Different hay, I'm in trouble here

[dixie_belle]

As I have mentioned earlier, I moved from Texas to Kentucky in January with my four mini horses. I was so concerned about finding hay up here during the winter that I actually moved 60 bales of hay 800 miles just so that I would have some here when we all arrived. Well, the time has come to purchase locally grown hay. OMG does it look different. In Texas I purchased coastal bermuda. It is not an especially great hay, but it grows in Texas when almost nothing else will. The hay was almost always fine lined with very few large thick stalks. So up here, coastal doesn't grow. I have called around and most places haven't done their first cut for this year but I did find several folks who have hay from last year that is stored in a barn so I figured I'd go check it out. We actually went to a farm today and purchased 6 bales of a combination of timothy, orchard grass and red clover. Now this hay looks absolutely nothing like what I purchased in Texas. I can see the timothy in there but the hay is quite brown with no green visible. It is rather coarse. Um...maybe not coarse but the stalks are large....um...fat looking. I talked to the lady and evidently up here I will have the choice of this combination or just orchard grass and clover or fescue. I bought 6 bales just to try to see if my guys would eat it. I won't know until I check on them in the morning. Is the hay up here supposed to look like that? I am unfamiliar with any of these types. If one better than the other? I have all geldings so I think from my research that fescue would be ok for them but I have never actually seen it baled. Is it this type of coarse hay also?

I didn't think hay would be a problem up here as it seems to grow everywhere. I just don't know what it is supposed to look like because I've never seen it. And I don't know what is the best choice, either. I did some research and timothy seems to be a really good hay choice but I don't know what it is supposed to look like once it is baled because all the pictures just showed it growing. Sigh.

I think I have enough now to last until the first cut of this growing season. But I would love to hear what people in this part of the world feed their horses and what it is supposed to look like baled. Once I find hay, I typically buy enough to last until next year at this time. I really hate trying to find hay in the middle of the winter, and storage here is not going to be a problem.

I just don't want to buy a bunch of this coarse looking stuff, even if they eat it, if it is not good for them as I do not give mass quantities of supplements. They get hay, some horse chow (not much as they get really fat), alfalfa cubes in the morning as a treat (again not much), carrots, apples and horse cookies. Texas vet had them strickly on hay as we had a severe weight problem.

Any opinions would be greatly appreciated.

 

[Mominis]

I have a Texan friend and I covet the color and quality of his hay over what we can get in the midwest. The barn that I stable in offers brome grass hay. It's rather colorless, kind of brown green, but it works well enough. Shake gets supplemented with a pound of timothy/alfalfa chops. Someone on this forum had advised me to try them and I am sure glad that I did. The brome gives him something to do and provides roughage, but the alfalfa he really looks forward to. He doesn't bolt it, but he sure knows when it's coming. As for the brome, he's eats it, but I think it's more because it's there.

I do feed grain as well, he gets three daily feedings of grain and he is also on supplements. Welcome to the world of midwest hay. The grasses available, at least in my area, are nothing to get excited about. The alfalfa, at least good alfalfa, is no where to be found. The closest I've seen decent alfalfa to Missouri is Northern Oklahoma. lol

 

[Marty]

Welcome to the south. Sounds to me like you just hit on a hay farmer that is selling you last years hay that wasn't very good. It shouldn't be coarse unless it was probably baled when it was too mature; that happens when the rains are persisting and the farmers can't cut their hay and they grow too much. That is one reason it would make it coarse and also loose color.

My choice of hay is pretty much what you have there otherwise. Orchard grass with a little timothy is native to the region and the foundation of my feed program and should be nice and soft. A touch of clover is ok as long as its just a tiny bit; they love it. My relatives near Lexington haven't even had a first cutting yet, neither have we down below here in Tennessee.Its too early for us and too much rain still. Usually Memorial Day weekend is when the hay baling really begins.

 

[Nathan Luszcz]

Clover hay will look like crap, and be brown and dry. And the horses will glomp it down

Clover hay is very nutritious, on par with alfalfa, but looks horrible. You will like Kentucky hay once it comes in

If you are near Shelbyville we have some hay from last year that we could sell. Its homegrown, with a lot of clover. Our horses are cleaning it up even though they have grass turnout.