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I have feed 1000# round bales for about a decade now.  My horses live in pastures with run in sheds that are 12 x 24 and I put the round bales in the sheds to keep them out of the weather.  I have 3-4 horses in each paddock and a bale lasts my mares 12-14 days.  My sisters geldings go through a bale in under a week.  I don't know what you are paying in Texas but in New Jersey for nice dry bales I am paying about $60.  What they waste becomes bedding for the shed.  I clean the sheds out in the spring.  I am very particular about how the bales are made.  The guy that makes my hay knows it needs to be dry and never rained on.  It is great to put out hay every week or two and then with a tractor.  I have heated 100 gallon stock tanks in each paddock also so my horses always have hay and water.  I would never want to deal with small bales on a daily basis again!

 

Sandy Terp

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From: Amber Roberts <Amber@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: ridecamp@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Sent: Thursday, December 25, 2008 5:31:42 PM
Subject: [RC] Feeding round bales

We live in Texas and have always fed small square bales of Coastal Bermuda.  We have the opportunity from one of our boarders to start feeding round bales but we have no knowledge about how to do this.  The square bales have always been stored inside our barn, but round bales would have to be outside, in the weather.  Do they have to be stored up off the ground?  If so, how?  To feed hay this way, do the round bales have to be inside feeders?  We have 5 horses.  Do we need more than one feeder?  When a bale gets eaten down enough to be replaced, do you have to move the feeder?  Do you have to clean up left over hay on the ground?  We don't know if we'd be better off sticking with square bales or trying round bales.  It would save us some work at feeding but perhaps the cleanup would negate that advantage?  Any thoughts would be appreciated.

 

Amber