Horse Sense

[Walt Davies]

I have always heard of Horse Sense but what i can't figure out is why they don't pass it on to their owners.
I'm dealing with 3 guys who have mules and horses and you wouldn't believe how these guys are about there HAY.
One guy walks the field after cutting and raking and says that looks great. We tell him the moisture is shade high and he's all upset. we have to leave it one more day rain not due till late tonight but he's worried. Boy I can see why a lot of people won't sell to horse people.
they worry about a small amount of mold. don't these people check the hay before feeding it. all it take is to flip though the folds to see any mold in it.
Well when we get this last one we may not want to do another till next year just to get back to making hay without all that will my hay hurt my poor horse or is it going rot in the barn will it burn the place down." "NO ITS LESS than 20%" "Here's a paper from the Missouri School of agronomy read it."
Some of the hay is less than 14% and they are worried about it burning the barn down. Can't tell them it needs to be 18 to 20% to make good hay.
There are times when I wish we had never bought that moisture tester.
Walt

 

[Anonymous-0]

I dunno Walt, we used to put up a fair amount of hay for our horses ourselves, a year like this year is ideal, cannot believe the periods of cool dry weather we have had, moisture-schmoisture, if you had decent weather and cut it with anything other than just a sickle, it ought to be dry enough by using the same methods most have used for years, dry one side, turn it over, check by hand, then bale. I can see your point, some of these people probably are getting a little ridiculous, but by the same token I get tired of the bashing of horse owners on this site, there are plenty who do not fall into the unreasonable hay customer category, we are one and if someone were to make statements to my face like I've heard here lately, they'd get an earful to say the least, because it does not apply to everyone, most around here used to put up there own hay, under some harsh conditions, with minimal help, one of dads friends turned an old JD over, was pinned but not badly hurt, lots of dangerous hills here, but all the fields used to get baled back then. It used to be the running joke when we were in school, as far as who put up the most bales that year. Anyone who knows what it takes to put up hay, would not be so arrogant when buying, I'd tell these people they need to come out and help cut, rake, bale and fix the equipment, + load/unload etc., might give em an education and less time to think about that marginal amount of extra moisture, sounds like they be a bit paranoid, tell em to cut back on the wacky tobacky LOL !!! Next thing they'll be asking aboyut the calibration records for that meter ! I realize there is an element of pompous asses that reside in the horse industry, but there also many who are just as realistic and down to earth as farmers are.

One of the local guys comes by throughout the year, brings half a dozen bales of whatever he has for sale, if we like it, ( which is usually the case) no charge for those, if not, whatever the going rate is, he's always got good hay, and he will deliver and stack, of course we help etc. There are others we have to be careful with, have found garbage and dangerous items in the bales, sounds like these people are reading way to far into these things, and that moisture meter is a tool to measure, that's it, matter of opinion after that.

 

[Dave_Id]

I had one neighbor who hauled his hay 200 miles, be lived just down the road from my hay. He claimed my hay was too close to the road, and was too dusty. He said once he got some hay from someone that had dirt in it. (Probably lots of ground squirrels). Anyway, he has his pasture right along side the road, and his horses are eating nothing but hawkweed, but wouldn't buy my clover, timothy hay for winter.. Don't figure. Retired Navy guy. We had another retired guy who must have pushed pencils in the Navy. He borrowed a ratchet and socket once, came back a little later and said it would just click. He didn't know how to operated the ratchet wrench.

 

[Walt Davies]

Billy nice that some of you have some of that Horse Sense. We went out this morning but it was still 24 with the due on it so we are going to wait till afternoon rain isn't supposed to come in till Sunday morning that should help some. Its hard to bale perfect hay in this kind of weather out here in Oregon. We just do what we can between storms and hope.
The moisture meter has a self calibration button on it.
I think what we need is good prgram for teaching about hay mowing and storage for these people so they don't get all their info from those city folks on the news who wouldn't know a bale of gras hay from alfalfa.

Walt

 

[Walt Davies]

Hey! don't be a picken on us old Navy guys.
Walt PS Jar-Heads are fair game though.

 

[Anonymous-0]

Reading about the picky horse people here...and getting some of the other side from my Dalmatian board, leaves me pondering the economics of building greenhouses to raise horse hay in

 

[Anonymous-0]

It's funny, because ironically, my fathers better half works for one of "those" kind of owners, although she is actually very nice and down to earth, the hay in their barns is museum quality !!! ( if that is a way to put it ) It's like night and day when going between our place and theirs, (we're kind of connected), their barns are kind of high end, nice living quarters, offices and other nicely finished rooms, whereas ours never seems to be short on cobwebs and things that need to be done when thar ain't no money to do em LOL !

Well, it is not that bad, but the contrast between what was commonplace for a stable like ours, and what some of the luxurious stables wealth has built is amazing.

I think some, but not all of the later generations of horse people may have lost touch with the reality of things, there is not one person my fathers age or generation in that business who did not know what hard work was around a barn, including baling hay, some of these people have too much money and not enough common sense, yet they certainly did fine before there were moisture meters and nutrient analysis !

 

[Anonymous-0]

If he is paying me to bale it, I would recomend waiting but if he isists then I'd bale it. I was baling for a lady horse owner who was paying by the bale and she kept asking me to make the bales lighter and lighter so they would be easy to lift. What could I do? She was the customers so I kept loosening the springs until she was happy with the weight.;-) Shecan bales.

 

[Dave_Id]

While in the Air Force, we always considered the Navy machinists to have the best training though.

 

[Anonymous-0]

Hi , My wife and I are horse owners and I put up the best hay I can for them . We don't have enough land to make enough hay so we have to buy extra most years . I know it's true that moldy or dusty hay will effect the respiritory systems of horses as well as people . Last year we bought a round bale to supplement what I made . It was nothing but black mold inside ( we weren't home to look at it when it was delivered by a friend of ours ) . We couldn't feed it so I had to tear it apart and load it on the rack with pichforks and unload it by hand at the end of the field were I could burn it . The next day I was so sick and had a headache and stuffy nose and a cough , I felt like crap . It wore off in a day or so and no it wasn't a normal cold . My point is - us horse people do the best we can for an animal in captivity that relies solely on us for their health and well being - no different than a hog farmer or meat/dairy farmer/rancher does . I agree some horse sense is needed but sometimes a little knowledge can be a terrible thing All that being said , my wife feeds slightly moldy hay to the horses if absolutely necessary but she washes it down with the garden hose first to get the dust off so they don't breath the spores in . We've never had a health problem with the horses here by doing that . ...Randy

 

[Davis In SC]

I wonder how those horse folks react to the bales with a snake baled in them ??

 

[1941 farmall a boy]

We have horses and I work for a race horse farm down the road some times. Now you tell me woud you wanna feed just a lil moldey to a 80,000 doller horse. Just a lil mold can really be bad for them. I woud not want to risk it at all. Now I have a horse if you do put out a lil moldey hay he wont eat it he just eats the good stuff. He is 30 years old my friend down the road gave him to me sence he did not have any money to pay me. His mom has a trail rideing place and thay have 500 horses and no moldey hay. But the lady I help only get a truck load at a time and if people put it up right it wont burn down the barn. So I can see where your comeing from im sure its a pain in the tail when thay do get that bad.

 

[Mike (WA)]

I guess it gets down to you making a choice as to whether you want to make decent money putting up small bales the way they need to be for horses (dry), or slap-dash some round bales together and try to sell them for half as much to the cow folks. Fact is, horses are much more sensitive to mold and mustiness than cows, and that's just a fact of nature. Nothing anyone can do about it. As for checking for mold after I've got it home- sure, there will be some "green slugs" that mold, from where the mower got clogged or rake dragged it into a pile, etc.- and I don't mind those. But I sure don't want hay that is baled too green, and every bale is musty. Then, I've just wasted my money and I'll be real unhappy. It sounds like you know how to make hay, and of course, you needn't listen to any buyer who tries to tell you differently. But a lot of it is in how you approach it. Don't make fun of your customers, and how little they know. Not one person in a hundred really knows how a car operates (mechanically) anymore, but you won't find a car salesman belittling his customers for that. I've put up hay all my life, and was pretty good at it- but now, my day job doesn't allow me the time, so we have to buy. I sure see a lot of difference in approaches to "salesmanship", and I tend to walk away from the guys who insist on letting me know how much smarter they are than I am. Even if they're not.