How to Analyze Your Horse’s Hay

Analyzing your horse’s forage is one of the smartest things you can do to improve their nutrition and add or avoid adding supplements. Here’s a reliable, step-by-step breakdown.

Why Analyze Hay? Even if it “looks nice”

Horses are designed to live on forage. Hay and pasture should make up the bulk of your horse’s diet — not the bagged feed, not the supplement du jour. And yet, most owners are feeding forage without having a single clue what’s actually in it.

Sure, you might know if it smells sweet or feels soft. Maybe it’s green. Maybe it’s stemmy. But here’s the cold, hard truth: a visual inspection tells you nothing about crude protein, non-structural carbohydrates, digestible energy, or mineral content. If you want to feed with intention, you need data.

A forage analysis gives you a nutritional roadmap. It tells you exactly how much protein, fiber, sugar, and minerals are in that hay stack you’ve been blindly feeding all winter. This matters — especially if you’re managing a metabolic horse, a hard keeper, or just want to avoid throwing money at supplements your horse doesn’t need.

✅ What Hay Analysis Helps You Do:

• Balance the diet with precision – Match actual forage values to vitamin-mineral needs
• Prevent over- or under-supplementation – Avoid deficiencies (like copper or selenium) and toxicities (like iron or selenium)
• Choose the right feed or ration balancer – Only supplement what’s missing, not what’s already present
• Support metabolic, laminitic, or insulin-resistant horses – Select low-NSC forage based on real data, not appearance

Without analysis, you risk overfeeding what your horse already has—or missing what they urgently need.

Choose the Right Lab and Package

Not all forage labs are created equal — and most are calibrated for dairy cows, not horses. If you want results you can actually use to build a smart equine diet, you need a lab that understands equine nutrition.

🧪 Best Lab for Horse Owners: Equi-Analytical (by Dairy One)

This lab offers horse-specific testing packages and reports nutrients in equine-relevant units. It’s the gold standard for equine forage analysis in North America.

Recommended test:
Trainer Package #603
This package uses wet chemistry for protein, fiber, and carbohydrate values (more accurate), and NIR (Near Infrared Reflectance) for minerals (cost-saving but still reliable).

💡 Why this combo works:

• Wet chemistry is more precise — essential for sugar, starch, and protein levels.
• NIR keeps cost down for minerals without major tradeoffs in accuracy.

🤔 Wet Chemistry vs. NIR: What’s the Difference?

These are the two main methods labs use to analyze hay — and knowing which one you’re getting matters.

What Your Test Should Include

Make sure the package includes values for:

Optional but helpful: Sulfur, Manganese, Potassium.

📦 Shipping Tips

• Send your labeled sample in a quart-sized Ziploc or lab sample bag.
• Ship it within 24 hours if possible.
• Avoid heat! Don’t leave it sitting in your car.
• Use a flat-rate 2-day envelope (USPS works well).

Once you get your results, you’ll finally be equipped to make data-driven decisions — not guesswork.

👉 Ready to interpret the numbers? Click here to decode your hay test like a pro →

Step 1: Take a Proper, Representative Sample

This step is non-negotiable. If you don’t sample correctly, your test results are garbage — and you might as well skip the whole thing.

Define a Single “Lot”

Only sample hay that came from the same field, same cutting, and same year. Don’t mix bales from:

• Different cuttings (e.g., 1st and 2nd)
• Different suppliers
• Different harvest years

Even if it looks the same, it won’t test the same.

Use a Hay Probe — Not Your Hands

A proper forage probe is essential. This stainless steel coring tool attaches to a drill and lets you collect a clean cross-section from each bale.

You can:

• Borrow one from your county extension office (free!)
• Ask your feed rep to sample for you
• Buy your own online (Penn State probes are excellent)

Avoid handheld grab samples. They’re worthless.

Core at Least 10 to 20 Bales

Stand at the short side of each bale and insert the probe straight in, perpendicular to the flakes. Go 12–24 inches deep. Sample randomly — don’t cherry-pick the best-looking bales. Walk around the stack and get a good mix from top, middle, and bottom.

After coring, combine all your samples into one clean plastic bag and mix thoroughly. Then transfer about one pound into a labeled, quart-sized ziplock bag. Be sure to include:

• Forage type (e.g., orchard/alfalfa mix)
• Cutting (e.g., 2nd)
• Field or grower name
• Date you sampled

You now have a sample worth testing.

Step: 2 Mix and Bag Your Sample

1. Collect the core samples in a large plastic bag (e.g., grocery bag or gallon Ziploc).
2. Mix thoroughly for 2–3 minutes. The finer the hay is chopped, the more evenly nutrients are distributed.
3. From this mixture, grab a handful (cupped palm up to capture fine particles) and fill a quart-sized Ziploc or lab-provided sample bag.
4. Label your bag with:
   • Type of forage (e.g., Alfalfa, Mixed Grass)
   • Cutting (e.g., 1st, 2nd)
   • Grower or field ID (optional but helpful)
   • Date sampled

Never mix bales from different fields or cuttings in one sample. The goal is precision.

Once your sample is labeled and sealed, ship it promptly (preferably within 24 hours). Avoid heat exposure during transport — don’t leave it in your car!

Flat-rate 2-day envelopes from USPS work great. That’s it — you’re ready to get actual answers, not guesses, about what your horse is eating.

👉 Next up: How to Interpret Your Hay Analysis Results (Without a PhD in Forage Science)

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