We get asked how much to feed, the answer is, it depends!
It depends on many factors such as breed, size, age, time of year and most importantly, the quality of the hay you are feeding.
If you feeding a good quality alfalfa hay, and you have a horse that isn't a senior and it is summer time, you can usually calculate easily how much to feed based on experience on how hard of a keeper your horse is.
If you have an older horse, and have so so alfalfa hay and it is winter, then you might need to feed more than you would in the summer.
Why is this? It takes more energy to keep warm in the winter and so your horse will need to consume more calories to keep weight on and avoid weight loss due to colder weather. We didn't mention coat quality and if you blanket or not. If you have a horse with a thick winter coat and or you blanket your horses, those can also be factors that will keep a horse warm in winter and would require less energy to keep warm, making it a bit easier to keep weight on. Under these conditions, you might not have to feed as much alfalfa as you normally would with a thin haired coat and no blankets in the winter.
The effect of wind and rain can increase the energy level needed to keep warm in addition to general coldness. If you have extra wind and rain, you might have to increase the pounds of alfalfa hay to keep the horse in the same condition. The answer really does depend on a lot of these factors and also some horses are just easier keepers than other and can get away with being fed less alfalfa hay than other harder keepers.
You might find that during colder conditions, your horse may require twice as much food to keep weight on them. You may have to experiement with the right amount of alfalfa hay for your horse, since all horses are different.
It is important to get good quality alfalfa hay to ensure the nutrients needed to keep your horse's weight steady in the winter. We lab test and certify our Barn 21 alfalfa hay for this very reason, so we can be sure it will be a good source of nutrition for your horse. We get it from only the best growers in Arizona and you can be sure that our Barn 21 hay is the best around.
It depends on many factors such as breed, size, age, time of year and most importantly, the quality of the hay you are feeding.
If you feeding a good quality alfalfa hay, and you have a horse that isn't a senior and it is summer time, you can usually calculate easily how much to feed based on experience on how hard of a keeper your horse is.
If you have an older horse, and have so so alfalfa hay and it is winter, then you might need to feed more than you would in the summer.
Why is this? It takes more energy to keep warm in the winter and so your horse will need to consume more calories to keep weight on and avoid weight loss due to colder weather. We didn't mention coat quality and if you blanket or not. If you have a horse with a thick winter coat and or you blanket your horses, those can also be factors that will keep a horse warm in winter and would require less energy to keep warm, making it a bit easier to keep weight on. Under these conditions, you might not have to feed as much alfalfa as you normally would with a thin haired coat and no blankets in the winter.
The effect of wind and rain can increase the energy level needed to keep warm in addition to general coldness. If you have extra wind and rain, you might have to increase the pounds of alfalfa hay to keep the horse in the same condition. The answer really does depend on a lot of these factors and also some horses are just easier keepers than other and can get away with being fed less alfalfa hay than other harder keepers.
You might find that during colder conditions, your horse may require twice as much food to keep weight on them. You may have to experiement with the right amount of alfalfa hay for your horse, since all horses are different.
It is important to get good quality alfalfa hay to ensure the nutrients needed to keep your horse's weight steady in the winter. We lab test and certify our Barn 21 alfalfa hay for this very reason, so we can be sure it will be a good source of nutrition for your horse. We get it from only the best growers in Arizona and you can be sure that our Barn 21 hay is the best around.