The old guys expect to be served first, showing proper respect for their status. Actually, they eat the slowest and have the largest quantity of feed to devour, so it is good to get them started first! Cricket's and Moe's teeth have lost much of their useful grinding surfaces due to age, so they do not chew & digest hay as efficiently as they did in their younger years. To help them maintain weight and get enough calories & nutrients, they eat a mash twice a day. They get beet pulp shreds (by-product of the sugar beet industry and an easily digested fiber source with about 40% more calories than an equivalent amount of hay) soaked to be soft & sloppy, mixed with a senior pelleted feed made specifically for older horses. Yum!
Cricket's evening meal
The horses all know when feed time is, and are usually hanging around by the gates waiting.
Tomas, with Cricket in the background
Cody & Winston
Cricket & Moe come into stalls to eat, which gives them uninterrupted eating and also keeps Killian away, so we don't have a repeat of Cricket's poor bitten nose (silly food-aggressive dog that thinks he's starving and that horse food is a great delicacy.)
Cricket leading himself to the barn
Once the old boys are in, everyone else eats in their pasture.
Tomas, with Kaos in the background
Rhio relishes his handful of "lite" horse pellets
Cody & Winston share the shelter to eat
There is much checking of everyone else's dish once the food has been inhaled, just to make sure no one missed a pellet here or there.
Rhio checking the status of Cody's dish
And then there's the shenanigans - Winston plays with his dish.
Free refills, right?
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