For your little horses, especially, there are many things you can feed to substitute or stretch hay, if you have the money, because most cost more than baled hay. There are commercial bagged hay stretchers (pelleted forage), beet pulp, alfalfa cubes, alfalfa pellets, many companies now make mixed hay pellets (timothy/alfalfa is the usual mix, but also Bermuda/alfalfa, oat/alfalfa and a few others I can't think of, since I can't get them remotely local), complete feeds (such as senior or adult), you can get chopped forage in a bag (alfalfa is the norm, but this also now comes in a mix). [Many of these things can be fed to other livestock, but it's not cost efficient because of how much needs to be fed to larger livestock.] If it comes down to it, if you need it, I can sure try to help you come up with a feed program with reduced hay and using other hay substitutes or stretchers. [Some stretchers take a little more work than just feeding hay, such as beet pulp which has to be soaked. And, most hay cubes should be soaked, at least any available around here as they are big and rock hard; some brands are softer.]
Luckily, this year, we are getting decent rain, so the crop is there if we can cut and bale it without too much rain on it.
