HBLFA organized the 2nd Austrian horse hay project to evaluate a total of 718 horse hay feed tests since 2019.
Compared to 10 years ago, the current data showed a positive trend towards better hay quality . Nevertheless, around a third of the horse hay batches were still covered with spoilage-indicating mold , especially the hay bales in storage that were too tightly packed. In addition, around 80% of the lots examined were harvested too late. Here the crude fiber content was over 340 g/kg DM, the nutritional value of this horse hay is now very low.
In this podcast you will find out the practical results about horse hay in short form - listen or just watch:
In this podcast episode, Priv.-Doz. Dr. Andreas Steinwidder with Ing. Reinhard Resch about the most important questions about the production and evaluation of horse hay - just take a look:
Further information about horse hay
- DLG practical guide to horse feeding - link
- Book recommendation: Rating key according to Kamphues in the book Horse Feeding (Coenen and Vervuert 2020), ISBN 978-3-13-241178-4, Thieme Verlag, 482 pages.
- Rosenau feed laboratory for chemical and microbiological horse hay analyzes - Link
- Hay evaluation for horses - one-page evaluation form - Onedrivedownload
- Straw evaluation - one-page evaluation form from ÖAG - Onedrive download
- Presentation on horse hay as part of the 2024 horse conference by Reinhard Resch
