Colic - caused by bad management?

I think some colic cases are caused by bad management, I soak all my horses hay don't think any horses should eat it dry for a number of reasons, and everyday turnout is a must in my opinion, I also think so many horses are fed too much hard feed or wrong feed, example horse at our yard on box rest for major leg injury, owner still feeding same amount of mix and chaff as if it was being ridden, a few weeks down the line horse has colic.
 
Stress induced colic could be a good example of bad management, if that is you ingnore the warning signs and don't bother to alther the horses enviroment to reduce his stress levels.

Shock induced colic, again if you have a stressy horse that suffers from the above, then the above can easily bring on these type of colic, so this type of colic potentially could also be from bad management as well.
 
It can be, but most often it is not. I have only had two cases of colic in thirty years. Both cases were in the same horse. The first time I thought it was because I had moved him into a field with oak trees (although he had been in it all summer before without a problem). He got over it within 12 hours. The second time he had it was two years later. I wasn't that worried as he had got over it no problem the last time. This time he didn't though and we ended up going to Rossdales at Newmarket. He was operated on and found to have 7 feet of intestine that had fallen through a membrane next to his diaphagm. So nothing to do with management. Sadly, although the operation went well, he was unable to use his back legs afterwards and had to be PTS.
 
I've only ever had one horse have colic....caused by a strangulating lipoma- he died:( And according to the vet that couldnt be predicted or prevented.

That said....I feed my horses fibre only, they have plenty of hay and not too much ( rich) grass....they have a routine and are wormed as necessary and have their teeth done every 6months. I don't think I could do anything else really.....
 
In my opinion most cases are bad management. I say most as I dont know everything about everything so cant presume to be so certain as to say yes all but I would think that good sense could prevent ALOT. I just dont think that alot of people use their common sense and read the signs.

Case and point above - 2 people whose colics could not have been prevented!
 
I've had a few colics.

1 was bad management on my part and I wil forever feel guilty for it. Fortunately non fatal.

1 was strangulated lipoma, fatal.

1 was a mild bout after a lot of travelling, a lot of stress anorexia and then the start of a new diet to put weight on. Again, non fatal.

To help prevent colic? I avoid practises that may result in it and if I am going to embark on a stressful situation, I get on the blower to Katie at H Bradshaws Coligone and stock up well in advance!

The more I learn about how delicate a herbivores tracks can be, the more consideration I give to it's natural state (constant food passing through, constant water supply) to help prevent colic. Absolutely can feeding dry forage without water, limiting grazing and not giving enough forage overnight cause colic!
 
My horse has had colic once - she had had surgery at Rossdales to repair a fracture to her fetlock and the next day she colicked. They thought it was stress induced from being away from home, having had the anaesthetic, different people handling her and all that. I wouldn't call it bad management though - after all, if you can't trust Rossdales to manage your horse properly...
 
After having 2 horses pts due to colic that was beyond my control I am quite sensitive on this though I do agree it can be prevented
My mare was colicy from day 1 she was also a stress head and cribber we followed vets advice and I also checked with exp yo to see if she could puck up on anything that was in my management of her to cause it. Nothing my mare then got a really bad episode of colic and went to leahurst she had a strangulated hernia with 6 ft of intestine rotted away so that was removed:( . She coliced twice a week for 8 months after op looked like a skeleton and was awful. She suddenly picked up looked great was doing really well when I got a call to say she was in a right state she was PTs that afternoon it was horrific balls up with the vet still angers me to this day :(
My boy never had colic then suddenly started with colic on a number of occasions he began to get worse :( the vet said he thought it could be something on the lines of a strangulated hernia so either op or PTs I got a sevens op who said the same I opted for pts I couldn't bear to watch him go through what my mare did. I was very unlucky but nothing I done or could of done would of prevented my two ;(
 
The term "colic" covers an extremely wide number of symptoms and outcomes. Therefore it is a very rash statement to directly link ALL colics to poor management. Of course there will be the colic from over feeding, or increasing stress, but as shown above, there a lot which you have no warnings of. Strangulated bowels are far more common that we realise, cribbing can quite frequently causes colic (first hand knowledge, not someones opinion). It is something I do take very seriously having had a horse go in for surgical colic who needed part of his bowel removed as a benign growth had swung around internally and was strangling part of his gut. My first and only symptoms were coming to a stable that was trashed with no signs of droppings. Vet was there 30 minutes later and horse en route to Liphook an hour after that.
 
Thank you for your educational :p replies.
I am particularly interested to read Aimeetb's assertion that most cases are due to bad management. As I've had two horses which required surgery for two different types, I'll try to 'up my game' accordingly.
S :D
 
oh don't push that idea out. I have known a very large number of horses have varying degrees of colic over the years and can honestly say their owners had no warning/could not have prevented it. The one time we were "expecting" a "preventable" colic was when someone didn't put away a piggy pony properly (bottom bolt not secured in a DIY yard) and said pony ate 2 black bins of my horses food for the week. You could argue that was bad management but all pony did was to look a bit bloated for a couple of days and a cross owner who had to drop everything the following day to replace my horse feed!
 
Over the bad winter, with all that snow and hard freeze, I heard of a few horses in this area getting colic as they didn't have access to enough water.

Yes, the weather was bad and it was freezing, that said, we were re-filling the water troughs twice a day (after scoopin out the thick ice each time) and yes, it was a killer, but a must.

Maybe it could be argued that this was bad management? I don't know, but none of ours suffered, and they had access to fresh water as often as we could get the ice out! You could stand there and watch it begin to freeze the minute you poured it in....
 
DragonSlayer said:
Over the bad winter, with all that snow and hard freeze, I heard of a few horses in this area getting colic as they didn't have access to enough water.

Yes, the weather was bad and it was freezing, that said, we were re-filling the water troughs twice a day (after scoopin out the thick ice each time) and yes, it was a killer, but a must.

Maybe it could be argued that this was bad management? I don't know, but none of ours suffered, and they had access to fresh water as often as we could get the ice out! You could stand there and watch it begin to freeze the minute you poured it in....
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Yes, it was awful, was't it? remember boiling kettle after kettle to defrost the drinker valves and warm up the water for a couple of the horses that refused to drink it ice cold! :rolleyes:
 
Shilasdair said:
Thank you for your educational :p replies.
I am particularly interested to read Aimeetb's assertion that most cases are due to bad management. As I've had two horses which required surgery for two different types, I'll try to 'up my game' accordingly.
S :D
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You and me both, Shilasdair. How could I have been so careless as to let that intestine slip through that membrane inside my horse? Bad management, certainly!
 
Shilasdair said:
Thank you for your educational :p replies.
I am particularly interested to read Aimeetb's assertion that most cases are due to bad management. As I've had two horses which required surgery for two different types, I'll try to 'up my game' accordingly.
S :D
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You are a bugger you are!! :p:rolleyes:;) - dont pick me, I dont want a beating!! LOL!

Let me re-phrase, most colics I have ever come across have been due to bad management and lack of common sense and in particular not recognising signs and situations that would indicate that colic is a potential at that time, however, as I said in my responce, I don't know everything (just the ones that I have seen) and the next few posters (and you shils) proved that its is most definately NOT ALWAYS bad management - just damn unlucky.

Sorry to hear about your mis-fortunes now let me retreat to my cave with being chewed - I did say most! xxxxxxxxx
 
Wagtail said:
You and me both, Shilasdair. How could I have been so careless as to let that intestine slip through that membrane inside my horse? Bad management, certainly!
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We must both be guilty of cruelty/neglect.
I carelessly gave one of mine a blood clot in her small colon wall (despite no parasites), and the other I foolishly neglected til she suffered from IFEE (idiopathic focal eosinophilic enteritis). :D
Now, I must dash to report someone calling me rude names to rhyme with rugger. :p
S :D
 
Shilasdair said:
We must both be guilty of cruelty/neglect.
I carelessly gave one of mine a blood clot in her small colon wall (despite no parasites), and the other I foolishly neglected til she suffered from IFEE (idiopathic focal eosinophilic enteritis). :D
Now, I must dash to report someone calling me rude names to rhyme with rugger. :p
S :D
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Well I gave my one and only case of colic a strangulated lipoma, how very remiss of me - still I did learn from my mistake and have not given any others one since :D
 
We lost a 7 yo mare after weeks of recurrent colic in the middle of winter (we had her put to sleep on Christmas Eve as decide we couldn't expect the vets to keep on trying to save her). Feed/water were the main suspect, but we had PM and they found extensive scarring probably caused by worms earlier in life. We'd only had her a year and had had worm counts in that time, etc, but the damage was inside. Nothing anyone could have done to save her.
 
Amaranta said:
Well I gave my one and only case of colic a strangulated lipoma, how very remiss of me - still I did learn from my mistake and have not given any others one since :D
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What were you thinking?! :mad:
I suppose I learned from my first expensive mistake, and went for a different type of colic the second time.
Even vets are impressed that I've had such different, yet rare colics...
S :D
 
Horse that ate his straw bed and developed impacted colic - lived this time. We changed it onto shavings but owner addement that she wanted the horse on straw and moved yards after. Horse died a few months later from impacted colic from eating bed.

A young TB x mare would colic if turned out on frosty grass yet if wintered out never had a problem. When stabled was turned out after frost cleared.

Colic induced by constipation - pony not fed any change in diet or work - just prone to these attacks.

School horse prone to impaction colic in winter when on hay - most of the time was fine but would have the odd attack through winter. Given a small daily dose of Liquid Parrafin in feed. Same horse died of colic several years later - new manager not listening.

Same school - pony prone to colic - no obvious reasons - diet, exercise, turnout no different usually settled with a bottle of beer. Several years later pony died of colic.

Pony at grazing dies of colic with unusual symptoms - was colicking but vital signs were not the usual for colic but diagnosed and treated for mild colic. Pony died in night, Autopsy showed a small anurism bleeding into stomach cavity, along with a ruptured bowel. Heavens knows what caused this.

Initial colic may or maynot be management related but once the cause of the colic has been identified then on going could easily be put down to management.

I've been so lucky with my own horses as I've never yet had them develop colic.
 
Colic can be caused by so many things, some bad management and some not... I find this a very strange question.
 
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That has to be biggest load of *******s I have ever heard! a horse will get colic no matter how is managed, some will have horrific management and never get it and some have the best management possible and be down with colic in a regular basis.
 
Shilasdair said:
Hi all
I wonder how many of you believe that colic is a consequence of bad management?
If so, how do you manage your horses to protect them?
S :D
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A lot of colics ARE the result of bad management - although a lot of badly managed horses DON'T get colic - while some well-managed ones do! There are so many different types of colic (and so many different horse behaviours/problems that may predispose to colic) that you CANNOT say a case of colic is due to bad management without a LOT of investigation!!

I have lots of 'rules' to try and avoid colics:

1. Horses must always have access to CLEAN water.
2. Stabled horses should not be left without forage for more than a few hours (and I do late night stables at midnight to top-up (and of course to check for colic which invariably STARTS at 10-11 at night!)
3. Horses coming back from hunting must be cool and dry and have had a drink before they are fed.
4. Horses wormed twice a year for tapeworm - a regular cause of impaction colics.
5. Concentrate feeds fed little and often - always with chaff to prevent 'bolting'.
6. Watch the droppings - harder, drier, or less volume of poo than normal is very often a sign of an impaction colic on the way.
7. EVERY 'change' of forage - i.e. each delivery - unless you are sure it was made on the same farm in the same way at the same time - should be done over at least 24 hours! If you have NONE left and get new, then feed less than normal for a day or two and feed extra chaff! If the new delivery is richer, or more palatable, or wetter, or drier than the last, it could lead to colic either as a result of gorging - or just because it does!
8. Do teeth regularly! Failure to chew adequately can lead to colic!
9. PRAY!
 
JanetGeorge said:
A lot of colics ARE the result of bad management - although a lot of badly managed horses DON'T get colic - while some well-managed ones do! There are so many different types of colic (and so many different horse behaviours/problems that may predispose to colic) that you CANNOT say a case of colic is due to bad management without a LOT of investigation!!

I have lots of 'rules' to try and avoid colics:

1. Horses must always have access to CLEAN water.
2. Stabled horses should not be left without forage for more than a few hours (and I do late night stables at midnight to top-up (and of course to check for colic which invariably STARTS at 10-11 at night!)
3. Horses coming back from hunting must be cool and dry and have had a drink before they are fed.
4. Horses wormed twice a year for tapeworm - a regular cause of impaction colics.
5. Concentrate feeds fed little and often - always with chaff to prevent 'bolting'.
6. Watch the droppings - harder, drier, or less volume of poo than normal is very often a sign of an impaction colic on the way.
7. EVERY 'change' of forage - i.e. each delivery - unless you are sure it was made on the same farm in the same way at the same time - should be done over at least 24 hours! If you have NONE left and get new, then feed less than normal for a day or two and feed extra chaff! If the new delivery is richer, or more palatable, or wetter, or drier than the last, it could lead to colic either as a result of gorging - or just because it does!
8. Do teeth regularly! Failure to chew adequately can lead to colic!
9. PRAY!
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I never do number 9 - that's obviously where I fail. :p
S :D
 
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