While you might assume this is a uncomplicated thing to achieve – feed your horse – you would be shocked at the number of horse owners that don’t appreciate the fundamentals. There is no real rule of thumb for feeding, as each horse’s dietary needs will fluctuate depending on age, weight and amount of activity.
To start with, your horse naturally uses forage as being a principal component of their diets. It is likely one of the Main requirements for any correctly operating digestive system. When we speak of forage, we usually mean natural pasture and cut hay.
Older horses ordinarily eat in the region of 2 to 2.5 pct of their body mass in feed each day. So a 1,000 pound horse will consume approximately 20 to 25 lbs of feed a day. Meaning premium feed, not low quality high fibre feed (that may interfere with proper digestion).
In an ideal pasture world, your horse should consume at least 1 % of his body mass in hay/pasture fodder on a daily basis. If your horse doesn’t do much exertion, they should do well on strictly forage, with no grain scattered in. On the other hand, developing, breeding, or working horses require dietary supplements in combination with forage – for instance grain or a supplement concentrate. Imagine it in this way, forages ought to supply at least one half or more of the entire mass of the feed eaten on a daily basis for optimum growth and development.
Till you can feed a well balanced “meal” for a horse, you need to know the nutrient content and quality of your forage. As soon as you know that, one can work out the correct quantities of each to satisfy nutrient necessities.
The very best resource, and the least expensive one for summer feed is your pasture. And, typically good pasture by itself can offer all the nutritional needs your horse needs. How do you determine just how much pasture is required to provide for a horse? Here’s a rough and ready guideline that will help you: (using a mass of 1,000 – 1,200 pounds)
Mare and foal 1.75 to 2 acres
Yearlings 1.5 to 2 acre
Weanlings 0.5 to 1 acre
Winter feed naturally would be cut hay, and again, top quality if you can find it. It should be cut early, be leafy and green in color and as free as possible of dust, moulds, weeds and stubble. This feed is usually abundant with protein, minerals and nutritional vitamins.
Yes, you may want to use alfalfa hay, but be careful about the higher protein contents if you are feeding to young growing horses, as it could contain an excessive quantity of calcium in correlation to phosphorus. Excessive calcium isn’t good for developing horses. If you’re not positive about hay quality, have it analyzed.
If you’re looking for horses for sale or ponies for sale, please visit the Horse and Pony Directory.