Can we talk food intolerance and behaviour issues?

[Pearlsasinger]

Thanks, and feed him what instead? he is on ad lib hay but the other 2 need dinner (old standies) and he would need something when they were eating..
I wonder if horse food allergies are like dogs.. have to feed them elimination diet for 8 weeks to properly assess response.

You could give him Emerald Green grass chaff, I suggest that company because they say they don't use pesticides etc

 

[littleshetland]

Interesting thread and it's interesting that Appys appear to be particularly sensitive. It just occurred to me that some of the oldest examples of human art / cave paintings (in excess of 30,000 years old) are of spotty horses... Perhaps there's a connection here that Spottys maybe, being of particularly ancient heritage (ie not over manipulated by human breeding practices to become more 'sporty' or more draught like) maybe more genetically sensitive to modern feed additives? Just a thought.....

 

[YorksG]

Interesting thread and it's interesting that Appys appear to be particularly sensitive. It just occurred to me that some of the oldest examples of human art / cave paintings (in excess of 30,000 years old) are of spotty horses... Perhaps there's a connection here that Spottys maybe, being of particularly ancient heritage (ie not over manipulated by human breeding practices to become more 'sporty' or more draught like) maybe more genetically sensitive to modern feed additives? Just a thought.....

That's a really interesting thought. The allergy Centre near us, suggests a "paleo" diet, with old types of cereal, rather than the common modern ones, for people.

 

[Nasicus]

Haylage always made my previous youngster come out in hives, and made me itchy too for that matter (mind, I wasn't the one eating it!). I kept her on a low sugar diet, as that seemed to help with her itchyness in general.

 

[Slightlyconfused]

Mine cannot have alfafa, makes one into a loon and the other itches his skin raw.

Oatfeed also makes one of mine loony.

I cannot feed one of mine magnesium either, turns home extra loopy.

They are on eithet honey chop lite and heathly for one, dengie meadow grass for the other and then vit e, salt and mycosorb +


Edited to add they are both Appy's

 

[palo1]

Interesting thread and it's interesting that Appys appear to be particularly sensitive. It just occurred to me that some of the oldest examples of human art / cave paintings (in excess of 30,000 years old) are of spotty horses... Perhaps there's a connection here that Spottys maybe, being of particularly ancient heritage (ie not over manipulated by human breeding practices to become more 'sporty' or more draught like) maybe more genetically sensitive to modern feed additives? Just a thought.....

Yes it is interesting - my appy x is basically a veneer of an appaloosa - his genetic inheritance is all TB or Arab apart from his his appaloosa father's line which is, in part almost 50% TB - eventually, of course heading back to Darley Arabian and Byerley Turk. It's possible that the tiny bit of appy genes could have carried some pretty primitive heritable traits in the same way that we are now realising that Neanderthal DNA makes some of us far more susceptible to getting very sick with Covid.

 

[Slightlyconfused]

I bought my first spotty back in 1973 and started breeding them. Lost track of how many I bred but in excess of 20 and kept in touch with some all their lives. I bred my last appaloosa in 1997 but continued to own them up to 2017. I always used soaked sugarbeet pellets and only stopped when I took on a laminitic pony. I used alfalfa too in later years. Never had any sort of reaction from any of mine in fact after feeding it to my stallion who had soft soles and kept getting abscesses his feet improved massively. I never had any with sarcoids, must have been very lucky. Had a couple of few spots who were night blind and the first mare I bred who lived to be 29 did go blind which may have been uveitis and another from my breeding but not bred by me was put down with uveitis.
Until I started hearing about food intolerances on here I had never come across it. Just shows there is always something new to learn.

One of our old appys, bred by the Paskins, thrived on alfafa. So i think maybe breed lines also might play into it

 

[blitznbobs]

Sugar beet sends on of mine to a bonkers nutter

 

[Errin Paddywack]

One of our old appys, bred by the Paskins,

They had some lovely horses. Mick and Jan are/were great friends of ours. Mick has been dead quite a while now sadly but Jan and family have just acquired two new babies.

 

[Slightlyconfused]

They had some lovely horses. Mick and Jan are/were great friends of ours. Mick has been dead quite a while now sadly but Jan and family have just acquired two new babies.

They were lovely when we went down and saw them. We had Clearwater Drifter whose old owner brought him from them as a 6month old. We nearly had Buddy, Clearwater Dreamboy, but couldn't quite make it work our end.

I had heard Mick had passed away, he will always be remembered fondly by us.

I have yet to find another appy breeder like them.

My current ones are awesome and would not change them for the world and their breeders are lovely, i just liked the traditional foundation look of Mick and Jan's.

 

[Elno]

Got a new horse a couple of months ago.

Since our hay is lacking in protein the horses have to be supplemented with extra in some form.

I committed the grave mistake of trying pure, unmollased alfalfa on him which is usually my first go to when supplementing protein before I reach for the hard feed. I noticed that when he got about 0.5 kilo of it he was a bit spookier and more reactive- basically just more horse to handle than previously but still manageable. So last week we upped his ration to 1 kilo and oooooh boy....! 😳😵‍💫

On friday I was sitting on a bouncing, rearing, broncing black ball of fury who got more and more aggrevated because I simply wouldn't let him tank of like he wanted and who had a complete meltdown when we encountered a tractor (usually totally safe with traffic).

Yesterday me and the YO decided to hack out together. I couldn't even bring in my horse from his paddock because he was so extremely wired. He ran around like a lunatic bucking, farting and spooking at his watertank and almost running over me several times.

Seriously, seriously way out of character since albeit young this horse is the most calm and sane horse I've ever had the pleasure to owning- he is a saint.

Naturally I have removed everything feed wise except hay and water for a week or two and will see if he goes back to his normal laid back self.

 

[Pearlsasinger]

My cob had a few grass nuts for a few days last November to stop her from stealing the Appy's bucket when she needed to eat magnesium and so was given a few grass nuts as encouragement.
Unfortunately, the grassnuts made the cob itchy on her back legs and she chewed them until they were sore.
We took her off the grass nuts as soon as we noticed. It has taken until now to get both back legs back to normal with the hair growing back in.
I can only think that it was the sugar level in the grass nuts, which we normally keep for the sheep, that caused the original problem.

 

[onemoretime]

I'm in the same position with 2 riding horses but I am unable to make the link to anything. Like above I take them off whatever I think is suspect, get back to normal and 2 days later we are back to wild eyes. It is very disappointing.

Some days they are both spooky ridden and some days only one of them, some times it relates to wilder weather. it is difficult to see that my horse can be ridden on the buckle with me fast asleep one day and the next he spooks at everything (and I mean everything) and if a horse either comes up behind us or we hear it in front on the road he really panics. Today a horse came down the road towards us and he put his head up and looked but kept on walking. Another day it is 180 degree turn and back down the road.
I have been working on food intolerance for a while so this thread is very timely but I just cannot make the link.



the feed between the 2 of them is soaked hay
one gets micro linseed the other gets none
copra
grass nuts
hi fibre nut
alfalfa nuts which I have been trying to relate it to but can't really
equimins AC
salt
vit E


one is fat and one thin.

has anyone had problems with copra? I am thinking of just feeding copra to start an elimination diet
can anyone link Dengie grass pellets to problems?

I remember someone have trouble with Equimins AC it sent their horse loopy.

 

[onemoretime]

Just reading this thread out of general interest.

This may be physiological anthropomorphism but I do wonder about the relationship between gut biome and mental health.. it's accepted that the gut biome can affect human mental health and can also be associated with behavioural conditions... is there any reason not to suppose that the same is not also true of equines??

I know from personal experience that introducing fermented food into my own diet reduces my inflammatory response to foods I would otherwise react to (sneeze) .. chocolate, red wine etc. Not suggesting feeding fermented food to equines but paying attention to gut biome I suspect will eventually be better understood as a way of addressing behaviour and other aspects of equine health more generally.

Also noting some people noting linseed as a trigger / intolerance.. is that for all different brands of linseed..? My horse loves one brand but wont touch another and comparing their nutritional info they are quite markedly different.

Also on the beet front.. another bit of physiological anthropomorphism .. sugarbeet is a know trigger for human IBS suffers.

Do people eat sugar beet?

 

[nagsrule]

I'm in the same position with 2 riding horses but I am unable to make the link to anything. Like above I take them off whatever I think is suspect, get back to normal and 2 days later we are back to wild eyes. It is very disappointing.

Some days they are both spooky ridden and some days only one of them, some times it relates to wilder weather. it is difficult to see that my horse can be ridden on the buckle with me fast asleep one day and the next he spooks at everything (and I mean everything) and if a horse either comes up behind us or we hear it in front on the road he really panics. Today a horse came down the road towards us and he put his head up and looked but kept on walking. Another day it is 180 degree turn and back down the road.
I have been working on food intolerance for a while so this thread is very timely but I just cannot make the link.



the feed between the 2 of them is soaked hay
one gets micro linseed the other gets none
copra
grass nuts
hi fibre nut
alfalfa nuts which I have been trying to relate it to but can't really
equimins AC
salt
vit E


one is fat and one thin.

has anyone had problems with copra? I am thinking of just feeding copra to start an elimination diet
can anyone link Dengie grass pellets to problems?

It could be the high fibre nuts, check the label. Could be the alfalfa nuts, if you take them out give it 2 weeks to get out of the system. Copra, speedibeet and linseed and or grass nuts. Keep it simple to start.

 

[ycbm]

I remember someone have trouble with Equimins AC it sent their horse loopy.

It has linseed in it to get the vits and mins cheaply.
.

 

[southerncomfort]

During winter I started adding D&H classic fibre cubes to my boy's bucket. Within a week he'd turned in to a complete hooligan. Really difficult to handle and argumentative to ride. Took him off the cubes and after a few days I had my laid back boy back.

No idea what it was in the feed he reacted to but we won't be trying them again!

 

[Gloi]

My Arab/Highland youngster became covered in small pimples which burst and scabbed. It was years ago when barley rings were the fattening feed of the day. I took him off them and it all cleared up and never came back.

I've come across that in the past from barley on youngstock being fattened up. Fortunately not mine.

 

[Loveponies]

This is hugely interesting. I have started feeding Dengi original chaf to my Fjord 2 weeks ago simply to hide his magnesium supplement and he has suddenly become very bolshy, pushy, strong and a lot more forward when ridden. He is fed the magnesium to help his spooking which works to some degree. He is only having a mug of chaff once a day so not sure if such a tiny amount would effect him but he has certainly become a bit of a monster. He is on grass ( nothing else) but muzzled and it is old rough pasture which has not been fertilised for decades. I gave him a handful of soaked sugarbeet during winter to hide the mag but thought chaff would keep better during warmer months. Not sure what else to hide the mag in.

 

[ycbm]

This is hugely interesting. I have started feeding Dengi original chaf to my Fjord 2 weeks ago simply to hide his magnesium supplement and he has suddenly become very bolshy, pushy, strong and a lot more forward when ridden. He is fed the magnesium to help his spooking which works to some degree. He is only having a mug of chaff once a day so not sure if such a tiny amount would effect him but he has certainly become a bit of a monster. He is on grass ( nothing else) but muzzled and it is old rough pasture which has not been fertilised for decades. I gave him a handful of soaked sugarbeet during winter to hide the mag but thought chaff would keep better during warmer months. Not sure what else to hide the mag in.

I think it has alfalfa in it? Mine was set off by 100g of a feed which is only partly alfalfa.
.

 

[onemoretime]

It has linseed in it to get the vits and mins cheaply.
.

Ah I see, well some horses do seem to get sharp on linseed.

 

[paddy555]

I had forgotten this thread. Shortly afterwards I changed all the horses feed to molassed sugar beet, hi fibre nuts, one gets some grass nuts, Equimins AC, vit e and salt. All are doing well on that. The horses are ridden daily barefoot, feet are doing fine on this with quite a few stoney tracks deliberately. (soaked hay and grass)

 

[spotty_pony]

My Appy develops a rash of fed barley - when in hard work I fed him a high oil diet to keep his condition and weight on, as most of the mixes contain barley and I opted for the oil option as I never like giving them large amounts of feed full of carbohydrates.

 

[Elno]

Naturally I have removed everything feed wise except hay and water for a week or two and will see if he goes back to his normal laid back self.

Didn't even take a week. Rode him yesterday- totally different horse and back to being a dope on a rope! No more alfalfa for this little dude, then.