This winter your horse will need 1.5-2.0 pounds of hay per 100 pounds of body weight. Never feed less than a pound of hay per 100 pounds of body weight. Inventory both the quantity and quality of your current hay supply and determine your winter hay needs now. Waiting to buy hay later will make it more expensive and more difficult to find. But dry pastures may make it necessary to feed hay longer than usual.
Horses require a higher-quality hay than cattle.
Horses don't have a cud to chew. Hays for horses can be classified as high, medium, low and poor quality. Don't feed poor quality hays to horses. These hays are stemmy with few leaves and may be dusty. Also don't feed moldy hays to horses.