Cody’s test result is n/P1 for EPSM. Now what? ?

[catembi]

As per title, I sent off a hair sample and the result came back this morning. Does this mean that he has it himself rather than just being able to pass it onto offspring (he is a gelding).

It’s not my first brush with EPSM as Adrian my ISH had it. Cody is out 24/7 on poor grass, constant access to hay, fed Agrobs muesli, soaked TB hay cobs and micronised linseed. The supplements are mag-ox, ALCAR and vit E plus selenium. What else should I be doing?

The warning signs were being v tense and explosive under saddle when usually he is v v laid back, and feeling stiff and uncoordinated. Hard to say if the supplements have improved things as I can only ride up and down a strip of concrete behind the house. He does seem a lot less tense.

**sighs** FFS, here we go again! I specialise in field ornaments.

All suggestions welcomed.

 

[Roxylola]

I know a positive means he has it - often they have no symptoms but they still could get symptoms.
We've been treating supercob as if for pssm/some myopathy since getting him on a gut supplement in january resulted in muscle tremors that looked like mild tying up after a feed of mollichop with supplement in. Assume it was a reaction to the sugar. So on alfalfa now. We started on a high vit e only supplement added magnesium, keep on top of exercise and keeping him warm and hes been great - very occasionally if he gets over excited we have a bit if an issue with muscle tremors happening but hes stayed very rideable

 

[ester]

Yes as far as I'm aware heterozygotes are symptomatic, just perhaps not as much as homo ones.
Sorry to read this post.

 

[SEL]

Sorry to read this. I'm afraid my n/p1 appaloosa mare is hugely symptomatic - much more so than her p1/p1 Ardennes field mate.

This time of the year is really tough because even minimal grass has sugar spikes that cause insulin surges. I'm trying hard to knock back on sugars anywhere else in her diet by soaking hay plus I feed her more oil because it flattens the insulin response (not so good for her waistline....)

Alcar never worked for mine, but she's getting around 6000iU of vitamin E a day and she is worked every single day - even if its just a 15 minute walk (suspensory niggle). Muzzle on if I open up a bit more of the track around the field.

You might want to try taking out the linseed if you're playing around with the diet. A few of the more sensitive PSSM horses have had issues with that for some reason.

Also she is rugged warmer than you would usually do for a fat horse. No shivering the blubber off with her because she can't move for a week if you try that.

 

[catembi]

SEL...what do you mean by ‘symptomatic’ please?

 

[TheSpottyCobby]

My n/P1 gelding copes with my poor grazing but I know that many do not. I may be digging out the muzzle in the next few days however after all of this rain, we shall see.
He's on 6000iu of natural vitamin e, magnesium oxide, salt, equimins advance complete powder, copra and brewers yeast for his mild sweet itch. 4kg of well soaked hay overnight in a trickle net (stabled at night but happy with this arrangement). Having to feed alfalfa pellets in a mash mixed with a little chaff (healthy hooves molasses free) to get it all into him as he's being a right fusspot.
Exercise is the number one most important thing for mine, since diagnosis back in January he's now in the most work he's ever been in - at least 6 days a week, mixture of hacking, schooling, pole work, lunging or long reining and we've just started jumping again much to his pleasure! On his days off, he has a 10-15 minute in hand walk before 'bedtime' just to check for any stiffness etc.
Rugging (cries) he is now rugged more than the TB's and oldies on the yard (mine is a teeny fluffy cob!). I'm actually sat at home now typing this whilst I'm supposed to be working, worrying if I should have put his thicker rug on as the wind is relentless today.

Sorry to hear of the diagnosis

ETA mine was asymptomatic until he had a short period of box rest before Christmas and then completely tied up. N/P1 means they carry the faulty gene and could pass it in (if not a gelding) and can be symptomatic - I'm loathe to say mine has gone back to being asymptomatic as it feels like I'm tempting fate, but *touches wood*

 

[PapaverFollis]

Movement, warmth, high vitamin E, either high oil or Alcar. Ditch the vitamin E plus selenium supplement and replace with just natural vitamin E and feed up to 10,000iu a day (don't do this with the selenium added supplement! )

Exercise sheets. At least 10 mins walk to warm up. Introduce trot work slowly, start with literally 1 minute! Once in work keep working daily at a consistent level and make any increases very slowly. We do a lot of long lining when mine is in work.

Turnout as much as possible but minimal grass intake. Mine (still assumed not tested) is not intolerant of grass but quite a few seem to be. I tend to limit it though. Grass tracks or starvation paddocks.

Mine doesn't get on with balancers as a rule but am trialling Equivita with her as I think I have really high iron soil now, which seemed to be affecting her hooves, so feel she needs something. If I was on more average soil she wouldn't get a balancer.

Depending on the horse it's not necessarily a sentence to be a field ornament so don't panic. Once mine is reasonably fit she's more than capable of a decent hack and a canter. But it would take a lot if management and work to get her much fitter than that... so it has shifted our goals a bit.

Mine was/is only mildy symptomatic but gets big tye-ups every so often if things have gone wrong. Before management she could be explosive when long lining but not under saddle, just rushed and a bit spooky under saddle. But if she hadn't tied up at any point I wouldn't have noticed anything.

 

[paddy555]

It’s not my first brush with EPSM as Adrian my ISH had it. Cody is out 24/7 on poor grass, constant access to hay, fed Agrobs muesli, soaked TB hay cobs and micronised linseed. The supplements are mag-ox, ALCAR and vit E plus selenium. What else should I be doing?


All suggestions welcomed.

ride or ride and lead daily and use an exercise sheet. For today's ride mine had an exercise sheet that used to be the back of a 250g rug. The thin ones are too thin. If you can only lead rug to exercise. If your riding is restricted due to Covid 19 can you do anything else? ride in the field, lunge, long rein, lead out on your own daily exercise?


Rug at least 200g more than you could ever dream of. Mine (PSSM2) has 450g rug on today and has had the last few days, even during the last few weeks of lovely warm weather he was rugged in a lighter rug, everyone else was naked.

Looking at your vit e plus selenium. I don't think you can be giving sufficient if this is a vit e, selenium combined product. Which product are you using?
I would instantly up your vit e to 10000iu per day preferably to start with between 2 applications. If you have a combined product you will need a vit e only supplement otherwise you will seriously overdose on selenium.

The first sentence of your para 3 is a good description of it.
Did you post before about this? I vaguely remember the name Cody?

 

[catembi]

Thank you for all the suggestions. I will get a natural vit E & feed the higher dose. I know to be careful iro overdosing on selenium. I am not going outside to check as it's tipping it down, but I think it's an Equine America supplement.

Yes, I have posted about him before. The behaviour was just so odd. He started having hiccups in warm-ups, whipping round, not wanting to go forward, leaping about...but in a really strange way. I have had sharp horses before & they are hair-raising but follow the pattern (generally) of super-sharp for 5 minutes, sharp but slightly less for another 5, gradually winding neck in for another 5 & then you're okay. He would suddenly go bananas again after 20-25 minutes. I know now that if you work them, it depletes the magnesium more, hence 'naughtiness' after that interval. He would also go stiff & uncoordinated jumping sometimes. Then he was getting more & more explosive in lessons, clinics, hacking etc, but not settling in the least. And his behaviour/responses had no correlation to what I was doing as a rider. I was v bemused. It now makes sense that he was responding to how his body was feeling, i.e. increasingly crampy and uncomfy, and I as a rider was pretty much irrelevant.

I am waiting for my arena. Covid hit just as we were about to start :-( We have 4 acres of sloping clay swamp/concrete & you wouldn't believe it but NONE it it is rideable!

 

[Goldenstar]

It’s rotten luck .
I would withdraw grass altogether and see if that helps .
But I might wait until you have a school .
You are doing all the right things

 

[paddy555]

Thank you for all the suggestions. I will get a natural vit E & feed the higher dose. I know to be careful iro overdosing on selenium. I am not going outside to check as it's tipping it down, but I think it's an Equine America supplement.

Yes, I have posted about him before. The behaviour was just so odd. He started having hiccups in warm-ups, whipping round, not wanting to go forward, leaping about...but in a really strange way. I have had sharp horses before & they are hair-raising but follow the pattern (generally) of super-sharp for 5 minutes, sharp but slightly less for another 5, gradually winding neck in for another 5 & then you're okay. He would suddenly go bananas again after 20-25 minutes. I know now that if you work them, it depletes the magnesium more, hence 'naughtiness' after that interval. He would also go stiff & uncoordinated jumping sometimes. Then he was getting more & more explosive in lessons, clinics, hacking etc, but not settling in the least. And his behaviour/responses had no correlation to what I was doing as a rider. I was v bemused. It now makes sense that he was responding to how his body was feeling, i.e. increasingly crampy and uncomfy, and I as a rider was pretty much irrelevant.

I am waiting for my arena. Covid hit just as we were about to start :-( We have 4 acres of sloping clay swamp/concrete & you wouldn't believe it but NONE it it is rideable!

how frustrating about the arena. Many of us have found good vit e supps to be either equimins (cheaper but a liquid) or forageplus,(more expensive and a powder)

My horse was similar to your description. One day he could be ridden on a ride he had done hundreds of times before, was perfect. Next day and absolutely no difference in anything on the same ride he would be impossible. I got off many times and tried to simply work him in hand, just stops, moving quarters, backs. Still couldn't do it. Completely over the top. A 6 yo horse could not walk, in hand, 3 steps forward, 3 steps back and turn on the forehand. Beyond belief. He was on another planet. When I picked a hind foot up he double barrelled me and put me on the ground.
I know exactly where you are coming from. Good luck

 

[catembi]

OMG, P555, that’s what happened to mine! Hacked out on the buckle at a plod day after day after day and you pretty much needed to check for a pulse. Last hack (last year) he went so mental that I had to get off, then I was having so much trouble even leading him home. Sprained finger, torn nail (I had gloves on), nearly trampled on loads of times...!

He was ridden daily til the clocks changed, then we had to go to w’end only as I work f/t, it got colder and I closed off most of the fields due to turning swamp. So a perfect storm for an EPSM horse ?But at the time, going nuts could have been a ‘normal’ horse with a change of routine...

I have seen the liquid. Is it palatable?

 

[PapaverFollis]

I think they either need to be in consistent daily work or out of work completely. Not pick up and put down horses unfortunately. Mine has been very happy out of work all winter and into lockdown. Need to start bringing her back in but it's such a commitment once we get going I'm almost dreading it!

 

[Roasted Chestnuts]

Thank you for all the suggestions. I will get a natural vit E & feed the higher dose. I know to be careful iro overdosing on selenium. I am not going outside to check as it's tipping it down, but I think it's an Equine America supplement.

Yes, I have posted about him before. The behaviour was just so odd. He started having hiccups in warm-ups, whipping round, not wanting to go forward, leaping about...but in a really strange way. I have had sharp horses before & they are hair-raising but follow the pattern (generally) of super-sharp for 5 minutes, sharp but slightly less for another 5, gradually winding neck in for another 5 & then you're okay. He would suddenly go bananas again after 20-25 minutes. I know now that if you work them, it depletes the magnesium more, hence 'naughtiness' after that interval. He would also go stiff & uncoordinated jumping sometimes. Then he was getting more & more explosive in lessons, clinics, hacking etc, but not settling in the least. And his behaviour/responses had no correlation to what I was doing as a rider. I was v bemused. It now makes sense that he was responding to how his body was feeling, i.e. increasingly crampy and uncomfy, and I as a rider was pretty much irrelevant.

I am waiting for my arena. Covid hit just as we were about to start :-( We have 4 acres of sloping clay swamp/concrete & you wouldn't believe it but NONE it it is rideable!

I fed this to my cushings a boy and I think it helped loads

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/171891145841

 

[DabDab]

I have seen the liquid. Is it palatable?

Yes, I don't think they can taste it at all, it's just a bit of a faff to deal with as very sticky

 

[catembi]

Okay, so being thick here... This is the liquid...how long would the bottle last at 10,000 iu a day? There doesn't seem to be enough info to work it out. https://www.equimins-online.com/en/all-products/772-equimins-vitamin-e-oil.html

I think that CheekyChestnut's powder would last 60 days, so I am trying to do a comparison.

 

[HBB]

So sorry to hear about your boy Catembi. I can't offer any advice regarding EPSM but I can highly recommend this natural vitamin E product from Pro Earth.

https://progressive-earth.com/produ...-stress-performance-superior-bioavailability/

 

[catembi]

Okay, so the Pro Earth - 500g would last 15 days. Is that right...? So £2 a day...?

I am not brainy enough for this!

 

[paddy555]

equimins oil which BTW tastes of nothing ( I have tried it)
1000iu = 1ml

10000 = 10 ml per day

bottle = 1 litre = 1000ml

1000 divided by 10 = 100 days

the liquid works well but you need to get it under control. I decant mine into a heinz tomato sauce/mayonaise bottle that is squeezy. Then I squeeze it out onto a slice of bread. Until I got used to the amount I put the bread on gram scales, zero'd it and squeezed out 10 grams (which is 10ml or 10000iu)

I have 5 on it and they are at home so it may be easier, it takes me a couple of minutes to make up their sandwiches and feed them. They love it. It is their treat.

Some people don't like having to deal with the oil. I didn't find it easy to syringe it, this way I find very easy. I don't like the idea of powder in a feed because it is a very expensive product and there is the chance they will drop feed out of their mouths and waste it.

ETA the main thing to remember with vit e is that quality counts and quality is expensive.

 

[paddy555]

OMG, P555, that’s what happened to mine! Hacked out on the buckle at a plod day after day after day and you pretty much needed to check for a pulse. Last hack (last year) he went so mental that I had to get off, then I was having so much trouble even leading him home. Sprained finger, torn nail (I had gloves on), nearly trampled on loads of times...!

He was ridden daily til the clocks changed, then we had to go to w’end only as I work f/t, it got colder and I closed off most of the fields due to turning swamp. So a perfect storm for an EPSM horse ?But at the time, going nuts could have been a ‘normal’ horse with a change of routine...

I have seen the liquid. Is it palatable?

It took me 2 years to sort mine. There was little info available at the time. Now I could sort it in a few weeks. Now he is ridden daily, is very safe, causes no problems as long as we stick to the regime. Not a written off pasture pet but a good riding horse.

The biggest change for mine was vit E oil. After 2 days I thought he was getting "nicer' after 3 days OH commented he was slightly different. After a week we had a different horse and could see a way forward. I worked him daily in long reins, 20 mins a day building up to an hour. Then got back on. We haven't looked back.

 

[catembi]

Oh thank you - that's v helpful. Mine are at home & I currently have 4 (they break...i get another one...plus I seem to collect littlies) but Cody is the only one (AFAIK....) with a medical need for vit E.

 

[catembi]

Fab! So if I EVER get my bl**dy arena (insert v v long, boring & infuriating planning saga which was finally sorted, only to be covid-ed literally the day that work was due to start) we might be able to crack on

 

[TheSpottyCobby]

I scared myself silly at the start of the year due to poor vets advise and prognosis, but took some time to research myself. Got back on board taking things very slowly, but I've got my pony back. He was bought as a low level all-rounder/riding club pony and he will certainly be able to continue doing all of the things we were before (we will never be world beaters but he is my best friend). If this damn virus wasn't about we would have started our show season by now as he is feeling fab and fit

 

[maya2008]

The temperament on the one I have is worth the cost of the supplements a million times over. I have one other I suspect - again, amazing temperament. Good riding horses both.

 

[catembi]

What supplements are yours on, Maya2008, please? Nice to hear some positive stories! I tried 4 or 5 when looking for Cody and he was the only one that I wanted to do more with and not hop off and give back, so temperament was v important to me.

 

[ycbm]

I fed this to my cushings a boy and I think it helped loads

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/171891145841

Okay, so being thick here... This is the liquid...how long would the bottle last at 10,000 iu a day? There doesn't seem to be enough info to work it out. https://www.equimins-online.com/en/all-products/772-equimins-vitamin-e-oil.html

I think that CheekyChestnut's powder would last 60 days, so I am trying to do a comparison.

Cheeky Chestnut's powder is synthetic, not natural and you have to feed twice as much because the horse is only able to use half of it.

If a product does not state that it's natural then it's synthetic. Synthetic works, but once you've doubled the amount and the price it's no cheaper than natural.

Forage Plus natural powder has higher iu than Progressive Earth's per gram and last time I checked worked out cheaper.

Oil is still cheapest but I gave up on the mess



.

 

[Roasted Chestnuts]

Cheeky Chestnut's powder is synthetic, not natural and you have to feed twice as much because the horse is only able to use half of it.

If a product does not state that it's natural then it's synthetic. Synthetic works, but once you've doubled the amount and the price it's no cheaper than natural.

Forage Plus natural powder has higher iu than Progressive Earth's per gram and last time I checked worked out cheaper.

Oil is still cheapest but I gave up on the mess



.

YCBM the recommended amount that is stated on the product To give you the amount of VitE is what you feed of that product. You don’t need to double up to get the desired effect, I don’t understand where you are coming from with the whole double up thing.
Are you meaning to double what they are recommending or that you are feeding double the product synthetic as you would natural?

For example if you were feeding one scoop of the synthetic version in a feed twice a day you would only have to put in half a scoop to each feed twice a day of natural?

Trying to understand where you are coming from is all as I fed this at the recommended levels on the product to my old boy and saw a difference

 

[ycbm]

YCBM the recommended amount that is stated on the product To give you the amount of VitE is what you feed of that product. You don’t need to double up to get the desired effect, I don’t understand where you are coming from with the whole double up thing.
Are you meaning to double what they are recommending or that you are feeding double the product synthetic as you would natural?

For example if you were feeding one scoop of the synthetic version in a feed twice a day you would only have to put in half a scoop to each feed twice a day of natural?

Trying to understand where you are coming from is all as I fed this at the recommended levels on the product to my old boy and saw a difference

PSSM horses need thousands of iu (International units) a day. The synthetic form counts left handed molecules in the iu. But horses can only use the right handed version. Synthetic vitamin E is half right and half left handed. Natural vitamin E is all right handed. (I may have left and right hand mixed up, but you get the gist).

Any synthetic vitamin E has to be fed at twice the amount of a natural vitamin E if you are measuring iu.

If you got a result with the stuff you pointed to, you would get the same result with half the amount of natural.

 

[maya2008]

What supplements are yours on, Maya2008, please? Nice to hear some positive stories! I tried 4 or 5 when looking for Cody and he was the only one that I wanted to do more with and not hop off and give back, so temperament was v important to me.

As far as I'm aware, the exact supplement balance differs from horse to horse, as some have other genetic issues also (there are many more variants of 'pssm' (although they aren't, as they are apparently protein issues not polysaccharide issues)) in the more detailed testing that is currently being properly studied, and many horses appear to have a combination.

So... that said, we use:

1) Alcar from bulk powders - it works for us. Didn't originally, had to find the right dose, but it obviously raises her metabolism (she dropped weight until I upped her feed) and it seems to fix things so she can have a day off without getting more poorly.
2) Gold label Vitamin E. I know it isn't natural, but it does help, and at the moment she is improving rapidly and is over the 'hump' of trying to get fit again. There is also vit E in her balancer. I had to play with costings and try some lower rated supplements because the amount of money being spent on supplements was through the roof.
3) Lysine - we started on whey powder isolate (70g a day for a 400kg pony) and that initially made a huge difference and got her going again a lot better than she had been, then switched to this as maintenance because there's a fair whack of protein in her balancer and feed (mostly legume based so complementary to the haylage she eats). She's still improving, so it gets my vote.
4) Veterinary Probiotic (that our local vets sell) - no idea what's in it, no ingredients on the label, but it makes her more comfortable and she moves better. Best guess as to why this helps is because there is a certain amount of pain involved with the issues of PSSM so probably some level of ulcers there, that this helps with. She looks happier and brighter on it, and moves more freely.

You have to get the feed right too, and that's very individual. ANY amount of Alfalfa causes huge tying up issues in this mare, and obviously we need low NSC... we're using Topspec Ulsakind at the moment, because the Dodson and Horrell ERS cubes changed their recipe and it was no longer working for her. We also use a balancer that's targeted to a healthy gut and has a high protein content. It's more NSC than I would like, but it has been so amazing for all my other horses I'm reluctant to stop it. It doesn't make her worse, and it should help.

We use hay specially grown for laminitis, or haylage.

And exercise...I have found a minimum of 20mins of reasonably fast work once fit enough, with warm-up and cool down on top, is what is needed to keep her improving and to keep her healthy once she is fit. No more than one day off at a time (the Alcar has helped with this, but it doesn't work for every horse). I paid someone once to do this while I had tiny children - she started to get worse and I couldn't work out what it was. It was only when I found out they were cutting the time, that it clicked. I paid for childcare and rode her myself every day after that!

Any lay-off causes issues as muscle degenerates, she gets stiffer and is more sore. Coming back from injury and complete lack of work for many months takes years. I reckon this time it'll be a good 18 months to full fitness from when she came back into work. She started being ridden again last summer, and only now do I have bouncy paces. Any change in the grass also causes problems. It's a nice juggling act!

The other one is young yet - at the age they are at, my mare showed few symptoms. I will test at some point when I have spare cash to throw at it. I have added some supplements for now and there is some improvement - they all get low NSC feed and hay plus regular work so nothing to change there.

Start with the best quality of everything, change one thing at a time. Once you know what helps, you can try the cheaper version and see if there is a difference. What we did anyway!

 

[catembi]

Thank you... that’s really helpful. We are already using bulk powders ALCAR at the rate of one blue scoop a day split between two feeds. I have ordered the vit E liquid. Will try the protein and prebiotics. He was v tense and upset yesterday. He had been doing so well that I was contemplating hacking but that was in that warm spell. Yest he was actually spooking at his own shadow ?