Do you feed what it says on the bag.....

If I fed the reccomended amount on the bag I would just have very expensive horse poo and a fat hyper horse!!!
She doesn't need much feed to keep her going!
 
I feed according to the horse, its age, condition and work, plus temperament, I find that most concentrate recommendations are twice the amount I feed to my mature animal; I wondered if I might be underfeeding vitamins and minerals, but my horse gets to graze in a proper field during the day with mixed grasses, herbs and hedges, not an overgrazed billiard table. He gets good hay and haylage as well in winter.
I have changed from cereal based sweet feed to a fibre based regime, with an alfalfa/oat straw chaff in addition to a molasses and barley free conditioning feed (Allen and Page) This works for light work, if he gets more than 60 minutes exercise, he either gets more of his conditioning feed, or, if he is lacking energy. a mix of alfalafa and Mare and Youngstock which has oats plus mineral and vitamins.
I think that most horses are overfed in winter, a lot of hay and haylage is thrown out in the wheelbarrow in spite of it being good quality. A lot of happy hackers are good doers, so small feeds are a treat and top up vitamins and minerals, personally I like to feed a mix of fibrous feeds eg hay, haylage, oat straw chaff and alfalfa chaff, the chaff helps to aid digestion, and makes the diet more interesting for the horse without fizzing them up with cereals.
Horses tend to come in from summer grass with a generous layer of fat, in nature this would help them through the winter, and they are pretty lean come spring. I try to emulate this by controlling their feed intake, and walking the fat off.
 
Mine gets a handfull of hi fi lite and a mug of balancer, but I was looking at someones Safe & Sound and thinking what a nice moist yummy feed it looked until I realised a bag would only last 15 days if I fed at recommended amount!!
 
Crikey, no. I've never had a horse that needed anything like the sort of amounts recommended on the bag (always thought the recommended figures were a kind of marketing ploy tbh). Mine get most of what they need from their haylage, the short feed is more to make them feel special and to mix supplements into.
 
If I fed according to the bag my good doer would burst :) I feed 1.5% of her bodyweight and weigh her every 2 weeks.
 
it amazes me the levels they advise on some bags as others have said theyed all be on their sides unable to get up

I go by scoops only because ive been doing it for so long its ingrained as to how much gives what effect.
 
My daughter's horse get pretty near the recommended amount as he is hunting and competing. My good doer only gets a handful as a token though.

What does surprise me is the number of people who give their horse a couple of handfuls of mix and say that they feed the mix to ensure their horse gets its vit/mins! They don't seem to realise that to be of use for vit/min supplementation it has to be fed at or near the recommended rate.
 
I go by what I see in front of me. My pony recently lost weight so I introduced a conditioning feed at 1/3 of the recommended amount. I continued this over 10 day and weight was gained. I had no need to feed the 3 scoops advised as the I got the result I wanted in a controlled way, topping up the diet with a balancer.
 
I bought some A&P stuff for laminitics to keep my boy's weight down, as he isn't laminitic but I keep a watchful eye. When I carried out the instructions for feeding at the recommended quantities I was horrified! Once it was soaked it filled his feed skip right to the top. There was no way I was going to give him that much even between 2 feeds! The sack would have lasted 2 weeks. He hated the stuff anyway...
I think it's all a massive rip-off. Most sacks of feed fed at recommended doses would last less than a month, even those for laminitics. I don't understand how they can recommend you feed a laminitic that much? And just try to find something specifically made for laminitics which is free from molasses!
My good doer now gets a couple of handfuls of low sugar chaff with vits and mins and a 15 kg sack of chaff lasts him about 2 months.
 
I feed Allen and Page Power and Performance, for the fact it can be fed at just 600g a day for the recommended vits and mins for a horse in light work. She actually gets about 1.2kg a day, as she is generally working a little bit harder than that! She also gets Molichaff calmer now which is also supplemented. I used to feed (and do love!) the winergy feeds, but at a bag a week, I just couldn't afford it!!
 
The only time I do is with Bluechip but the recommended amount is around 400g

With 3 feeds a day the recommended amount for every other food we have would be too much for him, I've always wondered why it is so much?
 
Kokopelli said:
The only time I do is with Bluechip but the recommended amount is around 400g

With 3 feeds a day the recommended amount for every other food we have would be too much for him, I've always wondered why it is so much?
Click to expand...

Working on the basis of the recommended daily amount being split between 3 feeds, and no feed being larger than 2kg I wonder what you're feeding to necessitate feeding more than that?
 
Nope.

I feed Healthy Hooves and for Bella according to her type and build etc they recommend 3 scoops but I give her just under 2 as she is maintaining her weight nicely and is growing too. Same for daughters youngster, he gets 2 scoops and the little fatty gets less than half a scoop so she thinks she's getting something.

Dread to think how long the bags would last if we fed at recommended rates. 2 bags last about 3 weeks for the 3 of them. Oh and Ebony gets 2 handfuls (literally) as she is a very good doer
 
sleepingdragon10 said:
Working on the basis of the recommended daily amount being split between 3 feeds, and no feed being larger than 2kg I wonder what you're feeding to necessitate feeding more than that?
Click to expand...

I'm not feeding more than that.
I'm saying that even if we did feed the recommended amount between 3 feeds it would be far too much and wanted to know why the recommended amount is so much.

Sorry I'm not great at getting what I want to say into words.
 
Kokopelli said:
I'm saying that even if we did feed the recommended amount between 3 feeds it would be far too much and wanted to know why the recommended amount is so much.
Click to expand...

Far too much in what way?

Obviously with good doers, feeding the recommended rate would be far too much in terms of calorie levels, and I do think the daily rates of the 'good doer', 'laminitic' and 'leisure' feeds are generally too high on that basis.

However, when it comes to horses in poor condition or those working hard then often it is necessary to feed near the recommended rate to get the extra calories into them.
 
Kokopelli said:
I'm not feeding more than that.
I'm saying that even if we did feed the recommended amount between 3 feeds it would be far too much and wanted to know why the recommended amount is so much.

Sorry I'm not great at getting what I want to say into words.
Click to expand...

Tis ok:)

I suppose the recommended amount would contain a full compliment of what the manufacturers consider to be the horses daily requirement of vits/mins etc.
 
TGM said:
Far too much in what way?

Obviously with good doers, feeding the recommended rate would be far too much in terms of calorie levels, and I do think the daily rates of the 'good doer', 'laminitic' and 'leisure' feeds are generally too high on that basis.

However, when it comes to horses in poor condition or those working hard then often it is necessary to feed near the recommended rate to get the extra calories into them.
Click to expand...

The amount would be too much and it would just go striaght through him and not give him a chance to get the goodness out of the food.
 
Kokopelli said:
The amount would be too much and it would just go striaght through him and not give him a chance to get the goodness out of the food.
Click to expand...

That would only be the case if you fed more than he could fit in the stomach per feed - the usual guideline as SD10 has said is about 2kg per feed. If you take Spiller's Conditioning Cubes as an example, they suggest 3-4kg a day for a 15.2hh riding club horse, so you could easily give 3 x 1kg feeds a day without overloading the stomach.
 
I can't remember the details/amounts now, but when I was trying to get weight on Dizzy last year, if I'd fed everything that the manufacturers told me to feed, I'd have had to feed her five times a day (going by the 2kg rule).

As with most peeps on here, I feed according to what is in front of me, i.e. the condition of the horse, plus taking into account the workload.

At the moment they all get a handful of Happy Hoof (in because LL is laminitic and two of the others go whappy on sugar), plus a specific vit and mineral supplement, which is fed according to the manufacturer's instructions.

If any of them drop weight, then dependent on which horse it is depends on what the feeding response is. Dizz will get sugarbeet or Equijewel, or both if she needs it; LC will get sugarbeet (non-mollassed) as will LL; GM will get more chaff/short fibre as anything else heats her up, though if she was somehow in need, she would have the Equijewel as well.
 
Nooooo!!!
I brought a bag of healthy hooves for my boy and was astonished to read he should be getting 3kg a day of it which equals to 6 big round scoops!!! They're having a laugh, If I fed that a bag would only last a week. I give him about 1/3 of the scoop with vits and mins as he really doesn't need it.

My other horse is nearly on the reccomended amount of conditioning cubes as he needs it but hes also fed other stuff too.

You can see why some horses go loopy when owners follow the guidelines- thinking they're doing the right thing.

Feed for the individual :)
 
Tried that with Bailey's Outshine, cue one insane horse, rearing and bucking in his stable! Now he is back on C&C and is fed what I think suits him, not what it says on the bag! And is back to his laid back(ish) self.
FDC
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top