Fed up of getting ripped off

Is it a case that horses (like people) will cope happily with an average diet, might be low in a few things but will generally tick along fine. Is it only horses in high intensity work that really need their diets analysed?
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I used to think so but now I'm less sure. I suspect there an a lot of laminitis cases being tipped over the edge by the average grazing in this country being too high in iron.

And since expecting horses to work without shoes, it's become obvious to me that feed with added sugar and forage made from high sugar ryegrass are pure poison to a lot of horses, and yet that's what most horses are fed.
 
Hi all, the campaign is growing and we've even had the director of Freestep try and hijack the group..... please keep spreading the word... there's more to come and ore we can do :)
 
ycbm said:
I used to think so but now I'm less sure. I suspect there an a lot of laminitis cases being tipped over the edge by the average grazing in this country being too high in iron.

And since expecting horses to work without shoes, it's become obvious to me that feed with added sugar and forage made from high sugar ryegrass are pure poison to a lot of horses, and yet that's what most horses are fed.
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oh thats interesting about the laminitis, never knew that.

Am thinking of keeping one of mine barefoot as she has hardy hooves, is there anything you would recommend for feed? She get fed the small bales of robinsons haylage, so i'm worried now it mightn't help her
 
I don't disagree with the thrust of this FB group, but for my taste, it is intermingling two separate topics too much (as can be seen by comments here and on FB). One is about the wide topic of general horse nutrition, and the other about false advertisement in the equine industry. I can get fully behind the false advertisement part (does this product deliver what it promises?), but IMO, this should be separate from the much wider topic of equine nutrition (what is the best way to feed my horse?). Optimum equine nutrition is an open research topic with few clear-cut answers available. So long as a product does not make false claims, I don't think it should be part of the discussion whether brand X's balancer is better than brand Y's vit&min supplement. It's a different topic, and just scatters the focus of this campaign.
 
paddi22 said:
oh thats interesting about the laminitis, never knew that.

Am thinking of keeping one of mine barefoot as she has hardy hooves, is there anything you would recommend for feed? She get fed the small bales of robinsons haylage, so i'm worried now it mightn't help her
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She may be fine, many are. If not:

Avoid ryegrass haylage, it's far too high in sugar. Buy timothy if you can (Horsehage do it and in Cheshire Roger Nicholas does it in three bale sizes). Avoid any food with added sugar, molasses, molglo, or any syrup in the ingredients list (that's most of them!!).

If your pony does well, that's it. If she is sensitive, then feed either Progressive Earth or Forageplus supplement, which have no iron or manganese and high copper, zinc and magnesium.

If she still has sensitivity, add yeast if there isn't any in the supplement you are giving.

If that doesn't work, test for Cushings and EMS.
 
I think this is brilliant, I am sick of my YM and other livery owners telling me I should put my horse on some concoction or another cos of XYZ and when I tell them to look at the ingredients list they are baffled as to why I take exception to them.

I've just asked to join the group there. I have some supplements I would love to hear peoples ideas on.
 
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