Food aggression update
Posted by Bill on Jan 13 2009 at 01:00 am | Tagged as: General
Thanks for all the suggestions in the comments on my last post about surprise food aggression. Separate hay stacks are the plan and I’m glad to see most of you seem to do that as well. One question though. Do you do as I do and drop the hay on the ground? I’ve heard we should try to keep it off of the dirt/mud/stone but does that mean I should buy four or five hay feeders (not round bale feeders but trough-style)? For now, it’s on the ground but I’m always looking for the better way.
Although that seems like this food aggression was an isolated incident, I always keep an eye on my position and as was noted in the comments, I am careful to not let myself get between two horses. I’m seen demeanor change in a flash. A common comment from those who have had horse accidents is “it happened so fast!” and we’d all be better for keeping that in mind.
Well, I’m sure many folks will have all kinds of opinions on this, but ours go right onto the ground in separate piles–about 7 piles for four horses so they can move around. We have a very dry area where they eat so it works. I also worm every three months so hopefully that will take care of any issues. Besides, they spend all day in the pasture grazing–this is a normal position for them to eat in!
–Mindy
I usually feed hay on the ground, but in the winter we have a lot of wind here in northwestern NC so I use the hay bags that you can attach to a fence. They are usually the kind used in trailers but they work well in pastures if you have a sturdy fence. This keeps my two horses separated and it takes them longer to eat the hay since they have to work a little to get it out of the bags. That way they don’t scarf down their entire meal in just a few minutes. Best of luck with the food aggression issue! I hope it was an isolated incident.
-Stephanie
Not sure if you have these in the US but here in Australia we have some great cheap feed buckets that are big and flat enough to put an armful of hay in (a flake, or a biscuit etc). They are made from old recycled car tyres and have a big flat bottom and sides the width of a tyre. They are quite cheap here, heavy so they don’t move too much (like normal buckets) and being thick rubber they stand up to lots of horse kicks and bumps and can’t hurt the horses by breaking etc. We keep them in lots of yards for feeding hay as our ground is really dusty (then muddy if it ever rains). You could probably make them if you had some tyres but our feed stores sell them.
I have some similar to louise but not made to look like tires. They are the heavy rubber and black, so that they might be recycled tires or something. I chunk the hay over the fence into the tub. It is about a foot tall and two feet wide. They sell them at Tractor Supply I think, but you can sometimes find them on craigslist.com. The one in our pasture is split down the side, but is not sharp enough or tough enough to hurt the horse. It will still hold the hay though.
It seems ok to feed off the ground here in Tennessee as long as it isn’t sandy, for example you should not feed on the ground in an arena. In California horses fed off the ground ingested a lot of sand and could colic (we had to feed psyllium to them to clear it out). Also, try to avoid putting hay on manure, of course. If you constantly move the places you throw the hay you won’t get as much churned up ground. Also, I used to occasionally rake up the leavings so it didn’t get moldy. I don’t find feeder on the ground too helpful as the horses toss the hay out and it’s just another thing to clean.
Just thought I’d drop a comment to let ya’ll know how much I’ve enjoyed your blog - I found it last week and went back and read all the previous posts! Reading your experiences with your first horse(s) has reminded me so much of my first experiences with owning horses. Thanks so much for a fabulous blog!