Bloated belly on no grass

D

DellaMoon

Well-Known Member
Joined
23 April 2009
Messages
650
Location
Cambridgeshire
Visit site
I posted a while ago about my mare and her rather large bloated belly. She had a worm count in April which came back clear but double dosed for tape worm anyway. The vet has done a physical examination and definitely no foal. She's on VERY short grazing and gets half a section of 12hr soaked hay once a day so she feels a bit more full. But, she is still massively bloated, probably more so than when she was on longer grass. Her ribs disappeared for a while but have now reappeared as the grass has dried out. I've turned her away as she's only 3 and she's done as much as I want this year. I am totally stumped. What do I do about the belly? She's now looking a bit lethargic as if she's not got enough energy. Do I feed for the ribs and lethargy or the giant tummy? And would it be worth worming again?

I'm totally at a loss and any help would be gratefully received.

Thank you
 
id feed for the ribs. and get the vet out. might be worth testing for gastric ulcers? is she very gassy?xxxx
 
Exactly this happened to my mare last year. She looked like she was going to pop! We worm regularly, Vet found nothing unusual and said it could be a lack of minerals and fibre - she was on very poor grazing as was sharing with a lami pony. I moved her to slightly better (but still fairly poor) grazing, and fed her Fast Fibre and added NAF mineral supplement. The bloating was gone within a week.
Same thing started to happen this year with the cr*p non existant grazing. So I've been bringing her in and giving her a feed of Fast Fibre and a large haynet. Seems to have solved it again.
(oh not that its of much relevance but she is a retired tbx)
 
Unless your sections are different to mine half a section isn't nearly enough hay. I'd put her on adlib soaked hay and see what difference that makes. If you aren't putting enough fibre through your horse's body they will really feel it.
 
PStarfish said:
Exactly this happened to my mare last year. She looked like she was going to pop! We worm regularly, Vet found nothing unusual and said it could be a lack of minerals and fibre - she was on very poor grazing as was sharing with a lami pony. I moved her to slightly better (but still fairly poor) grazing, and fed her Fast Fibre and added NAF mineral supplement. The bloating was gone within a week.
Same thing started to happen this year with the cr*p non existant grazing. So I've been bringing her in and giving her a feed of Fast Fibre and a large haynet. Seems to have solved it again.
(oh not that its of much relevance but she is a retired tbx)
Click to expand...

I would do what Starfish has done and introduce a mineral balancer and possibly even pink powder to sort the bacteria out - not enough bacteria/too much of the wrong kind can cause alot of hidgut gas.

A pony on a previous yard had a bloat - turned out it was ulcers. Was on omeprazole for 10 weeks, pink powder - no more bloat, good cond.
 
Not gassy and she's shown no other signs of ulcers but that is definitely worth investigating, thank you.

My next plan was to up the hay and give her a small feed of hi-fi good doer with pink powder. Sounds similar to your experiences and treatment PStarfish so hopefully that will be the right way to go.

I've not noticed any double breathing but she wasn't specifically tested for lungworm.
 
Great minds think alike tallyho! I will try her with the ad-lib soaked hay and short feed for a week or so and see how I get on. If no change I will get the vet back. When he examined her before he didn;t seem overly worried and didn't really have much help for me. Might ask for a different one this time!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top