Does anyone use feed bags to feed horses in a field setting? We have some air ferns and some hard keepers and were considering using feed bags and I would love to hear any pros and cons.
Yes…They work. The horses learn that running the slow eater is pointless. However it requires you to hover while they eat. The bags get gummy. Someone will learn how to step on it and pull it off or tear it. We quit using them for the hover reason.
I haven’t really had too many issues with feeding from the bags. Much better than the bucket game.
Our BO does; two herds of elderly horses. 6 horses in each herd. Works great. Everyone gets what they need, especially if any need meds. No fighting. We actually soak all of them as some of the horses have choked. The bags can get pretty knarly. We hang them to dry out between feedings. And they are fine.
Would never go back to tubs. We do wait while they finish. Which is not a big deal.
I do, and I love them. It completely solved meal-time drama for our field boarders. Someone does have to hang out until the old man finishes, but I try to use that time to fill a water trough or get the mail, etc.
One of mine does. I’m in a sandy area and she’s an older pony who’s starting to lose teeth and is the world’s messiest eater. She also will get run off her food by my gelding if she eats in a bucket.
I put her scoop of senior in the bag, feed everyone else in buckets and put her feed bag on, and go do something else for 30 min or so (other old gelding takes forever to eat) When old man is finally done I go back out to take the pony’s bag off and open the gate that separates the old man from the greedies and they all mill around to see who left what 
So far she hasn’t shredded the bag though I did repair a front seam that came loose - dental floss works great for that sort of thing!
I have been using Feed Rite Bags for years and love them!
The pros are huge. Like others have mentioned, the bags pretty much end the meal-time theatrics. The horses eat side by side quietly because no one can steal anyone else’s feed. Plus there’s little to no grain spillage.
The cons are minimal, the biggest is probably that you need to stick around to remove them. They need to be rinsed out on regular basis. And they don’t last as long as a bucket. I don’t find any of these to be a big deal… the benefits are worth it!
Ooooh I might have to get a few of these! My broodmare shares her meals with the goats, and trying to keep everyone on their own buckets when they share a field is getting old! 
[QUOTE=Texarkana;7698484]
I have been using Feed Rite Bags for years and love them![/QUOTE]
Thanks for the link! Horses we used on a trail-riding holiday in France years ago (shout-out for Equitours:)) were fed in them twice a day, and I thought they were ingeneous - wonder why they fell out of fashion?
Can you use it if you don’t use halters? Or do you halter for feeding? (not that I never use halters, you know what I mean…)
you don’t need halters at all.
We quit using them b/c being tied to eyeballing them 365 simply got old. You’d get busy raking the hall, quit thinking about the feed bags a second, and look up to see a horse trying to drink with it on, making a dirty mess (feed bags+ muddy ground + stock tank = muddied water +nasty feedbag).
They work great, they just didn’t work for us
I’ve had problems with choke when using them with a pelleted feed. I’ve since gone to feeding all meals soaked which feedbags obviously don’t work for. They would probably work just fine if I didn’t have starvingly ravenous Morgans (aka garbage disposals) whose goals in life include eating as fast as they can to try and prove I didn’t feed them in the first place.
My pony doesn’t wear a halter, the bag has a strap attached & I just shove it over her ears And yeah, she drinks with it on but I don’t care. The horses still drink from the tank (in TN they seemed to prefer mud puddles to a sparkling water tank anyway) and in any case, the sand from the bottom of the bag drifts to the bottom of the tank and gets rinsed out when I dump and scrub. The feedbag itself gets upturned on a post and dries out in between feedings.
Thanks for all of the replies. I am definitely going to try these out and see how it goes.
[QUOTE=tabula rashah;7699270]
I’ve had problems with choke when using them with a pelleted feed. I’ve since gone to feeding all meals soaked which feedbags obviously don’t work for. They would probably work just fine if I didn’t have starvingly ravenous Morgans (aka garbage disposals) whose goals in life include eating as fast as they can to try and prove I didn’t feed them in the first place.[/QUOTE]
I feed all meals soaked in mesh feed bags without problem! The only downside is that they DEFINITELY need to be rinsed every time after feeding a mushy meal!
I just started this year but for a bit of a different reason. I have a mare and foal and mare is eating a good bit to keep weight on her, foal needed separate feeding for her supplement (progressive) and to keep her from eating all of mom’s breakfast (I only use it for one meal). I do feed soaked beet pulp in it no trouble, any powdery supplements (she is on a cool calories) will fall through. Mare is not too happy about getting it put on because it is so HEAVY, but eats just fine in hers. Baby does try to paw at it occasionally but not too bad. I am usually in their stall cleaning while they are eating so baby will come bother me instead of mom most of the time. I’ve always wondered how they would work and so far they seem just fine at least for my issue.
They make bags that have a rubber feed tub bottom, my trainer uses those and they work for wet food and supplements.
Be forewarned that if you have young colts, they probably will play bitey faces in them and figure out how to bash each other over the head. No harm to the horses, but maybe hard on the bags.
