Preparations

FEED

Know in advance what you are going to feed during the winter months. When first frost kills your summer pasture is not the time to decide on a winter feeding program and it can be detrimental to your horse.

Chances are the grass that he was feeding on was devoid in nutrient value and he was losing body condition. With less time to acclimate your horse to new feed sources, plus a declining body condition, you have lost valuable time to prepare your horse for more extreme weather.

When temperatures dip, the best heat source for your horse is extra hay. During the cold weather it is best to increase the amount of hay, not concentrated feeds. Hay is digested in the cecum and colon which results in heat production by bacterial fermentation.

On the other hand, concentrated feed is primarily digested in the small intestine in a short amount of time and does not produce much heat. This means a greater amount of heat is produced through the utilization of hay than utilization of grain.  This makes hay a more desirable way to meet a horses’ elevated energy requirements. Supplementation with grain is only necessary if horses have difficulty in maintaining body condition.

Therefore, horses maintained in extremely cold conditions for an extended period, with minimal shelter may need grain supplementation to meet their energy demands.

The first step to winterizing for your horse is knowing the nutrient value of your hay. Your local county Extension office can assist you in getting your hay tested. The test will take several weeks to get the results back, so plan ahead. While you are waiting on your hay sample, find out the nutritional requirements of your horse.

There are nutritional tables that determine equine nutritional requirements that can found in reference books, or in some cases, your feed store may have a copy. The nutritional requirements are based on age, size, reproductive stage (mares), and amount of work.

When your hay sample results are returned, compare the nutrient value of your hay to the nutrient requirements of your horse(s).  Every horse should be fed as an individual. You will need to calculate your horses’ weight to determine his feeding needs. Once you have your horse’s weight, there’s a simple rule of thumb you can use to determine how much feed your horse should be getting each day.

The total weight of feed per day should be between 1.5% and 3.0% of your horse’s body weight.

Extra calories are particularly important for older horses in winter,  recommendations are that horses on the high side of 20 years be fed at least 120% of the National Research Council’s recommendations for daily intake  (from 1.5% to 3.0% of the horse’s body weight).
Many adult horses can maintain body condition on a complete diet of a good quality hay with access to free choice trace mineralized salt. Adult horses should consume between 1.5 and 2 percent of their body weight in hay or a 1,000 lb. horse will eat 15 to 20 lb. of hay per day. Supplementation with grain is only necessary if horses have difficulty in maintaining body condition.

Therefore, horses maintained in extremely cold conditions for an extended period, with minimal shelter may need grain supplementation to meet their energy demands. In cases where a combination of hay and grain will be required to meet the nutritional needs of the horse, savings may be realized without affecting the horse if you can utilize more of the cheaper hay and less of the more expensive grain.

Make sure that vitamin and mineral requirements are met as well.

Get in enough good hay to last through until next year’s hay crop. To calculate how much you need, figure on half a square (50 LB) bale per horse per day then add some to cover for the occasional moldy bale or extra cold weather.

Providing more hay is a fairly simple; just feed an extra flake or two per meal, and monitor how much your horse eats and how well he maintains his weight.  Since a horses’ tendency is to be wasteful and trample the hay  into the ground, you’ll need to allow at least 25% extra for wastage. With horses fed in groups make sure each get their fair share of hay, space the piles out of kicking distance and put out one ot two more piles than the number of horses. That way, when the boss horse keeps thinking another pile looks better than the one she’s presently eating from, the other horses can move to new piles too.

This is one instance when you might want to seek out hay with a slightly higher legume content than grass, even for your mature horses. Higher protein legume hays are also higher in energy and nutrients, and that bit of extra energy might be a boon when temperatures plunge. 

Feed only clean hay , discard any that shows signs of moldiness (generally noticeable as white matted or fuzzy patches within a flake), smells musty, or raises clouds of particles when dropped to the floor from a height of a few feet. 

All horses should have access to a trace mineralized salt block.

Part 3 coming on Friday…