a bit a guidance please.... feed

[izzabella]

i have a 580kg sport horse who is a good does. ive had her for 3 months and want to check that im feeding her right.

she hasnt lost any weight since i got her which is a good sign as she was in perfect heath.

she had alot of grass in her field. a good half a foot in all of the one acre shes got to herself.

i also give her 2 handfuls of pasture mix every mornin.

is this enough. should she be getting any supliments?
do i need to increase this as it gets colder?

 

[sally2]

As long as she does not have a back end like an apple and a big gutter above her tail she should be ok but you will need to learn how to condition score, you can find good info and explanations on line regards this which will explain it better than i can. At this time of year my horses only get supplements for their joints and i am still not convinced they do any good anyway, but others swear by them it depends on how much work they are in. The people that get the most out of supplements are the feed producers and no doubt this years cereal shortage will give them a great excuse to put prices up again.

 

[izzabella]

i learnt how to condition score. and she a 2.5.

she doesnt have an apple bum or a big neck or anything. i can only just feel her ribs but she hasnt got a very big belly. i just wondered if i should up her feed as it gets colder as i dont want to to loose weight to quickly

 

[TGM]

As the grass starts to stop growing, you should start feeding hay or haylage to make up for this. Condition score 2.5 is the minimum vets advise to be a healthy weight, so you need to keep a close eye to ensure she doesn't drop below that. The couple of handfuls of pasture mix you give her won't actually contribute much to her diet at the moment, but as she is on plenty of grass at the moment most of her vitamins and minerals will be supplied by that anyway.

As you go into the winter and she relies more on hay or haylage than grass, then it might be necessary to supplement her for vitamins and minerals - although that does depend on the quality of the hay or haylage. As a general rule, haylage tends to retain more vitamins and minerals than hay. You might want to give her a general vit/min supplement (such as Equivite, Benevit etc) in a handful of chaff. If she is dropping weight then you need to ensure she has as much hay/haylage as she can possibly eat. If she still needs more after that, then start adding some high calorie fibre foods such as unmollassed beet (eg Speedibeet), Alfa A Oil, Readigrass etc.

It is a good idea to measure her with a weigh tape once a week to get an accurate idea of whether she is losing, gaining or maintaining weight.