For a quick and easy eyeball exam, the color of our hay can tell you a few
things about its condition, quality and nutritional content. First, know
your hay - is it grass or legume? If it is grass is it Timothy, Oat, Rye,
Barley, Sudan, Brome, Orchard, Johnson, Fescue? Or if it is legume hay is
it alfalfa, birds foot treifoil, vetch or one of the many clover species?
Each type of hay will have a slightly different color, smell and texture.
Grass hays:
If your bale is light gold hay, [except for oat or barley] and green
inside your hay is sun-bleached. As long as the inside hay smells fresh,
feels soft and flexible, you can feed it. You have lost some nutritional
value, but not much. If your hay is coarse and quite yellow [again unless
oat or barley] then they cut the hay too late. It is best to cut grass
hays in the "soft touch" stage. This is where the grain is inside the leaf
sheaths or just poking out of the leaf sheath. If the hay is clean and to
be used as fiber in a well-balanced diet, then go ahead and feed it; if you
plan to use it as the primary feed however, then don't use it.
But hay that has been overheated and over fermented from being baked and
stored with too high moisture content is brown. There may be a musty,
moldy odor to the inside of the hay. Brown hay will probably have mold.
This hay should go directly to the garbage. Don't feed it!! Moldy hay
can cause major healthy problems - respiratory, digestive, and
reproductive. Death is the usual end result.
Hay that is dark brown or black has been exposed to excessive moisture or
overheated and burned. Yes, hay can burn during the "sweating" period.
Don't even open the bale, get your money refunded or refuse it. In fact,
the hay dealer should not have even sold it to you!!
When buying hay, make sure you obtain as much information as you can about
its production and harvest management. Ask if there is a quality analysis
information available. If not, test it for its nutritive content before
using as feed. Examine the hay to determine it stage of maturity at
harvest. Buy native grass hays that have been harvested before July 15, to
obtain highest protein levels. Do not buy hay containing excessive weed
content or highly objectionable types of weeds [e.g. loco weed etc.]. Do
not purchase hay just based upon color, check it, twist it, smell it etc.
Never, never buy hay that is moldy or wet.
(Equus May 1998, #249 pp. 24 & Dairy Herd Management July 1998 pp. 16.)
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