Do your horses like eating 'human' food?

One of my horses loves jelly babies. Instead of horse treats I have a bag of jelly babies in the lorry for when he behaves. I don't know how this was found out, but when we bought him his previous owners said he had to have jelly babies!! His favourite are the pink and black ones, which unfortunatly are my favourite too, so we have to fight it out!!!!! He also has a soft spot for vodka, malibu and ribena (not all mixed together i'll hasten to add!) and will happily drink straight out of the glass!

The rest of the time he is a grumpy b*gger!!!!!
 
the only human food my pony likes are mints - he does not like any other processed foods including the majority of horse treats and some horse feeds as well and some hay. he is very greedy though for things he does like.

I bought some oat and apple biscuits and he even did not like that or flapjack which I thought he would love being oaty and sweet!
 
I had a QH who was very partial to human food and you had to be very careful to keep your lunch/snacks out of his sight/reach - he tried pork pies, chips with BBQ sauce; the worst was when I was tucking into a chilli-burger at the end of a pleasure ride and he tucked into the other side... I have no idea what motivated him to these sorts of foods, bless him.
 
My old pony stole everythin including tuna sandwidges, his fave was jelly babies though :D
Honey loves prawn cocktail crisps, she even went as far as mugging my nan for some :p
 
My Clydesdale is passionate about Powerade & V she will drink both straight from the bottle.

Is also addicted to peppermints too (has an english mum) - can't get Polo's here so she has Oddfellows instead.
 
Mine LOVES human food, he has been known to steal a sausage roll as a girl walked past his stable, he likes ham sandwich but only proper ham not wafer thin, he loves bread, bananas, he likes doughnuts with lots of icing!! he loves biscuits and looks forward to the farrier coming as he always gets biscuis while we have tea to keep him occupied!
 
My girl loves chocolate hobnobs, she'll mug you for them. She does make me laugh cause her eyes pop out when she sees the packet coming towards her... Infact she's a bit like her mum and loves chocolate.. oops :eek: it is very rare that she gets any though so it makes it even more special when she does... The other 2 arent really bothered by them.
 
Mine used to love pot noodles, and those pink shrimps and eggs you get from pick n mix sweets. Though he hasn't had them in years as we're very strict with his diet now.
 
Human food would include apples, turnips, parsnips, carrots and polos then yes? Most feed at least three of those... my horses haven't had colic off those *touch wood*

I only ever feed small amounts but my gelding enjoys luke warm or cold coffee out of mum's cup and mints... any mint at all. He "fleeces" you for them, undo's pockets etc... so we don't feed him tipbits often!
My mare loves: Red grapes, green grapes, melon, passionfruit, parsnips, turnips, orange, nice biscuits, bourbons, most crisps, bread, sandwiches if she can grab them, chocolate, sweeties (rare!)
Other mare lived near Cadbury's (years ago previous owner used to pop up for freebies) so LOVES chocolate but doesn't get it very often (once every two years a tiny bit maximum)
 
misty loves everything- burgers crisps etc but now has diabetes, so all treats out unfortunatly! no more mugging me for my crusts!
cloud loves coleslaw and chicken pasties- daft mare!
dont give matrix treats anymore- he bites :rolleyes: but i used to give him my crusts :p
 
irish_only said:
Black coffee - make him a mugful and put it in his bucket, he drinks it and licks the bucket clean lol
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Are you not concerned that that is very harmful to him? :confused:

I'm guessing no one on this thread has been through the torture of watching, and losing, your beloved horse to colic :( :(
 
irish_only said:
Black coffee - make him a mugful and put it in his bucket, he drinks it and licks the bucket clean lol
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Mine likes a lick of black coffee too but we don't give him much or he'd be off the roof (he's like a little kid with sweeties!) :)

Edit: have seen horses be PTS from colic, identified it myself in another horse and none were through feeding human food but it can happen.
 
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The Old Appy had a fairly long list of favourites :- Idris Ginger beer, half coated digestive biscuits, cheese and onion crisps, coffee with milk and sugar (used to steal this off the farrier). Her friend (TbxWelsh D) loved cherry cola. The current Appy eats the bread off burgers and hot dogs (we tend to fight over them at shows) and has a taste for gin. If we go on a pub ride, I tend to drink gin, the mare knocks it over my hand and then licks up the spills. The Old Appy lived until she was 33, so I do not fear over much for the health of this ones digestion.
 
Puppy said:
Are you not concerned that that is very harmful to him? :confused:

I'm guessing no one on this thread has been through the torture of watching, and losing, your beloved horse to colic :( :(
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Eh nobody is feeding their horse solely on 'human food' nor are they even using it as a major part of the horses diet.

Of the major colics I've known, 3 have been from grass, 2 from haylage, 1 from worms and the remainder of no particular dietary cause. Clearly grass and haylage are dangerous so we shouldn't feed them to horses at all. And even with anthelmintic provision, worms can still be a problem so we should prevent them from eating from the ground and feed only a sterile feedstuff and keep them in a gnotobiotic environment. Hmmm.

My old girl does seem to like many 'human foods'. She stole the ice cream from a cone that a toddler was holding (god the embarrassment!!) and ate my whole bacon and fried egg roll in one go - well she spat out the fried egg intact so I reckon bacon is to her liking but not eggs!!!
 
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