Separate feeding for outdoor horses

[awesomenessity]

Hey guys, just wondering if anyone had any good solutions for separating outdoor horses for feeding times (preferably without having to catch them individually, etc). One of my five horses is a painfully slow eater, so he tends to get his feed stolen by the ones who scarf down their food, and sadly he’s the one that needs the feed the most!

My current idea is making outdoor “tie stalls” that they could go into, I’d close gates behind them, then let them out when they’re done. But that seems like a lot of construction so I’m hoping someone is cleverer than me lol.

[DMK]

I feed both of mine a similar amount in the summer, but in the winter the fjord eats MORE than the dominant TB… I know, I know, but the TB is retired, the fjord does CDE in winter and is a lean mean competition machine. The TB is the easiest keeper ever and the fjord is a hard keeper by fjord standards… which is to say, he is an easy keeper, but it’s all relative. Oh yes and he’s absolutely atypical of a fjord in that he likes to savor every bite.

Anyway, things I have done to equalize eating time:

1. add soaked beet pulp to the fatty’s food. It’s just average in calories, but a half pound of soaked beet pulp is a lot of volume!

2. (this is what I do) add some soaked or broken up alfalfa cubes to the fatty food.

It’s not perfect, because the dominant ones know they can check out any bucket they want, whenever they want (and they will), but it is an easy cheap way to manage the problem until you figure out a solution. For me it makes it so when I don’t have time to stick around the fjord gets most of his food. But most days I make sure I am there for all of feeding time to enforce order!

[onthebit]

We use feedbags, but this does mean you have to handle the horses twice. Once to put them on and once to take them off. Since we stand with the horses and monitor them while they’re eating it isn’t an issue for us. For you, I might use corral panels and make a pen just for the painfully slow eater who gets more feed and needs a lot more time. That way you would only have to pen one horse.

[Bluey]

If one only needs extra feed, see if you can pull that one out, put him where it can eat in peace, maybe a couple panels in a corner somewhere and once finished, let him back with the others.

[buck22]

I have a hard keeper, and easy keeper and an ultra-easy keeper to feed each day while they’re loose in their paddock and my phone is permanently inserted in my ear, assuring a never-ending string of clients I’ll be back to my desk shortly.

And of course, the ultra EK is the boss and the pig, and HK is the herd safety blanket, so removing him is not an option, otherwise, the entire herd tries to commit simultaneous suicide.

HK gets his ration delivered first in a little corner of the shed so he’s somewhat out of sight. EK and UEK are respectful enough that once they start to eyeball and circle like the pudgy little buzzards they are, a bark from me scatters them.

Then EK and UEK get thrown a flake, on the other side of the paddock, of whatever prime hay is being served on a restricted basis at that time (winter, its alfalfa), so its much coveted. EK and UEK romp around “stealing” the identical flakes they’ve each been given, spending more time chasing around than eating. This gives HK valuable time to chow down.

When EK and UEK finally hoover their flakes, they resume their circling.

I wait until EK and UEK are just on the verge of not-being-able-to-take-it-any-more, I call them to their spots, and deliver their meager, watered-down rations - more water than feed so they have to work for the bits, and then have gravy to keep them occupied.

If timed well, all 3 geldings are licking the last of their rations at the same time.

But when it rains, and all 3 are in the shed together, loose, shoulder to shoulder, it goes to hell in a handbasket pretty quick unless I physically stand there and monitor the situation.

[demidq]

It doesn’t seem worth the stress to everyone to try and feed all horses in the same paddock. I second removing the slow feeder from the herd so he can eat in peace!

[NaturalSelection]

We have four horses that live outside together. We have plenty of shelter and never-ending free choice hay buffet.

One horse is an older TB who is a very hard keeper, the others are young WBs and generally easy keepers. I really need to make sure the old TB gets sufficient calories through the winter, plus he gets daily Equioxx and on-going Ulcerguard meds (ranitidine). The old horse is a SLOW eater, but as long as his tummy feels good, he will eat.

The old horse gets a giant (draft-sized feedbag), as much TC Sr as he’s willing to eat top dressed with canola oil and aforementioned meds. The youngsters get TC Sr cut with alfalfa pellets dispersed between six ground feeders. It’s the 2:1 bowl to horse ratio that keeps the youngsters occupied long enough for the oldster to finish his meal. In fact, when there’s snow cover I make even more piles of food just by pouring some out right onto the ground. I figure this process is similar to a slow-feeder for a dog or cat and with 2:1 bowl to horse ratio there’s no squabbling.

I did build an outdoor stall in one of the shelters using gates, but old horse has a fit if he’s confined so that didn’t work for us.

Edited to add that we started out with everyone in a feedbag, but one of the youngsters is a feedbag fail bc he would step on the bag and snap the strap. The feeding free-for-all also helps slow the meal for the youngsters.

[Equkelly]

I struggle with this because my mare is definitely a bottom of the totem pole horse and her roommates are constantly pushing her off her food. Literally one dirty look and she won’t even dare go to that side of the paddock go eat. I maintain her weight by pulling her out when I can to let her eat alfalfa and her grain when I’m doing chores. When she’s in with everyone else i feed in lots of different areas that are all very spaced out that when when she gets pushed off her food, she just goes to the next pile.

[ElementFarm]

If you have just one hard keeper/slow eater, than yes, it makes the most sense to make him a private place to eat. We have kind of U-channels in our divided run-in, so we can drop in a board and have one horse locked in the ‘stall’ and everyone else locked out. This is very effective, but does require the most ‘work’ for me as a feeder/handler.

If you have one bully or fast eater, how about keeping a halter (leather or breakaway) on him and tying him at his feed station? We have to do this with DH’s Shetland who can somehow chase the WBs away, but he does NOT need their calories. We keep a halter on him, and give him a handful of grain in ‘his spot’. Then we clip a pre-tied leadrop (tied to a baling twine loop around the fencepost with a quick release knot. A Velcro breakaway trailer tie would also work well for this) to his halter. He finishes his handful quickly, but then can’t go steal someone else’s meal–he just stays put and licks his feed tub until I let him loose. This still requires me to handle him both before and after each meal, but I can just reach over the fence to clip/unclip him, so it’s pretty easy.

Feeding the horses in order of dominance does help a lot. And adding low-cal bulk (like soaked beetpulp) to add volume to a fast/light eater keeps them busy while everyone else eats their TC Senior. At least up until they realize everyone else gets TC Sr and it tastes better than beetpulp.

Hay is pretty easy if you do 24/7 hay like we do. Not even the fatties can eat it every minute, so the wimpy horses do get their chances to eat. Grain takes some management, but by using the techniques above, our system works fairly well. That being said, we have 6 horses that are stalled and fed breakfast/dinner there, so I generally have just 3-4 horses out that I have to find a working system for feeding grain.

[wildlifer]

I deal with this with my two. I successfully divide them with a single strip of fence tape (it’s not hot) that clips in to bucket-holder loops I put around posts in the run in shed, at horse chest height. This keeps the dominant horse from walking over & stealing the other’s food. He could walk right through it if he wanted, but he’s not an aggressive type, so it works. I’ve been doing that for 6 yrs now. It cost me $0 since I already have tape & I can just coil up the piece & store it anywhere. I didn’t have to build anything extra. I just remove the strip of tape when mr. slow submissive horse is done eating (bc of COURSE he is the slowest eater in the history of the world).

So there are plenty of cheap ways to do that, especially if you don’t have an angry monster who will run through things. I like the concept of feed bags, but my slow, submissive horse is a 5 yr old OTTB who gets pretty big meals, so it’s too much to hang off of his face. If he got a smaller meal, I would try them though.

[Real_Rush]

I second onthebit ”‹”‹”‹with the use of nosebags. I have 5 horses in all combinations of easy/hard keepers and slow/fast eaters. With the nosebags I can feed everyone at once. One of the harder keepers is bottom of the pecking order (of course). She can move as she wants/needs to and her food goes with her regardless. I use the Cashel feedrite bags and love them.

Said mare also loves having her food wet, so after a few times of her dunking the feed bag in the water trough (and not only getting the water dirty, but also her powder supplements literally get washed out)), I went looking for a solution. I already use the draft size bags because they’re big enough to fit up to 2 whole scoops of feed and still have room for the horse’s muzzle. I had an old 8 qt “personal pail” bucket without a handle. Turns out it fit perfectly in the nosebag! So now I pre-water her food and just slip it on. The added weight of the water and bucket doesn’t bother her at all. I just have to make sure to remove the bucket and put the nosebag back on so she can clean up anything that escaped the bucket. And of course everything gets sprayed off with the hose afterwards.

[RedHorses]

My younger horse used to be fed outside with his buddy, and the buddy would. take a bite or two of his own feed then go over to my horse. I used to stand near my horse and just move so I was between them and buddy kept his distance and eventually went back to his own. Until the day he left his own feed and I blocked both my horse and buddy’s bowl. Buddy was astonished - that was HIS feed! :lol:

After my horse finished his feed he wandered over to check out buddy’s bowl and then I let buddy join my horse.

I only had to do that twice and buddy became motivated to eat his own feed first.

Having related that tale I realize it is not helpful in the OPs situation. But it’s still funny.

[Buglet]

We easily built individual pens for our field boarded horses. We used one of the existing fencelines. We put a post 8’ out and 6’ over to basically create a square. Then put 2 fence boards up on both sides and a 6’ gate at end. Did this multiple times in a row to create a row of 6 pens. Each morning we open the gates to the pens and horses happily go in (we dont have to go catch a single one of them). While they can reach their heads over into pen next to them, they cant reach the buckets (we hung ours in the middle of fence). We wait about 30 min for everyone to finish and then let them out of their pens. While it was a little pricey at first, it has definitely helped to keep our horses from sharing/stealing food. Also helps to have them penned up for blanket changes and to look them over for injuries. Also allows us to see if a certain horse hasnt finished their grain.

[awesomenessity]

@Buglet

We easily built individual pens for our field boarded horses. We used one of the existing fencelines. We put a post 8’ out and 6’ over to basically create a square. Then put 2 fence boards up on both sides and a 6’ gate at end. Did this multiple times in a row to create a row of 6 pens. Each morning we open the gates to the pens and horses happily go in (we dont have to go catch a single one of them). While they can reach their heads over into pen next to them, they cant reach the buckets (we hung ours in the middle of fence). We wait about 30 min for everyone to finish and then let them out of their pens. While it was a little pricey at first, it has definitely helped to keep our horses from sharing/stealing food. Also helps to have them penned up for blanket changes and to look them over for injuries. Also allows us to see if a certain horse hasnt finished their grain.

That is exactly what I was thinking of setting up! Good to know it works in practice, not just in my brain lol.

Thanks for all the suggestions everybody! I think I will probably just separate out the slow eater, or add soaked alfalfa cubes to the others’ food.

[Bluey]

In one breeding farm they had several panels against a fence making little individual pens for each mare and foal to walk in and eat grain in peace.
The back part was just a chain foals could go under.
Mares were confined until all were thru eating and the chains were removed.
Mares could not bother others over the top of the tallish panels.

[YankeeLawyer]

@Buglet

We easily built individual pens for our field boarded horses. We used one of the existing fencelines. We put a post 8’ out and 6’ over to basically create a square. Then put 2 fence boards up on both sides and a 6’ gate at end. Did this multiple times in a row to create a row of 6 pens. Each morning we open the gates to the pens and horses happily go in (we dont have to go catch a single one of them). While they can reach their heads over into pen next to them, they cant reach the buckets (we hung ours in the middle of fence). We wait about 30 min for everyone to finish and then let them out of their pens. While it was a little pricey at first, it has definitely helped to keep our horses from sharing/stealing food. Also helps to have them penned up for blanket changes and to look them over for injuries. Also allows us to see if a certain horse hasnt finished their grain.

This is what I was going to suggest…

[ASB_Stars]

Nosebags are your friend. Put it on, feed, walk away. Come back when you are done with other chores. Now, I do tie my mare in the nosebag, to eat. But this is because she will wander down to the trough, and fill the nosebag with water at some point after eating a bit. Then, she is done. No gruel for her! She is out with Fatty McFat, and a Donkey, who I do not grain. She is a very hard keeper, and this works GREAT!!

[TheHunterKid90]

I know you said you don’t want to catch them but once horses get the idea that you’re catching them to feed them, it should only take 30 seconds.
My solution in the past has been halted and then straight tie on the fence. Just takes a couple minutes, keep a trailer tie clipped on a piece of hay string on the fence with a bucket clipped next to it. Clip each horse to the fence and dump their grain in their bucket.
Gets horses ok with being caught every day, getting tied and teaches patience!

[Wanderosa]

I used to work at a barn where the primary offender got haltered and tied loosely to the fence post. His owner wasn’t happy when she found out; she thought he’d get hurt somehow. We tried it a few times with him loose and the barn manager pretty much told the owner that she could come deal with him 2x a day if she didn’t want him tied. I don’t know what she thought was going to happen. The horse was dominant as hell and could keep the others at bay even while tied. We stood there and supervised the entire meal so it wasn’t like he was going to get hung up in the halter somehow. It was dangerous to the humans involved if he was loose. We could’ve tied all of them but it was time consuming. And the others were all older horses getting similar amounts or the same feeds and ate at the same pace.