Copper deficiency? Boost?

[PapaverFollis]

So both my horses are showing niggling signs of copper deficiency. Coat and hoof issues... I suspect my field to be high in iron and possibly the other one that interferes with copper absorption.

I've been feeding Equivita balancer which should counteract a normal high iron level. I've not been able to get my grass tested because of Covid though I will check back to see if Forage Plus are "go" again... so I don't know if I'm looking at abnormally high iron in the forage...

But. They've been on Equivita for a month and I was seeing some improvement but its all still there, especially now there's more grass coming through. I wonder if Equivita is fine for maintenance but I need to give them a boost the get them back on track?

I'm considering giving a further supplement but not sure if I need to speak to a vet first. I imagine a vet looking at me like I've grown a second head if I start rambling about minerals though... and I don't know how a further supplements would interact with the Equivita.

I think I might phone the Equivita lady for her input. But without forage analysis and interpretation I feel like I'm flying blind. I'm just looking at feet and coat and knowing it's not right.

???

Any thoughts?

 

[PapaverFollis]

No-one?

I've emailed Equivita anyway.

 

[bluehorse]

How much copper and zinc is in the equivita? it might be that you need more, you could always ask Forageplus for advice? Check the molybdenum levels on your soil too, that can cause similar issues if it’s very high and the fix is to supplement with additional copper and zinc (although the only fix for my boy was to move yards unfortunately).

 

[PapaverFollis]

Well I can't move yards because they're at home so I'm screwed if I can't fix it!

I will speak to forage plus and get analysis asap but they arent doing it at the moment.

I'm not sure about zinc but Equivita says 400mg if copper and there's an appropriate amount if zinc to go with that.

 

[bluehorse]

Well I can't move yards because they're at home so I'm screwed if I can't fix it!

I will speak to forage plus and get analysis asap but they arent doing it at the moment.

I'm not sure about zinc but Equivita says 400mg if copper and there's an appropriate amount if zinc to go with that.

It was off the scale molybdenum, Forageplus said it was beyond their reference range so must be quite unusual. Hopefully it’s nothing to do with your issue, it’s just something to be aware of.

The levels of copper and zinc in Equivita match Forageplus balancers. I do know you can double that amount and still be within a safe theraputic range (did that with mine to correct red blood cell anaemia). So it might be worth doing that for a short period if you can’t get any advice at the moment.

Have you looked at the UK Soil Observatory interactive soil maps?

http://www.ukso.org/

It won’t beat analysis obviously but give you a good indication of whether you have high or low levels of a particular mineral in your area so might be worth a look.

Hope you get to the bottom of it...

 

[PapaverFollis]

Thank you. Looked at some soil analysis for the general area and high molybdenum is possible but not an overwhelming chance. Plus as it is our land there seems to be a couple of things you can do to the land to lower the molybdenum in the vegetation...

Spoke to farmer we bought the place from and just plain low copper seems likely. They supplement the sheep and cows. And if they supplement the sheep then it must be really quite low as they don't need much.

I'm leaning towards a course of Cuppra to give them a boost as I looked up safe levels and it's very very high to overdose them (2,500mg a day).

 

[Leo Walker]

I'm at livery so use this to get a good, rough idea of levels

http://www.ukso.org/maps.html

You have to balance copper and zinc so I would be very wary of just adding copper

 

[PapaverFollis]

Hmmmm Scotland doesn't seem to be covered...

 

[Leo Walker]

Hmmmm Scotland doesn't seem to be covered...

Dammit! I didn't think to check first, sorry!

 

[PapaverFollis]

It's ok, don't worry! There was some scottish stuff there but not as a map... but I didn't drill into it enough to check if there was anything relevant to me.

I think I'm going to go for the course of Cuppra... the grass analysis as soon as possible. I'm a bit worried about the molybdenum now as I know the fields were limed a couple of years ago which can release the molybdenum to the vegetation. Hope Forage Plus get going again soon!

 

[bluehorse]

Hmmmm Scotland doesn't seem to be covered...

Oh that’s useful then! Sorry about that...

I didn’t mean to worry you about the molybdenum, as I said in my previous post, it was off the scale. I’ve heard from one vet that it causes cushings type symptoms, but my regular vet had never heard of it causing issues. Cushings symptoms definitely fits with mine, but other horses on the yard appeared To be completely unaffected.

 

[PapaverFollis]

It's ok ? I'll just be mildly fixated on a element I can't even pronounce properly for a while. Have spoken to the farmers and they don't know the molybdenum status so I'm implying from that that it's not insane anyway. Just low copper.

 

[palo1]

So both my horses are showing niggling signs of copper deficiency. Coat and hoof issues... I suspect my field to be high in iron and possibly the other one that interferes with copper absorption.

I've been feeding Equivita balancer which should counteract a normal high iron level. I've not been able to get my grass tested because of Covid though I will check back to see if Forage Plus are "go" again... so I don't know if I'm looking at abnormally high iron in the forage...

But. They've been on Equivita for a month and I was seeing some improvement but its all still there, especially now there's more grass coming through. I wonder if Equivita is fine for maintenance but I need to give them a boost the get them back on track?

I'm considering giving a further supplement but not sure if I need to speak to a vet first. I imagine a vet looking at me like I've grown a second head if I start rambling about minerals though... and I don't know how a further supplements would interact with the Equivita.

I think I might phone the Equivita lady for her input. But without forage analysis and interpretation I feel like I'm flying blind. I'm just looking at feet and coat and knowing it's not right.

???

Any thoughts?

Equivita is a really good supplement and a great company to deal with BUT I think (please feel free to correct me) that they do not use sufficient quantities of copper and zinc in their balancers to address a really serious iron problem/deficiency. I know that we have had to add significant quantities of extra of both of those so I would think if you are still having issues then the best way forward would deffo be to get a forage analysis and mineral supplementation plan. Then you could carry on using an equivita balancer but add extra zinc and copper/others as advised. This is what I have had to do over several years and it does work but you do need to know what you are trying to balance if you are still having coat/feet niggles.

 

[PapaverFollis]

I think their quantities are good for typical UK soil but speaking to the farmer we have lower copper than typical so I'm definitely going to need to add more.

 

[PapaverFollis]

Update. Have managed to find somewhere that can do me a forage mineral analysis now. A farming place rather than an equestrian specific one. Not sure how much difference it makes except it's half the price of forage plus and available now!

 

[PapaverFollis]

Another update on this. Got my field analysed. High in all copper antagonists. Low on calcium. Generally not great. Although good amount of selenium which is rare in the uk! But am on to Forage Plus to get a recipe to balance it out.

I did give them a month of Cuppra to boost their copper and found the results pretty amazing actually! No pictures of the feet but dreadful tatty, thrushy frogs and weak, black, stone collecting whitelines have all changed to now nicely solid frogs (although a way still to go before they actually beef back up to strongly functional frogs) and very few little stones in the whitelines. Obviously feet will take a while to change but they've definitely shifted a big step in the right direction.

The most obvious thing has been the change in the chestnut's coat.... again it's not all the way improved yet but if you'd told me it would change as much as it has I wouldn't have believed it without seeing it. Mostly updating this as I have pictures to show the change and want to share them.

So before...


And after a month of Cuppra...


And a side view comparison...

Excited about getting them on the forage plus recipe now and hopefully getting them looking and feeling much better. I will 100% be testing hay and grass pretty regularly from now on having seen the massive effect it can have!

 

[ycbm]

Amazing, isn't it? Well done for sorting it.

 

[PapaverFollis]

Amazing, isn't it? Well done for sorting it.

I've just found it mindbendingly fascinating! I keep wanting to talk about it. I started to talk about it to a neighbour who stopped for a chat yesterday then had to remind myself that normal people aren't that interested in the mineral content of my horse's diets. ???

Got my forageplus recipes through... gonna be a lot of powder!

 

[dorsetladette]

I'm just heading down that rabbit hole of mystery. My older cob holds a bit of his coat. He looks a bit like your first picture this year. His feet are not great (neither are the younger ones TBH) and chip within a week or so of farrier visit. He also has thrush which I'm struggling to clear even though the ground is so dry and should clear easily.
So, once my samples come back I will be starting another thread on my results. Please feel free to talk away. All advise is gratefully received.

 

[ownedbyaconnie]

Sorry to hijack but I just had a look at that link Leo Walker posted and how fascinating! My area is 0% for copper and magnesium according to the map. I already supplement magnesium but am now looking into Cuppra. It says on the website to do two lots of 30 days a year, do people tend to do every 6 months then? Would you tie this in with changing from winter/summer fields or just whenever? My mare is newly barefoot (about 3 months ish) and farrier said her feet are doing really well but are a tad thrushy, I had been spraying with red horse products but he used artimud today so will buy some of that too.

 

[PapaverFollis]

Personally I viewed the Cuppra as a one off short term boost and am planning to feed copper and zinc in the correct balance at required levels continuously going forward. But if I just wanted to use Cuppra I would time it to co-incide with coat changes and use twice a year.

My grey mare didn't have an obvious coat issue but her frogs were just riddled with a thrush I could not get to clear up woth topical treatment. About a week into giving Cuppra they started to clear up. She has also been replacing all her coat in a similar way to tge chestnut but not as obvious.

 

[Reacher]

I have started mr H on extra copper and zinc . I’m hoping his thrush clears up too. (His coat is bright bay , colour looks fine)

 

[PapaverFollis]

It'll be interesting to hear if it helps, Reacher.

 

[Pinkvboots]

Progressive earth sell copper and zinc separately.

 

[PapaverFollis]

Just worked out how much copper The Beast will be getting according to the Forage Plus recipe! ?? it's rather a lot more than they were getting even with the Cuppra on top of a "high copper" supplement... pretty much twice as much in fact. Geeeez.

 

[Micky]

That link isn’t now working above..you’ve got my interest piqued so how would I find out what is in a peat based field? Apart from deep mud when it rains..?