Round bales can be a recipe for respiratory problems. Slow feed netting helps prevent horses tunnelling into the hay, but sometimes it’s not enough.
How to rinse hay and hardly get your hands wet
No matter what you call it (COPD, ROA, allergies, equine asthma or heaves), breathing problems can be improved or prevented by reducing exposure to airborne particles that irritate the lungs. Probably the most popular way to do this is soaking hay.
Tumble Feeder created a more convenient simple solution to one of the more common and costly challenges horse people face today.
Wetting hay is a nasty chore no one wants to deal with on a daily basis.
Gallons of dirty waste water after just under 2 hours of soaking 2 flakes of hay.
It’s messy, soppy, heavy and if you live in a cold climate freezing is an issue as well. Bacterial growth in the soaking water beyond 2 hours can also be a problem.
Hay steamers are expensive and only do small quantities at once. It can even be hard to find a place to board your horse with breathing issues, because no one wants the extra work. Consistency is the key and one missed day can cause a costly stressful flare up.
Many would rather pay to treat respiratory issues than prevent them. This strategy can actually be more damaging. Opening airways with medications and NOT reducing irritants, allows them to go even deeper to the lower airways. As Dr. Rose Nolan-Walston is quoted this this article http://www.thehorse.com/articles/35175/a-fresh-look-at-heaves
Treating a horse with breathing issues is far more expensive than preventing them.
“(Clenbuterol) is only a band-aid. You can use it when the horse is in trouble—having a heaves attack—to immediately give him relief for a few days. But it does not solve the problem.” – Dr. Rose Nolan-Walston
Time, money and water saving solution
What if managing your horses’ sensitivities only took a couple extra minutes ONCE a day?
Also it didn’t make a mess in the stall and wasn’t so heavy, but was easy to move?
Plus you could be free of yucky tubs of dirty wasted water to dump.
Unique flow through design creates a double hay wetting system for 1 or 2 bales at ONCE!
Tumble Feeder makes it EASIER for you and HEALTHIER for your horse.
Tumble Feeder is a multipurpose hay management tool. Our 1 bale (stall) model allows you to rinse enough hay for overnight in the stall and roll the rest out for the day. The light airy design allows air to circulate and the damp hay is less likely to get musty.
You can also use the 2 bale multi-horse model to rinse hay for multiple horses for the day outside. If you have 4 horses they would get about a half bale each. Refill, rinse and roll for overnight if your horses are out 24/7. Or you could fill 2 feeders once a day. When wetting hay, it’s probably best not to put out more hay than can be eaten in a 24 hour period.
Do you take a bath or a quick shower?
You can quickly rinse and reduce most airborne allergens from hay in less time than you can shave in the shower. Okay, maybe not the men, but the women for sure. I’m not talking about “spritzing” or misting here though. A thorough rinse is required, even on what seems like dust free hay. Think about getting soap out of your hair with a water saving shower head. How frustrating! You need nice free flowing water or you can pour from a bucket.
The dustier your hay or the more sensitive your horse, the more time you should spend. Common sense should prevail. It’s easy to reach into the feeder to check that you’ve done a good job and the hay is saturated after a minute or two.
The patent pending unique design of the Tumble Feeder allows effective water flow through the hay. This is faster than filling a tub and letting the hay soak. Lots of people soak hay over night, which leaches out nutrition value from the hay. This is really only needed if you are needing to reduce your horse’s weight or sugars. If you do need to soak, Tumble Feeder has something in the works for you as well.
So is soaking better than rinsing?
You decide, but if you don’t soak consistently, because it’s too inconvenient, then knowing better, isn’t always doing better. Tumble Feeder makes it reasonable for you to do the right thing and get the results you want. Managing breathing issues involves more than just wetting hay, but every bit can help you and your horse breathe a little easier.