Feeding a horse with alergies

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iCandy

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Hi all. I have a horse who is allergic to alfalfa and also reacts to soya, barley and molasses. He's 4 and is only on hay / grazing at the moment but would like him to have a more balanced diet. As yet I haven't found a balancer that does not contain these. Any ideas? Thanks :)
 
You could get a soil/hay analysis done so that you can make your own balancer containing the individual elements that your grazing/hay is lacking?
 
You could give him Thunderbrook Pure Essentails Base Mix http://thunderbrook.co.uk/equine-pure-essentials-base-mix/ they also do a meadow chaff (non mollassed) http://thunderbrook.co.uk/green-meadow-herb-grass-chaff/ and then you could also give him a natural herb blend for his allergies if you wanted to as well - there are a number of blends on EquiNatural depending on what he is allergic too - they also do a natural balancer: http://www.equinatural.co.uk/epages/BT3755.sf/en_GB/?ObjectPath=/Shops/BT3755/Categories/Allergies
 
Good luck finding anything that doesn't contain Soya. I have a horse who can't have alfalfa or molasses and although there are now many feeds that don't contain these soya ends up being the next main ingredient - it's a nightmare. I try to avoid it at all costs but it's a struggle.

You could feed a simple unmollassed beet and something like Pro-Balance... http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/PRO-BALAN...ealth-Supplement-Horse-Minerals-/280882042025

I feed two of my TB's like this and it works a treat, one gets KeyFlow KeyPlus rice bran added to help keep condition and I have no issues. :)
 
Thanks for the replies, they are really appreciated :) I have dug the test results out again from the skin test and forgot that there are more relevant allergens. He also can't have oat or wheat. I have thought about making my own balancer or buying it in powder form but its going to be tricky to get him to eat it. He's already gone off the speedibeet and I worry I will struggle to find a tasty chaff that's isn't made with alfalfa.
 
I wouldn't bother with supplements unless your hay is cut off your own grazing. Feed grassnuts/dried grass from different sources and you will be replicating the horses natural diet. I had a seriously allergic horse for many years and we kept her diet very simple and she was fine - alfalfa was one of the things she could tolerate actually but we only used it when we first found out what her problems were.
 
My youngster is allergic to alfalfa, garlic and molasses. Nightmare finding anything but dried grass to feed him until I found Simple Systems.
No cereal, molasses, additives or preservatives. Although the diet is primarily based on alfalfa, they have a lot of grass products which my boy is thriving on.

Definitely worth giving them a look.
 
Soya is tricky as it's used as a base in so many things.

You could try the forageplus balancers, they use a base of linseed and just the minerals but because they don't contain all the additives are not as tasty and need to be introduced very gradually.

http://forageplus.co.uk/


Unless you go for a straight straw chaff most have molasses in or alfalfa and I'm not sure plain chaff will be enough to tempt him. You could try adding things like mint or fenugreek to add a bit of flavour to the speedibeet. Or readigrass or similar as a carrier.
 
I feed my allergic to just about everything horse Just Chaff (oat straw and hay chaff with nothing else added - you can't use this but maybe substitute with something like Graze On), Speedibeet, seaweed/rosehips, MagOx and linseed and he looks amazing on it. In the winter he gets Blue Bag Grass Nuts added.
 
Thanks for all the suggestions! I'm going to try him on Speedibeet with micronised linseed and brewers yeast and will add / take away where needed. May pop some mint in to help tempt him :)
 
There is absolutely no need to feed any feed with Soy or Alfalfa in it.

Go back to basics. As he is allergic to Barley you could try Oats or Rice. Sugar beet, meadow chaff, and Linseed.

Buy a multi mineral block and allow 24/7 access to it.

Believe it or not we did not feed balancers and masses of minerals at one time. Horses got powdered lime, salt and some got Cod Liver Oil. Some got the rusty water from soaking nails in a bucket of water.

If you can't buy meadow chaff then use a garden mulches to chop up your hay. Does a good job.
 
Thanks Tnavas :)
Micky - he came up with lumps and bumps on his skin and after months of investigations we had him allergy tested. The dermatologist injected him with 65 needles on a pre-drawn graph on his skin and recorded the changes. I then got a report with her findings. There are some really random things on the report that aren't related to feed like cigarette smoke, bird feathers, dogs etc.
 
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