Can anyone shed light on my boy.

CastlelackSportHorses

CastlelackSportHorses

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My old retired eventer who has always wintered out (And extremely well) has gone very downhill the last two winters.
Bit of backstory, He was taken from the pound almost 12 years ago when I was told he was being PTS.
He was extremely emaciated but bounced back amazingly.

Retired from eventing 5 years ago due to Kissing spines. And has happily lived out 24/7, 365 for the last 5 years.
Last year he went to a new grass livery yard where they were all kept in a large field with ad lib haylage.

He lost so much weight it shocked us, and over the space of a month. Teeth and worming done, he was put out to fresh grass and thrived during the summer.

Again this winter in the space of 3/4 weeks He lost all his weight, he was on 6 acres of good grass with his best friend a 26yr old cob, and was fully rugged.
(I had had abdominal surgery so couldnt get rug off, just had someone looking at them every few days)

Finally got him home, and he was scouring water!
Vet ran bloods as we were suspecting Cushings or IBD, bloods came back showing just a little inflammation.
Fecal sample showed moderate worm burden (400epg) vet wasnt too worried.

He has now been off grass over a month due to scour, droppings are nearly back to normal, and he is looking much better weight wise.

But we are all stumped, Vet cant figure out what happened 2 winters ago to start this. Im wondering did the haylage damage his gut?!


Any and all help appreciated.
138BAF56-6CD6-467F-86B3-E7C96E559720.jpegIMG_8642.jpgIMG_9204.jpgOutdoor pic is day he got home, Stable pic is 3 weeks after.
 
This happened to my old cob, but he was found to have a split tooth and some loose molars. After surgery, I was advised to start replacing long stalk forage with soaked mashes etc. as he could not chew well enough for the foregut to complete the digestive process in order for the hindgut to be able to ferment. Maybe try adding soaked sugar beet and grass chaff to his diet to see if it makes a difference. My 14hh cob gets a full scoop of dry sugar beet pellets soaked overnight and split between three buckets. I dry it off with bran, and add grass chaff and oat chaff to bulk out. Two buckets in the evening and one in the morning, plus a soft meadow grass haylage - no rye grass.
 
ah thats so stressful. Have you tried getting the gut biome test done in the Irish equine centre? they take a sample of the poo and give you back a probiotic solution. it works wonders on some horse. I'd an older who lost weight like that before and his gut bacteria was out of whack. so no matter what he ate he wasn't able to digest the nutrients. He went on a course of very basic chaff and vitamins and a probiots and was back to himself in about a few weeks.
 
Pearlsasinger said:
If you had the ACTH test for Cushings, I would ask for the TRH-Stim test it gives much more accurate results.
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I think the Vet did both. He is extremely thorough! I had been thinking EMS for a long time. So pretty gutted when it was negative as still in the
paddi22 said:
ah thats so stressful. Have you tried getting the gut biome test done in the Irish equine centre? they take a sample of the poo and give you back a probiotic solution. it works wonders on some horse. I'd an older who lost weight like that before and his gut bacteria was out of whack. so no matter what he ate he wasn't able to digest the nutrients. He went on a course of very basic chaff and vitamins and a probiots and was back to himself in about a few weeks.
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Very interesting! I may contact them regarding this!!
 
Highmileagecob said:
This happened to my old cob, but he was found to have a split tooth and some loose molars. After surgery, I was advised to start replacing long stalk forage with soaked mashes etc. as he could not chew well enough for the foregut to complete the digestive process in order for the hindgut to be able to ferment. Maybe try adding soaked sugar beet and grass chaff to his diet to see if it makes a difference. My 14hh cob gets a full scoop of dry sugar beet pellets soaked overnight and split between three buckets. I dry it off with bran, and add grass chaff and oat chaff to bulk out. Two buckets in the evening and one in the morning, plus a soft meadow grass haylage - no rye grass.
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He is getting 3 feeds a day Morning/Lunch/Evening of
Scoop soaked beet pulp, 1/4 scoop barely, scoop of Agrobs muesli and scoop of Linseed meal, along with Oily herbs, nettle, mint and echinachea and Linseed oil and Precision microbes.
 
Irish-Only said:
I’m with you and would suspect the Haylage especially as he is putting the weight back on.
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Yes! Its the only thing in my mind that makes sense. Its like since he had the haylage for a whole winter its destroyed his gut!
I never feed haylage, so he would not have been used to it. And to be fair its all they had mid winter in the south of ireland as the grass was gone.
 
The IEC will do a fecal culture and tell you if he has any dysbiosis that would benefit from their custom probiotics. They don't push the product if it's not warranted. Vet doesn't need to be involved, owner can submit
 
Highmileagecob said:
Some horses cannot digest rye grass (mine is one of them) and it is whizzed through the gut and ejected asap. Might possibly be an explanation for some of his issues?
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He was wintered with 5 others and all others were perfect, including 2 much older horses.
This winter was in a totally different field and same issue so doubt its the grass?
 
Highmileagecob said:
Is your haylage made from ryegrass? Hopefully, you have found a solution to building his weight back up. It's quite a learning curve looking after the oldies isn't it?
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I doubt it as the haylage was made on the same farm so would have been the same grass. I personally dont like haylage, always feed hay.
Surely we will figure it out.
 
Guys Im back again. My old man has been thriving since getting his microbiome done spring last year and being put on Precision Microbes.
He gained so much weight over the summer I was afraid he was going to be too heavy.
He has been wintering out at home in 20 acres with his two old buddies and has been thriving up until recently.
We have started having runny poo again and I am starting to see a little weight loss(Thankfully he is right outside my house so I can keep an eye.)

Vet is coming today to routine dental on old boys so will see what he thinks.

BD9BB5B7-A111-4A8E-9186-3B84C13E09DC.jpeg This pic is from a month ago.

IMG_5885.jpegThis is from last week. So he defo has dropped off a little weight.
 
Nothing useful to add except to say, I'm sorry it's happening again and I hope you can get to the bottom of it. He looks positively porky in the first photo (in the nicest possible way 😆 ) so fingers crossed you've bought yourself a bit more time to investigate before he gets really skinny. At least he still looks shiny and cheerful in that second photo, and you've got him all the way through to the end of January in great shape. Only two months to go until spring. Very best wishes with it.
 
Widgeon said:
Nothing useful to add except to say, I'm sorry it's happening again and I hope you can get to the bottom of it. He looks positively porky in the first photo (in the nicest possible way 😆 ) so fingers crossed you've bought yourself a bit more time to investigate before he gets really skinny. At least he still looks shiny and cheerful in that second photo, and you've got him all the way through to the end of January in great shape. Only two months to go until spring. Very best wishes with it.
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Thank you. I have weighed him last night so will weigh him weekly to keep an eye on things.
Going to add Linseed to his feed to see if that will help as I gave him that last winter.
Vet coming tomorrow now so maybe a bit of dental work is needed also. Fingers crossed.
 
Sorry to hear it's happened again. Have you thought about scoping him for ulcers? My gelding had mild squamous ulcers (we believe developed from the stress of moving yards), and dropped a lot of weight off quickly from it. When he scoped clear, I added Thunderbrooks gentle gain and linseed to his feed and he's back to his normal weight now and maintaining (top photo Aug/bottom photo Dec).

image.png
 
MarvelVillis said:
Sorry to hear it's happened again. Have you thought about scoping him for ulcers? My gelding had mild squamous ulcers (we believe developed from the stress of moving yards), and dropped a lot of weight off quickly from it. When he scoped clear, I added Thunderbrooks gentle gain and linseed to his feed and he's back to his normal weight now and maintaining (top photo Aug/bottom photo Dec).

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Honestly, I had thought of scoping but he is the least stressful horse in the world so I would doubt he has.
My mare on the other hand may tho as is showing symptoms but looks a million dollars.

Horses will be the death of me.
:(
 
CastlelackSportHorses said:
Honestly, I had thought of scoping but he is the least stressful horse in the world so I would doubt he has.
My mare on the other hand may tho as is showing symptoms but looks a million dollars.

Horses will be the death of me.
:(
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I wouldn’t rule it out, my mare is quiet as a mouse and had lots of ulcers and a growth in her stomach (plus stomach not emptying

She didn’t actually lose any weight but displayed no symptoms other than a slightly smelly poo and reluctance to trot under saddle.
 
HopOnTrot said:
I wouldn’t rule it out, my mare is quiet as a mouse and had lots of ulcers and a growth in her stomach (plus stomach not emptying

She didn’t actually lose any weight but displayed no symptoms other than a slightly smelly poo and reluctance to trot under saddle.
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This lad is retired with 6 years due to KS, dental was good at weekend and didnt need much work done and vet said he was in great condition.
Unfortunately we will no longer be sedating him as an hour after sedation he had a massive seizure/fit and went down.
Was very scary, thankfully he is ok and no one injured but Vet said we will not be sedating again.
 
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