haylage

[dorothy]

This is in reference to Sophie1307's post about EH haylage. I thought that people may want to know about Haylage, and, as i feed it to my horses, thought i'd tell you all. 0

Haylage is hay that is bagged and wrapped soon after it has been cut.
This minimises any possible loss by making the bales waterproof. unlike Hay, Haylage doesn't dry out as much, and go the brown colour that hay does- it almost 'sweats' in the wrapping and that is what produces the sweet smell of it.

Once you have unwrapped the bale, it needs to be used within 3-4 days- it starts to go 'off' as soon as you open the bale.

It's water content is alot higher than a bale of hay the same size- so, when feeding it to horses, you have to give them double the amount of haylage than you would hay.

It wouldn't be suitable for piggies as it is ALOT richer than hay, and it spoils too quickly.

 

[Sophie1307]

Thanks dorothy that was very helpful.

I got a very nice email back from haylage. The lovely people rung the vets to ask if they could feed it to pigs.
(Thanks EH Haylage O0 )
they said:
Hi Sophie

Have spoken to a vet we see no reason why there should be any problems. You would need to make sure that enough Vit. C is available in the rest of the diet .

My only concern is that you need to use the bag up within about 10 days in the winter otherwise it will start to ferment and not be suitable to feed. I hope you have enough guinea pigs or other animals to share it with.

Hope this is useful

.Regards

Ed Howard

But i didn't feed mine it just to be safe. It seemed a bit too wet and it would of taken more than a couple of days to feed them. nice of them tho

 

[dorothy]

that was nice of them! i'd considered trying mine on it ages ago but after i'd read your post and i'm glad that i didn't.
It gives some horses the poops too, which makes me think that if its too rich for them, it will be for ickle piggies.