Advice needed- feeding an underweight 24yo cushings horse

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wormhugs

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I'm needing a bit of help please! My 24 yo cob has recently been diagnosed with cushings after developing laminitis last autumn.
He is on medication for the cushings which has made him quite picky when it comes to eating- apparently this medication is known for having appetite suppressing qualities.
He is turned out in a grazing muzzle and gets soaked hay when he comes in at night.
He is currently fed Safe and Sound (Dodson and Horrell I think!) and Badminton Complete fibre nuggets and a vitamin supplement.
He has been struggling to maintain his weight and I added Baileys Outshine as a high oil content feed and this put him off his feeds entirely. He has lost more weight this last week and I was hoping that some of you might have experience of feeding underweight laminitic/cushings horses. Would welcome any advice please!
Many thanks!
 
I can only tell of my own experience, rather that from a scientific viewpoint but I have a laminitic Cushings shetland, and a fussy 30 yr old TB who came to me underweight and very poor.

The pony went right off his food when he started his treatment - he was on Safe & Sound. He is now on Alfa A lite with a sprinkle of high fibre pony nuts and a splash of Speedibeet. He laps it up, maintains a good weight and looks good. If he does get offish I add a tablespoon of Fast Fibre or grass nut mush and this gets his interest again.

My old boy wouldn't eat any fibre, or veteran mix, or Speedibeet when he came. After trial and error he decided he loved Fast Fibre soaked into a mush with grass nuts and some Readymash, then he would eat this added to Alfa A lite, and finally with Build Up nuts and some veteran conditioning mix. He has gone from strength to strength and looks fab.

I think Fast Fibre is excellent stuff - it is laminitic safe and really does help with condition, and is easy for the oldies to eat. If your boy can't face big buckets of chaff then it is a good replacement. I think you can get sample bags from Allen and Paige direct if you call them. If he'll eat chaff then Alfa A Lite is a good one - all mine eat it, and it seems pretty inoffensive whereas the ones with added oil didn't seem so palatable to my lot. I think getting the fibre into his diet is the key - Speedibeet is laminitic safe and is high fibre.

I also feed Saracen Equijewel to my oldie as it ups his oil/fat intake without giving him a greasy feed.

Also, if you ring Dodson & Horrel for example, you could discuss their feed balancers - we use their Ultimate balancer for our oldies who won't eat big amounts and therefore won't necessarily get all the vits and mins they need. This, fed along side the correct amount of fibre, gives all the nutrients your horse needs.

Good luck with it all. x
 
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