anyone fed barley rings? for weight gain?

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MrVelvet

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Right I'm on with changing diets from a high sugar one - was going to do fast fibre and grass nuts or an unmollased chop but I need more calories (recovering from grass sickness so still a bit skinny!). Has anyone fed barley rings? Ill be putting them with fast fibre and pink powder.

:)
 
yes, I did, about 2 months ago. Almost immediately one of my mares developed a massive inflammatory reaction leading to an auto-immune skin disease. The ONLY thing that changed in her management was the barley rings. She is still undergoing tests etc to find a good management situation for this condition. None of the other horses had it, but in my view if it causes just one in lord knows how many (I have since heard of other horses have allergic responses to Barley/Barley rings), it is too many. There will obviously be those who give it with no problems whatsoever...but I will never use it again.

I have given D&H build up cubes or mix for weight gain, plus a small amount of Baileys Outshine and it has worked brilliantly on the two really big boys.

Edited to add I definitely wouldn't go near it if the horse already has a lowered resistance due to illness.
 
I am sure there is a better option than Barley Rings (I don't know what as I have a very good doer) but I do know that a woman on my last yard used to feed her veteran mare these to put on weight. She would leave the poor thing in a turnout for weeks and then one day it would come off - ribs and pelvis would appear and she would stuff her full of barley rings for a while. It did work. Felt sorry for the poor old thing though :(
 
Yes with good results and they have added linseed in which helps too. Those with soaked grass nuts (Graze On are the best I've found) should help a lot and why not use brewers yeast instead of PP? It's the base for PP anyway and is very good for digestion, skin and coat condition and it is full of B12 so does exactly the same job at a fraction of the price of PP. Some horses like them dry but I found best results from them being soaked and the whole feed needs to be easily digested for one like yours I would imagine.
 
I tried! My skinny beastie picked them all out (I counted them in!) and left them in his bucket.

He is now putting on weight with decent grass, copra and linseed.
 
Maesfen - thankyou :-) a few people have said about brewers yeast. My concern is that pink powder also has vits in and I started feeding the powder because he was eating bark off trees (and so lacking in something?) So would the brewers yeast have everything in it?

Hbm - sorry to hear about your mare. I have never heard that before but I hope you find a solution first - thanks for sharing
 
MrVelvet said:
Maesfen - thankyou :-) a few people have said about brewers yeast. My concern is that pink powder also has vits in and I started feeding the powder because he was eating bark off trees (and so lacking in something?) So would the brewers yeast have everything in it?

Hbm - sorry to hear about your mare. I have never heard that before but I hope you find a solution first - thanks for sharing
Click to expand...

Here's the gen for both of them. I apologise, BY doesn't have B12 in it (that's Kossolian) but it does have other Bs there.
http://www.nettex-supplies.co.uk/why_brewers_yeast_for_horses_equine_35.html
http://www.admani.com/horse/Equine Library/Horse Supplementing Horse diets with Yeast.htm

Check out each tab in this description http://www.naf-equine.eu/uk/products/productDetail.jsp?detail_id=in-the-pink-powder


It sounds HBM1 that your mare has a barley intolerance, many do but if it suits them it can be a very good feed too.

PS: if you soak the barley rings then mix in well with the feed there'll be nothing to pick out as it crumbles when dampened, they can only be picked out if fed dry. I've honestly never had any horse that doesn't wolf them right down and if I have some in my pocket they go mad for them.
 
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I find that my lot are all happy on them and PP. I use them fed soaked for my oldies and the shy drinker, some of the others just get them chucked in dry, everyone likes them.
 
Barley Rings are essentially barley and linseed and barley is very starchy so wouldn't be my first choice.

I would add the linseed part as Micronised linseed.

I might go for unmolassed sugarbeet as the base rather than a chop or fast fibre (
unmolassed sugarbeet and straw chops are the main ingredients) as it is higher in calories but still low in sugar.


If you need extra later on then consider oats or copra but I would start with the basics.

Brewers Yeast is a key ingredient of pink powder but there are other things in Pink Powder so if you switched to brewers yeast (or yeasacc or other probiotic) you might want to add a multivit.
 
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