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 Born not Made
Posts: 2931
   
Location: North Dakota | If you had 10 horses on 120 acres and going through the current Northern weather we are going through now .....
Would you provide your horses access to hay?
Or leave them to graze?
And I'm just going to leave the question and details at that. Go. |
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 Bit O Holic
Posts: 6448
 
Location: hot, humid and dry...Gulf coast East of Houston.. | I would think they need hay, especially if the ground is covered by snow, they may not be able to get grass. |
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 Good Grief!
Posts: 6343
Location: Cap'n Joan Rotgut.....alberta | we have 10 head out still pawing, snow is a couple feet or so deep.....on 160 acres with access to salt and water.......range in age from 2 to 14.......and all as fat as ticks...but the quarter they are on has not been cut or grazed in 10 years
m
Edited by mruggles 2013-12-05 2:04 PM
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Member
Posts: 48
| Depends on how much grass is left and how much snow is on the ground in your parts. |
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 Always Off Topic
Posts: 6382
Location: ND | the import an question is do they have access to water or are they using snow???
if they are just out in the pasture and snow is your water source then i say no to the hay.....if you are going to feed hay, they need water....
feeding hay depends on what you have for grass in that pasture and then your horses....plenty of grass, horses in good shape....wouldn't worry about it.....young horses, like 2yo and younger need a little more care than that....or really old horses....or problem horses.....
the only time i worry about pasture horses grazing is if the snow is really deep or ice.....ice is a definite to bring them in and feed hay..... |
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Elite Veteran
Posts: 1079
| I'm in ND too and I guess me and my horses are wimps but I couldn't imagine doing that? Maybe out west there is no snow, but we have enough that any remaining grass is covered. What about shelter? Mine are nose to the door at 5:30pm ready to come in for a scoop of grain and a few flakes of good hay. Hay bale during the day tucked up out of the wind.
I'm sure they can survive that way - but I'd feel to guilty and worried. |
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| Depends on how much snow and ice you have covering the grazing area.
Once you start haying you know the horses are going to stop hunting grazing areas and stand there waiting on you to return with more hay.
As long as good standing summer grass is available ... coastal Bermuda... and winter rye grass is growing .....>>>> I feed sack feed and save my hay for super bad weather and I always keep in mind the winter may be a bad one and hang on longer than planned. So, I start by saving hay as much as possible to pastured horses that has good grass cover and not overgrazed.!!
I continue the sack feeding even when I start haying ... to me they are two different sources of keeping mares fat, warm and unstressed while carrying foals.
The quality of my foals health, standup conformation and muscle/skeletal form at foaling time is what matters to me. I love to see those straight legged 120+lb foals bouncing around full of energy and no vets to call with problems with mares or babies!!
Edited by BARRELHORSE USA 2013-12-05 2:11 PM
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 The Bling Princess
Posts: 3411
Location: North Dakota | I have four horses on 40 acres of native prairie; the grass is still pokin up through the snow its so long, but I can't hardly stand watching my horses paw through it to get their food. One of my greatest pleasures in life is feeding my horses. I love to hear their nickers and watch them enjoy their eats. Even if they are out pawing around, which they do, I still feed them hay. Days like today I give them extra. Just me and how I like to do it on my ponderosa:) |
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Always Off Topic
Posts: 6382
Location: ND | BARRELHORSE USA - 2013-12-05 2:08 PM
Depends on how much snow and ice you have covering the grazing area.
Once you start haying you know the horses are going to stop hunting grazing areas and stand there waiting on you to return with more hay.
As long as good standing summer grass is available ... coastal Bermuda... and winter rye grass is growing .....>>>> I feed sack feed and save my hay for super bad weather and I always keep in mind the winter may be a bad one and hang on longer than planned. So, I start by saving hay as much as possible to pastured horses that has good grass cover and not overgrazed.!!
I continue the sack feeding even when I start haying ... to me they are two different sources of keeping mares fat, warm and unstressed while carrying foals.
The quality of my foals health, standup conformation and muscle/skeletal form at foaling time is what matters to me. I love to see those straight legged 120+lb foals bouncing around full of energy and no vets to call with problems with mares or babies!!
that's BS.....
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Elite Veteran
Posts: 629
Location: Roping pen | Depends on a lot. Some things not mentioned are:
Use-are you using them at all? If you riding a lot, they need some supplement (hay, grain, tub/block).
Are they staying full? Horses must be digesting to stay warm. If they get hungry, they get cold.
Can they get out the wind? Wind chill is a condition killer.
Are they wormed, feet in good shape, and in general overall healthy?
Age? As mentioned, older or younger horses need more.
As mentioned, snow condition is critical. Crusted, icy snow is a bugger when compared to fluffy deep snow.
Also, if you have south facing slopes, they melt off earlier and provide a lot of grazing. If flat or north facing pastures, snow stays on and feeding is more critical.
Our rule of thumb, south of you 200 miles, is that we have plenty of good pasture for them to graze. BUT if colder than 15, or windchill dropping it to 0 or so, OR crusted snow deeper than 4" or so, OR grass is covered over 6" on the flat, we feed all the hay they can eat.
Ours gets a 20% cube every day of ~2.5 lbs or so. Our grass, when dormate, is ~6% protien. A horse needs in the 10-12% range so the cubes cover that need. Also, a salt block at free choice.
We do ride ours moderately in the winter. |
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  Northern Chocolate Queen
Posts: 16576
Location: ND | I wouldn't even consider making mine fend for themselves in this weather. Granted my horses are SPOILED & a good share of them (sr citizens & the youngsters) are in the barn out of the weather. But the group that is left outside is getting all the hay they can eat and they still have access to their pasture. They are burning through a lot of hay to keep warm, about twice what they normally eat. |
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Northern Chocolate Queen
Posts: 16576
Location: ND | BARRELHORSE USA - 2013-12-05 1:08 PM Depends on how much snow and ice you have covering the grazing area. Once you start haying you know the horses are going to stop hunting grazing areas and stand there waiting on you to return with more hay. As long as good standing summer grass is available ... coastal Bermuda... and winter rye grass is growing .....>>>> I feed sack feed and save my hay for super bad weather and I always keep in mind the winter may be a bad one and hang on longer than planned. So, I start by saving hay as much as possible to pastured horses that has good grass cover and not overgrazed.!! I continue the sack feeding even when I start haying ... to me they are two different sources of keeping mares fat, warm and unstressed while carrying foals. The quality of my foals health, standup conformation and muscle/skeletal form at foaling time is what matters to me. I love to see those straight legged 120+lb foals bouncing around full of energy and no vets to call with problems with mares or babies!!
Disagree....If the weather gets nicer again most of my horses will go back out to picking at the grass instead of wanting hay. And trust me there is no grass growing in ND anymore this time of year! |
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 More bootie than waist!
Posts: 18425
Location: Riding Crackhead. | Feed them hay. |
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 Shelter Dog Lover
Posts: 10277
| SaraJean - 2013-12-05 2:38 PM BARRELHORSE USA - 2013-12-05 1:08 PM Depends on how much snow and ice you have covering the grazing area. Once you start haying you know the horses are going to stop hunting grazing areas and stand there waiting on you to return with more hay. As long as good standing summer grass is available ... coastal Bermuda... and winter rye grass is growing .....>>>> I feed sack feed and save my hay for super bad weather and I always keep in mind the winter may be a bad one and hang on longer than planned. So, I start by saving hay as much as possible to pastured horses that has good grass cover and not overgrazed.!! I continue the sack feeding even when I start haying ... to me they are two different sources of keeping mares fat, warm and unstressed while carrying foals. The quality of my foals health, standup conformation and muscle/skeletal form at foaling time is what matters to me. I love to see those straight legged 120+lb foals bouncing around full of energy and no vets to call with problems with mares or babies!! Disagree....If the weather gets nicer again most of my horses will go back out to picking at the grass instead of wanting hay. And trust me there is no grass growing in ND anymore this time of year!
My horses always prefer grazing over hay no matter what season it is. They don't touch their hay till the grazing is gone. |
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More bootie than waist!
Posts: 18425
Location: Riding Crackhead. | rodeomom3 - 2013-12-05 2:46 PM SaraJean - 2013-12-05 2:38 PM BARRELHORSE USA - 2013-12-05 1:08 PM Depends on how much snow and ice you have covering the grazing area. Once you start haying you know the horses are going to stop hunting grazing areas and stand there waiting on you to return with more hay. As long as good standing summer grass is available ... coastal Bermuda... and winter rye grass is growing .....>>>> I feed sack feed and save my hay for super bad weather and I always keep in mind the winter may be a bad one and hang on longer than planned. So, I start by saving hay as much as possible to pastured horses that has good grass cover and not overgrazed.!! I continue the sack feeding even when I start haying ... to me they are two different sources of keeping mares fat, warm and unstressed while carrying foals. The quality of my foals health, standup conformation and muscle/skeletal form at foaling time is what matters to me. I love to see those straight legged 120+lb foals bouncing around full of energy and no vets to call with problems with mares or babies!! Disagree....If the weather gets nicer again most of my horses will go back out to picking at the grass instead of wanting hay. And trust me there is no grass growing in ND anymore this time of year!
....and then they keep going back to search for grass just in case some grew up here in January....ya right. |
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 Life Saver
Posts: 10477
Location: MT | Depends on the snow and how much feed they have out there. If there isn't much snow and plenty of good feed left underneath they should do fine. If the snow gets crusty or too deep for them to easily get to the grass then I'd throw hay for sure.
My next door neighbors don't feed hay in the winter unless the snow gets real tough. Last year their horses didn't have a flake of hay all winter and they were fat and sassy. Of course, they only had 2 horses on 80 acres of pasture with good grass left in it. They haven't fed hay yet this winter and we were -26 this morning at the house with a few inches of snow on the ground.
On the ranch I used to live on we would winter bucking horses for a stock contractor. They were tough and used to ranging for feed, never had any problems with them wintering on pasture only.
edited because I can't spell worth a dang today!
Edited by ruggedchica 2013-12-05 3:53 PM
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Shelter Dog Lover
Posts: 10277
| CYA Ranch - 2013-12-05 2:48 PM rodeomom3 - 2013-12-05 2:46 PM SaraJean - 2013-12-05 2:38 PM BARRELHORSE USA - 2013-12-05 1:08 PM Depends on how much snow and ice you have covering the grazing area. Once you start haying you know the horses are going to stop hunting grazing areas and stand there waiting on you to return with more hay. As long as good standing summer grass is available ... coastal Bermuda... and winter rye grass is growing .....>>>> I feed sack feed and save my hay for super bad weather and I always keep in mind the winter may be a bad one and hang on longer than planned. So, I start by saving hay as much as possible to pastured horses that has good grass cover and not overgrazed.!! I continue the sack feeding even when I start haying ... to me they are two different sources of keeping mares fat, warm and unstressed while carrying foals. The quality of my foals health, standup conformation and muscle/skeletal form at foaling time is what matters to me. I love to see those straight legged 120+lb foals bouncing around full of energy and no vets to call with problems with mares or babies!! Disagree....If the weather gets nicer again most of my horses will go back out to picking at the grass instead of wanting hay. And trust me there is no grass growing in ND anymore this time of year!
I put a round bale out 4 weeks ago because we had some cooler weather and it is barely 1/4 gone - 4 horses. I still have green pastures where I am. |
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Born not Made
Posts: 2931
Location: North Dakota | Thank you everyone for your comments and insight. |
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 Balance Beam and more...
Posts: 11493
Location: 31 lengths farms | WYOTurn-n-Burn - 2013-12-06 12:11 PM
I have four horses on 40 acres of native prairie; the grass is still pokin up through the snow its so long, but I can't hardly stand watching my horses paw through it to get their food. One of my greatest pleasures in life is feeding my horses. I love to hear their nickers and watch them enjoy their eats. Even if they are out pawing around, which they do,  I still feed them hay.  Days like today I give them extra. Just me and how I like to do it on my ponderosa:)Â
I'm sappy today but still...this made me tear up. |
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 Chasin my Dream
Posts: 13651
Location: Alberta | mruggles - 2013-12-05 12:57 PM we have 10 head out still pawing, snow is a couple feet or so deep.....on 160 acres with access to salt and water.......range in age from 2 to 14.......and all as fat as ticks...but the quarter they are on has not been cut or grazed in 10 years
m this.......a couple winters ago we kicked ours out on 150 plus acres of crop land with lots of slough areas that had never been grazed! Turned out in October, had cold temps hit but never started feeding hay till January and that was only because we got an insane amount of snow that year and it got a hard crust to it....
But everyone's situation varies, so go accordingly....
Edited by dream_chaser 2013-12-05 4:57 PM
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