

[jvanrens]

My horse is out with three others and the farm owner is putting out two rounds for them. Seems to be the way he works it with the others. One round per two horses.

[horsenut_8700]

We have one mare who believes round bales (of any size) are single serving

[four2farm]

Max for me was four. Sometimes all four would eat at once but mostly one or two were off napping, sunning, grazing whatever. Since there are only three now it is pretty much the same. If I had more than 4, I would put out two.

I have noticed the same phenomenon as MissusS- they will eat one down to the ground and then move to the next. When we go away on vacation we always put two out so the sitter does not have to worry about it. We would get home to an empty net and them just starting on the second one.

[iJump]

I wouldn’t do more than 2 per round unless it was yearlings or ponies. Currently all mine have their own round in their own paddocks.

[sascha]

Something else to consider is placement of the bale. More horses will eat happily at a bale the more room there is around it on all sides.

If a bale is placed even close"ish" to a fence fewer horses will eat happily and more arguments will ensue.

[ChocoMare]

I use a Hay Hut, over a netted 750 pound round bale. At once time, we had 6 horses and 4 goats chowing down. It worked out just fine.

Now I have 2 draft-x’s, an OTTB and a pony. All eat happily as a herd.

Netted, elevated and covered makes the difference to me… Yesterday my boyfriend helped for the first time getting a new round bale out. When I flipped the Hay Hut over, he was shocked that the only thing left in the wadded up net was seed heads. Zero hay because it was all eaten. I HATE seeing 40% of round bale (AKA my money) pulled out, peed on and pooped on.

I put down a large plastic pallet and then another wood one on top. The bale is netted and flipped onto the pallet, then over goes the Hay Hut. That’ll last them 2 weeks.

[four2farm]

Same here, loyal customer of Haychix, they save me a fortune! Nets are tuff, like the closure system they are oversized so you get monster bales in them.

[halt]

@iJump

I wouldn’t do more than 2 per round unless it was yearlings or ponies. Currently all mine have their own round in their own paddocks.

For me, if there’s only 2 on a 600lb bale, there is significantly much more waste and the bale goes bad before they finish it up. Assuming yours are smaller.

It depends on the size of the bale, where it is positioned, and what kind of round-bale feeder it is in.

With a hay hut there’s very few reasons to limit the # of horses, up to the # of windows the Hay Hunt has. The windows keep horses at their spot, no alpha chasing around the bale easily with that.

I’ve had up to 8 large horses on mine. Now the herd is smaller, but I wouldn’t have an issue putting that many on it again. Currently have 6 on a 600 lb round bale and it lasts about a week.

[Djones]

4 to 6.

[ElementFarm]

We do large squares, so 6’+ long. We have 6-8 horses on it and it works fine. They do jockey for position sometimes but often one or two horses are on it, while the others are nibbling the pasture grass. Sometimes no one is eating it. I like to have at least 4 horses per bale, otherwise they don’t eat it down fast enough, and we risk the hay getting spoiled (it is in a roofed feeder, but the rain will blow in during storms).

As others have said, a lot depends on how the horses get along, and other horse-keeping factors. My horses come in at night and they have hay in their stalls. Additionally, we seed annual winter rye in the pastures, so there’s always something to nibble, in addition to the big bales which we tend to use mid-Nov through end of March.

[Weezer]

At my place 3 horses are happy around a bale at once, 4 works if nobody is feeling crabby. When I put more than one bale out, if they are too far apart, they seem to crowd around one anyway so I space them about 20 feet apart and everyone is happy.

[iJump]

@halt

For me, if there’s only 2 on a 600lb bale, there is significantly much more waste and the bale goes bad before they finish it up. Assuming yours are smaller.

It depends on the size of the bale, where it is positioned, and what kind of round-bale feeder it is in.

With a hay hut there’s very few reasons to limit the # of horses, up to the # of windows the Hay Hunt has. The windows keep horses at their spot, no alpha chasing around the bale easily with that.

I’ve had up to 8 large horses on mine. Now the herd is smaller, but I wouldn’t have an issue putting that many on it again. Currently have 6 on a 600 lb round bale and it lasts about a week.

I think mine are 4x5 rounds. They clean them up in a week on 8hr turnout. No feeders or nets. I should add that mine are on dry turnouts with basically no grass.

[walktrot]

I’ve seen 5 as the recommended limit for one bale. A lot depends on how the herd hierarchy works. My 26 y.o. gelding has semi-retired as alpha. Last time I counted there were 11 in 3 groups. One is a new huge nasty black gelding and a couple of others that hang with him. My horse is hanging with a new buddy in the middle group. He still bosses them around but they know what to do. If there isn’t a 3rd bale the bottom group won’t get enough. The huge nasty black gelding is disliked by most of the horses and all of the people. He supposedly is moving elsewhere on the farm.

[candyappy]

Herd dynamics will give you a varied answer. My 2 mares and my mule did great eating together off a round bale. They all had a dominant type personality so they were not afraid to shove in and eat when they felt like it.

If you have a wide variety of personalities together you have to make a way for the more timid herd members ( when you have them) to feel safe to eat.