Tips For buying Hay

Tips For buying Hay

Susan Allen
Susan Allen

 

If you are anywhere in the Northwest, outside of Portland and Seattle this weekend, take note of all the hay trucks on the highways. The alfalfa crop looks good this year and  in Central Washington where I live if the weather holds they’ll be cutting Timothy Saturday. Hi I’m Susan Allen, if you’re  are a new horse owner stay tuned on today’s Open Range for some tips on buying quality hay. Even seasoned horse owners can get duped buying hay. One woman I know lost a prized horse to cheat grass hidden deep in a hay bale.  Since hay makes up the bulk of a horses diet it’s simply not ever  worth  skimping  on quality. One vet bill can easily be more than a ton of  nice alfalfa. The Horse.com website, ( a great resource for horse owners I might add), offers six tips for buying good hay. The first, remember hay should provide a minimum of 2/3 of a horses nutrition so develop a good relationship with a hay supplier so that you have a constant reliable source of hay. If you can,  build additional hay storage to help reduce overall costs so you won’t be venerable to seasonal price fluctuations and buy your hay early, it costs more in late summer or fall.  Right now, Spring is the perfect time to realistically evaluate how many horses you can afford to feed and reduce your stock if need be. Finally, remember like with anything envolving horses, consistently is key. Don’t feed timothy one month, and switch to grass or worse alfalfa the next as changing diets can lead to a host of health problems like colic.  If you need to calculate what it will cost you over the winter to feed your horses  or make sure you are getting a fair deal, The website hayexchange.com lists average hay prices throughout the nation by zip code. I’m Susan Allen
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