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Posted: Fri Mar 05, 2010 8:04 pm
by Roger Goy
Our first winter with Dexters, they are in a straw yard with a shelter. Having fed them hay plus mineral bucket all winter, they have thrived but we can only now access haylage. Started them on it this week and they love it, but we're told this could be risky for pregnant cows - something about making their stomachs too acid? Do I need to alternate haylage with eg straw?
Roger
Posted: Fri Mar 05, 2010 9:24 pm
by domsmith
There are other wiser people on this link, but i would say rubbish.
firstly if you cant get any hay, that answers your question they will have to have haylage.
we swapped a couple of years back, half way through winter, from hay to silage no problems. i didnt even think of it. i would think there is a ph difference.
with winter forage in short supply you have to take what you can get.
i might be shot down in flames here :p
dom
Posted: Fri Mar 05, 2010 9:34 pm
by Duncan MacIntyre
I have had to switch from hay to silage this winter, having bought 6 dexters after I had bought my hay. What worries me most is that feeding small bale hay to outside groups which have a bit of roughage to eat is reasonably easy to control, but putting a large round bale in a feeder is not very controlled, and I am a bit worried they will get too much feed in the last month or two of gestation. A group of 12 of mixed ages ate the first big bale in a week but ate the second one in four or five days.
Any change being made should be gradual, but not always easy. At least outside animals have some constant forage to ease the change.
Duncan
Posted: Fri Mar 05, 2010 11:37 pm
by Broomcroft
Haylage can be anything from low feed value which you will not have any problems with and may even need to supplement, through to extremely rich forage often containing a lot of clover and 15% protein which I would never feed to a pregnant cow for long.
We feed almost nothing but haylage, but our cows get the worst, finishers get the best. This year though, all are getting the same because it's all rubbish due to the weather last summer 
....did I say summer?
If it looks like really good stuff, or you have test results telling you it is, then I would be careful with it, let them run out every day if you can, or get some hay or put some straw in for them to eat before giving them the haylage. But as I say, that's only if it is really good stuff.
Edited By Broomcroft on 1267828718
Posted: Sat Mar 06, 2010 6:43 pm
by davidw
I've been feeding our crew with haylage from two sources, our own which is pretty rough and some I bought in which is much better. I've also been bedding down with some fairly rough wheat straw and more recently with some much better - I thought - barley straw.
They love to eat the wheat straw, rougher the better. The decent haylage is ok, and the rough stuff acceptable - especially with a little molasses poured on it. As for the barley straw, they use it as bedding, which is what was intended after all.
Do Dexters ever do the obvious thing?
Posted: Sun Mar 07, 2010 9:26 am
by Broomcroft
PS. When deciding what to feed your pregnant cows I would look at their condition. If they look a bit under condition, then I feed them the best we have. We have two cows at the moment who aren't coping with pregnancy as well as the others, and their spines are showing too much, so they are getting haylage plus a kilo of mixed nuts, rolled barley and molasses each day.
Edited By Broomcroft on 1267950457