So I'm in the process of researching feeds that are high energy (without being "empty" calories), and compact/light. It's sooooooo confusing though!! I have a hard enough time with human nutrition, and I swear horses are more confusing (or maybe I just care more)
We have a string of around 22 horses who are used for packing and riding in the bush for 3-4 months at a time. For this period of time they are free-ranged at night and so feed almost completely on wild grasses, shrubs, whatever. Later in the season when grass is harder to find or frost killed, we have fed alfalfa cubes.
This is supplemented with 1x daily feedings of oats. I don't have a clue how much in weight as it is just free-poured... maybe an icecream pail full or 2 each. Most of the horses do fine on this, but by the end of a hard season inevitably some of the horses are thin.
I know oats aren't ideal, and realize that sweet-feed is pretty much junkfood for horses.
So, I'd like to find something that will provide the most good energy per amount. Weight/bulk needs to be kept down as all feed is transported in either on packhorses or in small bush planes.
Cost IS an issue. I can convince the owner of the company to spend more than he does on oats... but only to an extent.
One last thing - we live in a remote area with a small horse community. I'd have to see what feeds the feedstore will carry or order in, but it's likely to be limited brands.
I know there are some very knowledgeable people on here, so, any suggestions?
So you need a high fat feed. What would be available to you?
Look for a fat content of 6% or higher, and feed this instead of oats, little less than the oat portion to horses n normal weight, and more for the one's who need it. If you can't monitor the feeding and "fat" horses chase skinny horses away, you will need two different feeds, normal for normal horses and high fat for skinnies.
I would look into what local feed mills you have around you. Look or ask for a "range cube". It's the size of a horse cookie (1/2 to 5/8 inch in diameter) that you just shake on the ground. You don't waste anything because they can pick it all up unlike oats where a good portion gets left on the ground. They are more common with cattle and wildlife (like reindeer, elk... raised for human consumption) but if they will can make them, they can make it to your specification for horses. I would do a high fat content to increase the caloric content (the same weight of fat will contain about 3X more calories than oats). It will also take up less volume making transport more efficient. Who mills your alfalfa cubes? Have them add some soy, oil and a vitamin/mineral supplement to make it into a complete feed. Than you are only responsible for one feed item so you get a better price. A pound is a pound. Don't get hung up on the light part. You want calorie dense.
unfortunately, we have no mills nearby. I'm located wayyyyy up north - the feed we have available is all bagged and shipped in. I'll look into brands, and will look into range cubes for sure. the 6%+ fat tip is exactly what I was looking for... that way I can at least begin to search!
Something like their Ranch Hand 15. It must be for horses. Cattle cubes have a bunch of stuff that shouldn't be fed to horses or can be toxic to them.
I'm happy to help you run some #s to show how it can same you money feeding something more complete and energy dense than the oats even if they appear to be more costly. You are in fact paying less per calorie by both feeding less product but more importantly transporting less.
Most any mill that can do the extruded feeds can make you your blend. Basically what you need is a 5/8 inch senior feed. You want a complete feed than you can skip the alfalfa cubes. Run your numbers. How much feed do you feed over the season. Do you buy it all upfront or do you buy and ship as you go. Most feed mills require 1 ton minimums (which is probably a drop in the bucket for you) to start but you will get your best price in volume.
but back to the same thing... if we were to buy from a mill, we'd be looking at transporting from Alberta or at the VERY closest, British Columbia, which is still 15 hours away.
... that said, my dad does need to bring his truck back up from Alberta this spring, so it could be an option.
could I contact a mill (honestly had never even heard of them before), show them that Ranch Hand 15, and ask for something similar?
per calorie, how much more do you think we would be saving? (or gaining I suppose regarding energy/calories)
and a really dumb question.. what is an "extruded feed"? is 5/8inch the size of the feed once it's been milled or what?
There are a few common ways feeds are processed- most people are familiar with textured (think your traditional sweet feed) and pelleted. Extruded is less common in horse feed, but is very common in cat & dog food (and extruded horse feed looks a lot like extruded pet food). There are some differences in how the ingredients are 'cooked'- IIRC extruded uses very high temperatures for short time periods.
You should start with whomever you buy your alfalfa cubes from. Are you buying them locally or are they being trucked up to you by the pallet? If you have a "local" feed store, who are they buying from? Get their name and # and call them up (even the smallest mills typically have a nutritionist). Explain your situation and see what they can come up with. I'm sure your dilemma is not unique up there. Throw out extruded as it's a more sophisticated milling process and stick with pelleted. Only the largest mills can make extruded feed. Pellets will also be cheaper. The pellets can range from rabbit chow size up to horse cookie size. The larger they can be made, the less waste you will have because less is left on the ground. If you think better metric, you want a pellet with a diameter of 15-20mm.
Let's just say you feed 3/4 alfalfa cubes and 1/4 oats.
If you fed 300# alfalfa cubes, that would provide 300Mcals. (1# of alfalfa has approximately 1000kcal or 1 Mcal).
100# of oats would provide 130Mcals. (1# of oats has approximately 1.3Mcals).
300# of alfalfa cubes + 100# oats will provide 430 Mcals.
A typical Senior feed has about 1.5 Mcals/#. To get those same 430Mcals, you would need to feed 287# of senior.
From a transportation stance, that's a savings of 123#. Now that's not the whole picture as I would not totally eliminate the cubes from the diet as you want some type of long stem forage for them to chew on and help with digestion but you can see where I'm going.
Can the mill that makes the cubes add oil to the binding agent? Adding 5% oil will increase the caloric value to 1.15Mcal/#. It's not going to increase the volume you transport but now you've managed to add a few more calories. A small mill is not going to want to lose your business and if you're talking 10+T of product it's so worth their while to work with you. What's a batch size for them? That will probably be what they want to make in a run.
You should start with whomever
Can the mill that makes the cubes add oil to the binding agent? Adding 5% oil will increase the caloric value to 1.15Mcal/#. It's not going to increase the volume you transport but now you've managed to add a few more calories. A small mill is not going to want to lose your business and if you're talking 10+T of product it's so worth their while to work with you. What's a batch size for them? That will probably be what they want to make in a run.
Ok I wrote this out and understand it a bit more (I'm terrible with math), however I'm confused with one thing - you say adding 5% oil will increase the caloric value to 1.15Mcal per pound.... are you saying that if you added 5% oil to ALFALFA cubes it would be increased to 1.15, or if you added oil to oats?
... because you say that a "typical" senior feed is ~1.5Mcal already.
Orrrrr are you saying that adding 5% oil to a senior feed will ADD 1.15Mcal per pound?
If you are buying in bulk it might be worth talking directly to one of the bigger companies and see if you can cut out the middle man and buy direct
One of the benefits of buying a complete pelleted feed is that its all balanced and you dont have to worry about the risks of feeding too much of one thing causing issues if its not proportional to something else you're feeding
Another thought - Sugar beet shreds dont weigh much and they are a good source of safe energy, calcium and good for keeping weight on. You could add rice bran to that for some extra oils and either some chop to slow them down when they eat or some haystretcher pellets and maybe some oats to anything that needs a bit extra pop
Some mills might also call the range cube cattle cake. Don't mince words about what you need and let them talk you into feeding the cubes that are milled for cattle. A horse can't digest the main protein source, cottonseed meal, they are often medicated and they are too high in protein.
Back to your original quest, you really don't need to up the protein if you are feeding either alfalfa cubes or a complete feed that is alfalfa based. You are feeding around 10% protein and a mature, working horse only require around 8%.
Purina Amplify is a supplement not a feed but maybe it can be added in??? It consist of.............
CRUDE PROTEIN MIN 14.00 %
CRUDE FAT MAX 30.00 %
CRUDE FIBER MIN 5.00 %
CALCIUM (CA) MIN 2.00 %
CALCIUM (CA) MAX 2.10 %
PHOSPHORUS MIN 0.60 %
COPPER (CU) MIN 55 PPM
SELENIUM (SE) MIN 1.40 PPM
ZINC (ZN) MIN 225 PPM
VITAMIN A MIN 16000 IU/LB
VITAMIN E MIN 150 IU/LB
I think the oil is still your best bet.
2 1/2 gallons would be enough for all the horses for one day versus a pelleted feed or something that if you're feeding around 2 cups (which is half the recommended daily for most of them) that's 44 cups a day which is over 3 gallons and you're getting fewer calories. Go with the full recommended daily 4 cups and then you're at over 6 gallons per day. As opposed to feeding 2/5 of a cup of oil to each horse a day and that's only 2.5 gallons per day. And if they only need 1/4 of a cup per day, the one jug will last you almost 2 days.
Heheheheh, that is what I was thinking. Same with the cool calories. I think they would avoid eating it if they could. At least oil you can put on hay or alfalfa and it will soak in and they will eat it. Hummmmmmmm, did you look at the amplify? That is the highest fat supplement that I have found.
From what you say the problems I could see with oil is that it would be really hard to get it evenly distributed unless you mixed each feed individually as when you pour it on to dry feed its going to absorb and 'clump' really fast so chances are high that some would get more than others if you tried to mix it into one large bulk feed to split up between them all later on which is what some big yards do
Since you feed off the ground any dust and fine grit is likely to attach to the oily feed more than it would to dry feed
If it was mixed too far in advance - even several days in hot weather exposed to the air oil tends to go rancid
If you can get around these things then it could be ideal
dang lady, you're good! little things that I wouldn't have thought of...
I wonder if it would be a bad idea to just go with a senior feed, in place of the oats. So they'd be free to graze all night, and in the morning instead of oats would get seniors feed instead. Later in the season we'd start 'em on the alfalfa cubes and continue with senior feed in place of oats.
Just a thought. I'm still going to find out where exactly the feed store up here gets their stuff from and see about having something custom made... at least price it out
You're going to have a hard time competing pricewise with oats if you buy them right out of the field. With a big name senior feed, you are paying for a lot of slick ads and extensive research. You should get a price break on anything you buy by the pallet (typically one ton). I'd pursue a locally milled product first. It will save on transportation and all the other nonsense. How many tons of each product are you using? That will give you an idea of how many Mcals you need for the season and when you need it. How much product can you transport at any given time? Oats are going to be the most bulky feed but is it a set weight, volume or a combination of the 2? You might be able to feed a cheaper product (oats) when it's the only thing being fed but when you need to start adding serious calories, than you need to swap them out for a pelleted feed that is less bulky and more calorie dense. I don't think oats by themselves are ideal as the horses are lacking salt, vitamins, minerals and protein (I would add it here to get back on topic). If you are buying bagged oats from a feed store, with enough product purchased at once, you can get them to add these to the oats (pellet form or it will settle on the bottom of the bag) so you are only dealing with one product.
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