Clover....

[Debbie]

Do your ponies eat clover at all? Blossom's field has some in it along with a mix of other native grasses, but I've noticed she doesn't seem to be eating it. Its very slowly taking over in places.

Do your ponies eat the clover at all? A little? A lot??

[greydales]

My fields are full of clover and yes the horses eat it when they get the chance! There's not much I can do about it as there is so much, I assume it's not too good for horses in large doses though. However mine have been kept off lush grass this year and are the slimmest they've been at this time of year (but are still fat lol!).

[Debbie]

Hmmm.....well mine's white clover, and although Blossom will occasionally eat the wild onions in the field, she seems to be sticking her nose up at the clover.

I'm not particular one way or another, but will most likely start hand weeding it to see if I can get a bit more grass to grow instead.

[knight]

You may be lucky she doesn't eat it Debbie, as I've been warned that many horses should not have it, like laminitic, cushings (insulin resistant?) Topaz. Annie was alergic to many things, including alfalfa & I wonder is clover is not closely related as she didn't do well if she ate a good bit of it. We do try to remove it or mow alot to keep it down so sounds like you have a good plan. Our back pasture has a good bit of clover so I've got the same problem as Gill, we mostly mow and just limit Topaz time back there till it's hot & clover goes. Good luck with it. Any universities areound there that might have any native area grass seed for sale? The native grasses usually do best & aren't so over rich so maybe well suited to our ponies needs.

Edited for my usual inability to remember how to spell.

[Debbie]

That's a good idea, Nancy. I'll have to check with the University at Columbia to see if they happen to have any native grass seed for sale. We tried to purchase some from a buffalo breeder to the north of us, but he insisted that his grass seed wouldn't work. I've no idea why??

I remember coming across some implication of clover and grass sickness (in Scotland, apparently when they planted the clover, the ponies started coming down sick). I do know its a legume, so a nitrogen fixer for the ground. However, as you say, its very sweet (utilized for putting on weight for cows mostly, and I'd say for dairy cows at that), so I'm not surprised poor Anne and Topaz struggle with it.

LOL....Blossom's getting mad at me for handweeding just now! She's utterly convinced I've found 'grass' and I'm hoarding it by chucking it over the fence to haul off. I've shown her repeatedly its just weeds....dock, nettle, nasty burrs....definitely nothing edible

[The Moo]

I have also heard that it can make mares very mareish, full of phytoestrogens or something.

[shiatsudales]

It's very rich feeding and I'd be wary of having it as more than around 10% of the total sward. We have some but it stays at around this level. I know one person with clover as around half her sward and she has constant problems with her ponies putting too much weight on and getting wierd skin problems.

The buffalo man wouldn't have sold you grass seed as his 'mixture' would have been too rich for pony pasture. If you have anyone with sheep nearby that's the closest you might get to the horse mixtures we have over here if you can't get a horse specific one from anywhere. If you go to

www.farmdirectonline.co.uk/shop/21/5/

you can see the mixtures we have by clicking on the product titles. Our cattle farmers have pure ryegrass paddocks and they are WAY too rich to put the ponies on. The horse ones are based on ryegrass (but only half the seeds) and then a mixutre of timothy, fescue and other low sugar grasses, usually with some herbs added in now as well for the other half.

[knight]

This is so true Shiatsu Dales, almost all the grass mixtures sold here are too rich for ponies. That's just why I quit trying to improve our pastures when I got ponies and now the grass is mostly back to hardy native varieties that are hardy here but not all that nutirtious.

[Debbie]

I'd LOVE to find some plain ole timothy! But have given up completely...

The buffalo man sells eastern gamagrass. And he said bluntly that it only works well for rotational pastures, that it wouldn't hold up at all to horses or ponies.

Honestly, seeing how thick and tall the stuff gets, I half suspect that's what some of Blossom's field is and she only eats it after everything else.

[harveydales]

What's Eastern Gamagrass?

I suppose the sward has to depend to a large extent on the climate/environment/soil, not only the way you manage it. I'm sure the conditions over there are quite different to the heavy, Linconshire clay we're on. We did have quite a bit of white clover creeping into the heavily grazed paddock which worried my vet from the lami point of view but it seemed to retreat after I treated the paddock with calcified seaweed a couple of years ago.

[Debbie]

I may just lime the sections that have the clover then, and keep Blossom off them for a little bit.

This is what the gamagrass is like www.shepherdfarms.com/ If you click on the 'adaptability' to the left, you'll see a size comparison to a person. The stuff looks like it can take over quickly Its actually one of the native grasses for our area.

Its actually grown in clay, Pam. Much of Missouri is heavy clay. Our area is a bit odd in that its very rich soil, almost like a riverbottom soil, but we are on a high plateau. ?? I've no idea how it came about!

[harveydales]

Thanks Debbie. That's interesting. It looks to be very coarse leaved so I'm not suprised Blossom isn't that keen on eating it.

[knight]

Debbie, here's a link to ADM's forrage first feeds. If you can find a local dealer who carrys their brand (moormans) there may be something here worth trying. The forage first Hay Replacer looks interetsing. Knight & Topaz love their horse rewards treats based on the forage first principle, but Topaz should be eating their Metabolic mineral bot wont touch it. Knight kindly finished the bag for her. This is about the best I've been able to find here.

[sweetpea]

Having real problems with our paddocks this year due to clover. We moved here two years ago and the paddock looked lovely with lots of long grasses, flowers and herbs. However the ponies soon grazed it right down and it didn't regrow very well. By the end of the summer the paddock was almost bare and Sweetpea developed strange balding patches on her face and was losing mane. Vet visited and checked her out thoroughly but all tests were negative. Last summer the grass was very slow to start and once grazed down didn't regrow very much however there were obvious patches of clover and trefoil. We were told that the previous owners had resown the paddock with a goat mix which are apparently high in clover,trefoil,alfalfa and shorter on grasses as goats don't graze they browse! Both ponies were itchy and were rubbing their manes and tails when stabled and had discovered the joys of excessive mutual grooming! Things not too bad but didn't really settle over the winter like you might expect. Sweetpea also had several bouts of mild colic and both ponies looked bloated and were really windy at the end of the day.
This spring we had the paddock harrowed and oversown with a clover free mix but things are no better. The paddocks are a mass of clover,trefoil,selfheal and the grass is almost non existent as it's been too dry up until recently for the seed to germinate and the old established grasses are being pushed out by a legume invasion!! Ponies are itchy, bloated are coughing on exertion and are listless and grumpy. I'm sure the grazing is responsible but vet says it's probably sweet itch and I should buy rugs even though they have other symptoms not caused by sweet itch. Anyway ponies are off paddock and are in too sparsely covered areas with hay. Have contacted Gary Holter for advice as recommended by one of the seed companies and will wait to speak to him before I invest in boetts. It's not the cost particularly I just hate the thought of covering them up and them still being itchy because the problem is something other than midges. Didn't someone else start a thread about clover and itching at one point ?

[Debbie]

Oh dear! That sounds like the clover really isn't too good for your ponies...or rather that goat mix I find that's a big portion of the problem for grazing in the US. So much of its been planted for lactating (dairy) cattle, or those going to market for beef ~ so another high calorie need. The horses and ponies are an afterthought when it comes to grazing. Afterall, if they founder, the rancher can just buy another cheap horse at auction to replace it

Luckily the grazing problems are starting to be looked at and addressed in the US. But its still a HUGE struggle to find the right grasses to plant.

I've taken to handweeding Blossom's field, as the selective spray wasn't that effective when I tested it (on a different area of the yard) And with us heading into summer, there's no way the grass can re establish this year. I've been keeping hay in front of her, and I see more and more she's not bothering to graze. I don't know if that's simply because she's eaten the seedheads (hubby wanted the pasture to 'reseed' itself this year), and there's nothing 'good' to eat, or if she's managed to graze everything down at this point.

Whoever thought pasture grazing would be this difficult??