I feed Timothy because that is what the most reputable hay guy grows. His hay is clean, he fertilizes and seeds, and doesn’t bale junk.
As a bonus, I have 4 super easy keepers, so it’s a good match for them. They get free choice hay without being 12 feet wide. But even when I get harder keeping horses, they do fine on it. I usually just balance it out with a slightly higher protein feed, fat supplement or alfalfa cubes, depending on the horse’s needs.
I feed Timothy because that is what the most reputable hay guy grows. His hay is clean, he fertilizes and seeds, and doesn’t bale junk.
As a bonus, I have 4 super easy keepers, so it’s a good match for them. They get free choice hay without being 12 feet wide. But even when I get harder keeping horses, they do fine on it. I usually just balance it out with a slightly higher protein feed, fat supplement or alfalfa cubes, depending on the horse’s needs.
Gumtree, thanks for the very informative post! I thought there was probably a climate reason why we don’t grow a lot of orchard up here.
As far as when first cut is baled, in my local area (British Columbia lower mainland, PNW), the winters are wet and mild. Some years, the grass is green all winter, and in any case, you will see new grass starting to sprout by the end of February. But the ground is so wet that no-one can hay until May, or some years even June. By then, the grass is fully grown, very stalky, and has its flower heads, though not necessarily seeds. It is still green.
I don’t live near any hay fields, but I watch the progress of the grass in the open areas in the park where I ride, with interest, and take my horse out to hand graze for an hour at a time in early summer. It’s mostly canary reed grass, but every once in a while you find a clump of timothy or orchard.
(The canary reed grass is an invasive species in local wetlands, it’s palatable for limited grazing sessions, but apparently makes a low-grade hay that some people think contributes to impaction colic. By August, the stems are like twigs, and the horse won’t eat it — and she eats almost anything!)
By the time haying season arrives, the canary reed grass is six feet tall, and the isolated clumps of timothy and orchard are full height, and everything has flower heads. So locally, first cut hay is always very coarse.
I haven’t lived in the weather or observed the growing cycle of the dry belt hay growing regions, which are further north than us, at a higher elevation, and have much colder winters. But I’ve looked at hay samples from the dealers, and the first cut hay is coarse and mature, compared to second cut. So I assume that they too can’t cut early enough in the growing cycle to get fine hay from first cut.
Second cut timothy is always much finer. I didn’t realize that the stem doesn’t regrow, only the leaves. That makes sense! Is this true of all grass hay? I think the canary reed grass stems continue to grow if grazed down, but that stuff is in a category of its own in terms of hardiness and will to survive!
I’m “out West” (California), and Timothy is very hard to find here - it is grown in Oregon where it is cooler and wetter, and in the mountains (again, cooler and wetter). We have a LOT of orchard grass and a lot of alfalfa too. Agree with much of what gumtree says, and will add the “out West” info, since I talk to my hay guys quite a bit.
Timothy is a 2 cutting hay here, if you are lucky. Orchard grass is 4 or 5 cuttings if you have irrigation (and most of the hay growers DO have irrigation). So most grow orchard grass. The cutting period is a bit more forgiving with orchard grass too.
I have a mare who IS metabolic - and so hay testing is very important to me. I have fed Timothy because it is generally lower in NSC (which is why some horses don’t like it as much - it is not as sweet). Timothy is also much lower in protein - so for lactating mares and foals, it is not suitable UNLESS you are supplementing with adequate protein. Orchard grass is “all over” when it comes to NSCs - there is such a rumor going around that it is safe and lower in sugar then things like rye grass - but here in California, rye is a common horse grass too, and it is often similar in NSCs to orchard grass! I have seen orchard grass test anywhere from 8% to 28% NSCs - that is a pretty broad range. So if you are worried about metabolic issues, hay testing is important.
Alfalfa is very popular out here - because it grows with little water, and it gets horses fat easily. OTOH, it is TOO high in protein and it is TOO high in calcium, which means it can throw calcium/phosphorous balances out of whack (especially in issue with young, growing horses, and especially with Warmblood types), and as gum points out, all that protein is hard on the kidneys. Alfalfa tends to be very low in sugars - it is a legume (like peas, soy, and beans). I like alfalfa for my oldsters in the Winter - it does help keep weight on them, and if you get a finer (cut early enough) cut, it is very easy to eat. It is also a good resource for rescue horses who are in very low BCS. But it is NOT really a good day-to-day feed source for most horses.
I feed my guys 1st cut timothy–orchard grass is like crack to them. They are both easy keepers.
2nd/3rd cut timothy is also like crack, very soft with few seed heads.
Good write up from Gumtree. Timothy does well on well drained hillsides, which the NE has aplenty. I find it at its best when it is just past boot stage, that’s when the heads have just emerged. At that point the stems are finer. However weather plays a big part in this. as a good stand of timothy usually takes at least three dry days. One to cut, one to tedder, and with luck in drying, one to bale.
As time passes, the heads get longer the stems get tougher. Then die off starts and second growth appears, with brownish grasses mixed in.
Some farmers, if you want to call them that, wait till really late to cut as they get more volume, nevermind that it’s lesser quality. This hay does have advantages for caloric restricted horses
[QUOTE=merrygoround;8981359]
Some farmers, if you want to call them that, wait till really late to cut as they get more volume, nevermind that it’s lesser quality. This hay does have advantages for caloric restricted horses[/QUOTE]
That’s because the horses won’t eat it.
All late cut timothy is good for is bedding and burning it…not fit to feed to any animal.
Was next to impossible to get hay up with all the rain we had. So a lot of late cut hay no other choice…and only one cutting this year.
BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!
Originally posted by DMK (edited to amuse myself):
“…a useful standard for horse people so you get a lot more T&A…in show barns…”
lmlacross, amusement shared (and truth in advertising duly acknowledged)
I expect that there are different kinds of late-stage hay.
Around here, a late-stage hay is grass that started growing in February, and was cut in May or June, because of the rain. It has thicker stems and lower protein, but it has had more than enough water, and is still green and growing when it is cut. It will have flower heads, but may or may not have actual seeds. It is perfectly palatable to my horse, and almost all horses. Though the couple of times my mare has gone on a food strike, it has been over late stage/ first cut hay. But I think that had to do with the variety of grass, not the stage. It was never about timothy, but rather random local grass from a small delivery guy.
I’ve stopped feeding mature/first cut hay for a couple of reasons. It tends to be low-protein. Plus I expect that the higher ADF also sequesters some of the nutrients, making them less available. Also, our late stage/ first cut local grass hay can be off the charts in NSC. And shipped-in late stage/ first cut timothy costs almost as much as second cut. This timothy tends to be very low in both NSC and protein, which some folks need.
But it isn’t bad hay by any means, and the horses eat it.
Now, if the hay was truly mature, gone to seed, gone brown standing in the field, if it was harvested at the end of a long dry summer, that might be another problem.
We are perhaps lucky here to have one climate belt on the coast, and another one a couple of hundred miles inland, plus the open prairie within commercial shipping distance over the mountains, so there are a variety of hay regions and bad weather (at least so far) hasn’t struck all of them in the same year! Plus we have a mix of local, small scale farmers selling out of their fields or delivering for a fee, the feeds stores buying commercially produced hay that they will deliver, plus various hay shipping companies running commercially with their own trucks. The price differential between wholesale hay in the interior and small-lot resale on the coast makes this an attractive proposition for the trucker middlemen!
So while you can certainly find nasty hay that horses won’t eat, or on the other hand premium hay that’s insanely expensive, if you know what you are looking for, you can also get gorgeous hay that suits your horse’s needs, without going broke.
And, of course, any timothy that finds its way down to the coast is going to be good hay of its kind (either first or second cut), because it will be commercially grown, and then bought by a middleman (feed store or hay dealer) who is going to be picky, since he has to sell it on. Maybe there is nasty timothy sitting in a leaky barn up in 100 Mile House, but it isn’t going to turn up in our local feed store. The problematic hay I’ve run across has all been local, small producer, hay. I still don’t know why maresy went off that one batch so emphatically. If I rightly recall, it might have been rye grass (or advertised as such), and perhaps it was too high in NSC or fructans and was giving her gas. Or maybe in reality it was just a stand of canary reed grass someone has cut and baled, and it was giving her impaction. Nothing wrong in terms of colour, smell, etc, and the horses I sold it on to ate it fine. One of life’s mysteries. But I do listen; if my hoover-everything mare won’t eat her hay, she gets new hay.
Thanks everyone - great info!!!
Much appreciated.
I don’t mind being called ‘uneducated’. However, I am sitting right here in the middle of hay country amonst a generation farmers that have been haying for decades. If they tell me something is Foxtail, then I believe it is Foxtail. Whatever you call it, it comes with the second cutting and if horses eat it they can get blisters in the mouth. And believe me, some horses do eat it because some horses, as we all know, are really hungry due to the skimpy amounts many boarding barns feed.
As for Horse Nettle, it’s pretty darn hard for a horse to sort it. That is because the leaves get very dry and they crumbled throughout the hay. A well fed horse, like mine, will get one bit of that bitter stuff and not touch the hay. Again, a very hungry horse will eat it.
I am adamant there is is next to impossible to find in in my tri-state area any hay of any kind that is even close to comparable to what is grown in the northwest.
I believe that Timothy is the preferred hay for feeding IR/cushings/metabolic horses.
I like it because the farmer who grows ours is able to keep the NSC and Protein levels fairly consistent from year to year and cut to cut, whereas local grass hays seem to be really hit or miss.
Ours is a high % tim/alfalfa mix, and all of the horses in the barn are thriving on it. It is high enough protein for the hard working show horses, but not too much for the casually ridden equines either. The NSC is consistently low (like, 6.5% low) so is great for my IR gelding. The extra calcium of the alfalfa is great for the two horses who are prone to ulcers as well.
The barn I work at feeds straight timothy and supplements with straight alfalfa for some of the harder keepers. It is soft and leafy and all but one fussy gelding hoovers it up. There is a horse there who is allergic to timothy, so gets orchard grass, and it is much coarser, and doesn’t “flake” very well, compared to the timothy.
I’ve always fed a timothy/grass mix; it’s just what’s available here unless you want straight alfalfa.
We only ever get one cut which usually comes around July 1st.
Some summers we don’t get it all off the fields until end of August due to weather, so it can be a little bit stemmy. My vet recommended trying to find hay that’s cut a little bit later for my fatties.
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