Feed advice for my herd please.........

YasandCrystal

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Right - I have a really mixed herd of horses. A 17hh WB starting light work, a very good doer 14.2 hh cob who will be in medium work, a 2 yr old Dales youngster (good doer) and a retired 22 yr old 10hh pony.

The WB is sugar and cereal intolerant. Last winter (I had an ISH mare too) I fed everyone something different - the WB A & P sugar and cereal intolerant feed and carob and micronised linseed, my mare had A & P Veteren Vitality and carob and the 10 hh Healthy Hooves and carob. All had a general vit and min balancer.

They get adlib hay/haylage in winter.

This year I am really keen to feed everyone the same but in varying quantities and add oil to those needing condition.

I have thought about the new Dengie 'Happy Tummy' chaff/feed as I thought the 'good doers' could have mainly that. I thought I could buy grass nuts and carob/locust bean kibble ( much cheaper than the A & P feeds!) and give these alongside the Happy Tummy to the WB and to the good doers if they lose condition or the weather is particularly bad. I also thought about some unmolassed beet to add for everyone. The 10hh is typical elderly now and will likely need soaked grass nuts and the beet to make a sloppy feed. Then Rape seed or Rice Bran oil for condition for the aged pony and WB and a general vit + min for all.
I dropped the micronised linseed, but maybe I should get that as an alternative to oil?


Would that work? Have I overcomplicated it? I kept the carob in there as it is packed with nutrients and I quite rate it.
Thanks for reading.
 

fizzer

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I have a herd of 7. Range from 13hh ponies to 17.2 Shire x. I got fed up of having so many feeds for each. Now on Pure Fibre Balance as they only need vits & mins. Will be adding Fast Fibre in winter to bulk out. So much easier and all looking fab.
 

YasandCrystal

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I have a herd of 7. Range from 13hh ponies to 17.2 Shire x. I got fed up of having so many feeds for each. Now on Pure Fibre Balance as they only need vits & mins. Will be adding Fast Fibre in winter to bulk out. So much easier and all looking fab.

Ah thanks for that - I did keep meaning to research the Pure feeds - I shall take a look now!
 

Ilovefoals

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Like you I have a range of horses from a 17hh 4yr old Irish Draught, a 17yr old 16.1hh dutch wb mare, her 2yr old daughter, a 22yr old sec A with Cushings and a little fat shetland. I'm going to feed them all Dengie Healthy Tummy. Got my first bag today and it smells lush! The ID and Sec A are the only ones getting it at the mo but when the weather worsens, they all will. I'll probably add speedibeet if they need extra energy but tbh, they wont really be doing that much over winter. Seems like a great complete feed to me :)

ETA The Healthy Tummy is coated with soya oil so you shouldn't need to buy seperate oil and also contains Protexin too. I can see it saving me a lot of money as I feed Protexin and Linseed oil seperately and will no longer need to.
 
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