2 Questions: Mustangs...and hay

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Hillary_Indiana

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I've noticed that mustangs are cheaper than other types of horses around here. Is there a reason for this? Are they harder to train? Feistier? I've never been around one...we have QH, TWH, Spotted Saddle, Paso Fino. Just wondering what experiences you all had had with mustangs, they seem like such beautiful horses.

Also, I'm in Indiana...we've got 4 horses on about 2 acres...the weather has been pretty cold and pretty much stunted grass growth by now. I've been giving them 1 bale of hay per day. It is pretty high quality hay. In you all's opinion, should I be giving them more or less? They look great (if not a little chubby). I'd rather them be chubby in the winter though.

Also, what kind of hay should I buy for my horses? We've bought various things in the past, and I believe what we just bought is 50/50 alfalfa. I was thinking that maybe we should just be giving them grass hay, becuase I heard alfalfa gives them energy...but I don't feel that they need any more energy, it's not like we ride them through mountains or anything. We take them about once a month down to the state park and go on trails for a couple of hours, but that's pretty much it.

Just wanting opinions from you all's experience.

Thanks!!
 
The modern mustangs are very different then what people think when they picture the mustangs of the 1800s. As the army sarted disbanding the horse mounted calvery many of the TB and Morgan remount stallions were turned loose and bred with the mustangs. This resulted in some pretty good horseflesh. Also the western ranchers often turned good stallions loose and gathered the offspring for replacement ranch horses.

Today there are mustangs competing and winning in almost every area of the show world. Including the English disciplines.

That said they still carry the stigma of being "wild horses" and so people shy away from them and that holds the price down.

I have a solid black (not a white hair on him) 6 yo gelding in my pasture that if you didn't see the BLM brand you would swear was pure Morgan. The plan is to train him to a buggy and make a parade horse out of him.Z
 
4 horse and 1 square bale a day? I don't know what else you're feeding but I don't see how they could be getting the roughage they need. You realize that digesting helps keep the pony warm too. I feed coastal hay, when available, alfalfa seems to give my boys too much protien/sugar and keeps'm high strung. Now my ponies are fairly large, Scar (QH) is 15.3 and well over 1000 lbs, Wild Bill (Belgian) is 15.3 and over 1500 lbs.
I just wouldn't be comfortable feeding that little of hay to 4 horses.
 
I feed according to their weight. Usually we feed 4 flakes a day per horse, up to 6 flakes depending on their size and how much we use them. We feed alfalfa/grass mix and they stay chubby over the winter. If it's real cold, I bump it up or if we are working them, if we aren't and they are getting too fat, we cut it down. Works for me.
T.
 
Oh, and I love mustangs, we break and train, and some of the best, toughest horses I have are mustangs. We also have some that we sold, winning every show they enter. They are great all around horses if you get them young enough. We get them free around here because they run wild on the reservation.
T.
 
Horses should be 1 1/2 to 2 lbs of hay per 100 lbs of bodyweight.

2 lbs per 100 lbs bodyweight is recommended for idle horses that do not have good pasture.

A 1000 lb horse should get at least 20 lbs a day.

During the winter months, we feed free choice hay (Coastal Jiggs). Hay is important because the roughage in the gut helps keep the horse warm.

If you want to increase the amount of hay, you could feed a bale in the morning and more in the evening.
 
I figure hay at 3% of a horses body weight as a min. I bump from there depending on work and weather conditions. After all these years I don't depend on hay for any of a horses nutritional needs. If it helps fine but I've seen to much of it that looked good and was worthless.Z
 
have a mustang myself. got him as a colt (yes he's gelded now). a great sterdy horse big barreled, you give him 15 min. break and he's ready to go again. he rides english and western, barrell races for my nieces and nephew for 4-h and he loves to run. unfortunitly, when he was about 5yrs old we found out he's half blind. my niece was teaching him to junp, which he did rather well, but we noticed he was jumping with his head to one side so we took him to cornell and they said he had nerve damage to retnal and optical nerve in right eye and optical nerve damage to his left. said a hard knock on the head would have done it, but we never had anything like that happen to him while i've had him. (vet said it would have knock him out). so sometime in the wild or when he was rounded up, something must have happened to him. (i got him at 14 months, they caught him at about 8 months). he is 19 now and still does great. so long as you have a mustangs trust, they will do anything for you.
 
around here we feed the horses in the pen a block (some call it a flake i think) of hay mornin and night. we also feed them a scoop or two of sweet feed morning and night depends on the size of the horse.a scoop is equal to about a 39 ounce coffee can. we feed dry hay usually coastal. just keep in mind when feeding horses alfalfa one has to be careful there is no beatles in it.

that injury may of happened when they was catching them in the wild while penning or loading them. just my guess.
 
thats what the vet figures too. still a great horse, just have to remember he doesn't see like a normal horse. (no depth purseption)sp.
 

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