A crucial factor in managing horses on pasture is to avoid sudden abrupt changes from a fed ration to pasture and from extremes of pasture quality or type. This is especially a problem when moving from a lower quality pasture to a high quality pasture. In these situations a horse may colic, founder or have other digestive tract problems. A horse does not bloat from legumes or lush pastures like a cow. Many horses, when turned on lush pastures, tend to eat too fast. Others don’t. A good procedure has been to gradually increase the exposure to lush pasture over a period of days. The protocol to follow would be:
1. Feed all the hay a horse will eat before grazing.
2. Graze on lush pasture 30 minutes morning and evening.
3. Increase grazing time to one hour morning and one hour evening the second day.
4. The third day increase grazing to two hours morning and two hours evening.
5. Day four, continue as day three and make a judgment call. A horse should reach fill time in two hours. If they continue to eat after two hours, then you may want to continue with two hours in the morning and two hours in the evening for several days.
