Foal's Hard Feed

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assuan

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Morning all,

Need some advice please, we have 6 month old foal that we have just imported. He has been with us a week and in transit for around a week before hand.

He was weaned off milk around 4 months old and separated from the mare a month later. From 4 months old he was eating an alfalfa based product and cubes along with the rest of the herd he was with (they had to fight for the food) nothing that special.

During transit he only had hay and since being with us has only had hay and 2 hours of grass a day. He hasn't lost his appetite as such, but we can't get him to eat any hard food. It's been two weeks since he's had any hard food and a week since he arrived, so he's had enough time to settle in. We've tried with the hard food a few times with not sucess, but it's getting to the stage now where I'm concerned becauase he's obviously not getting everything he needs from just hay and grass. We've got him with Baileys Stud Mix and Hi-fi Lite, he won't touch it. We've tried mixing in apples, apple juice and molasses (which he'll happily eat of your fingers!), we've even threw in some cubes (which he will eat out of hand) but he just gives it a sniff and ignores it. We've tried tacking out various aspects at a time, but still no luck.

He's also now started to eat the wood in his box (going to get some CribX later)

Any advice or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
 
What about just giving him the cubes he likes in a bucket on their own, and see if he is tempted by that? Or, what about dampening his feed so it is not so dry/hard.

My friends youngster was a very fussy eater - she loved eating her mum's old faithful feed, but would turn her nose up at her youngstock feed. Eventually she got use to the 'new' taste of her feed and has been fine since. Then again, she was also unsure/scared of certain buckets too, which didn't help at feeding time. Maybe something else for you to consider? I'm fortunate where my youngster is a ganit and will demolish anything put before him.

It may just be your baby is still settling and getting over such a huge move. I would make sure he has as much forage as possible, give him another week or two, and if you are still worried, maybe consult a vet for advice.

What about putting some nuts in the hay? XX
 
thanks Rudey,

We kind of dampened the feed with the apple juice. Will try just giving him a bucket of cubes for a couple of days and get him used to eating hard feed again, then maybe slowly introduce the stud mix into that.

We tried hiding stuff in the hay, he ate around it (and under it somehow) lol
He's ok with the bucket, I had that thought, so put some hay in the bottom and he ate that without a problem and quite happy to stick is nose right in there.

It's difficult at the moment also because we are giving him Bute and Immuforte, but we're having to syringe it into his mouth as he won't eat the food.
 
assuan said:
but it's getting to the stage now where I'm concerned becauase he's obviously not getting everything he needs from just hay and grass.
Click to expand...

why do you say that?

Is he dropping off? It's quite normal for weanlings to look a bit poor after weaning and particularly after such a long journey. try not to worry. They REALLY don't need half the feed we often give over here.

I would firstly get him a dengie stable lick for him to have access to over night. this will provide him with all the vits and mins he needs and so long as he has add lib access to hay and good grass he'll be absolutely fine!

have you tried alfa a? I would try alfa lite (in small quantities) as it doesn't have as much sugar and then gradually introduce other things... sometimes it takes a while for them to latch on to new things but once they get going there'll be no stopping them!
 
Your foal is likely to be very stressed. Weaning off milk at 4 months is very young. He has been removed from his mother and herd. Then he has had an extremely long journey where the grass, hay, water, everything tastes different. Course mix would be the last thing i would give any foal, especially a stressed one. That will just increase the chance of ulcers, which i suspect he has already- especially as hes chewing wood.

You need to give him ad lib hay and plenty of grass. If you know for definite that he has eaten alfalfa before (someone could just have said it) then get some alfalfa. Leave it with him all the time. Then add a supplement for vits/mins such as suregrow from dodson and horrell. Throw out whats left each day and replace with fresh.

Dont try to feed bits of this and that, he doesnt know what they are! He has to learn to eat new things. Everything is alien to him and hes stressed so im not surprised hes not eating. You just have to persevere.
 
Thank you all for your comments!

He couldn't go out for long, he's come from Minorca and we were advised to restrict his grazing so he didn't go mad on the grass straight away, obviously because of their lack of luscious grass in Minorca. He also couldn't go out with other horses because we were waiting for test to come back from the vets checking he hadn't picked up an nasty diseases at some point.

We've had the results from the vet back, all clear, as we suspected.

I've also managed to get him eating his hard food. I started with a few handfuls of cubes, small amount of stud mix and some water to 'slush' it up a bit. We're slowly adjusting the mixture and have now also got some hi-fi in there too. The ratio of cubes to mix is being adjusted daily, he's not having more stud than cubes (and for some strange reason the water has seemed to get warmer in the cold weather - i.e. the mrs is using the kettle for feeds! bless her)

He's also got some friends in the field now, we've introduced him to a couple of gelds who are nice and friendly. He's spending most of the day out now also. One of them keeps grabbing his mane and pulling him around a little bit, but I guess thats natural (hope so anyway)

Anyway, again many thanks to all that replied.
 
foal pellets!! they contain a fair bit of milk powder to ease the weaning off of the mother and the foals love them. Mix them in with his normal feed or use seperatle just to get his appetitie back up to speed. They've been our saviour for our orphan foal!
 
I have 2 five month old faols I bought at auction last week. One eats stud mix, no problem at all, the other wouldnt touch it. I bought a bag of rolled oats and a bag of pony nuts , I have managed to get him eating hard feed by offering him 4 oz oats and 4 oz pony nuts. he nuzzled them around a bit for a couple of days , now hes eating this small amount. I added a tiny bit of stud mix last night and he ate it all ok.
I will be adding more stud mix over the next week or so . Small amounts of plain food have won the day. I have noticed in the past that some just prefer plainer feed and need to be slowly introduced to mixes.
both foals have ad-lib hay and are out on good grazing for around 7 hours a day.
 
Be careful about giving a foal too much hard feed and sugar. The best thing I found was to get a friendly horse and they will show them what the deal is with eating hard feed as babies just dont get it to begin with. It has to be a friendly enough to share horse though!!
 
my 8 mth foal who ive had from 6 mths has dodson and horell foal mix(2lb a day,split into 2x1lb feeds a day for her weight) with molichop and a bit of water mixed in.adlib hay and about 8hrs grazing a day.
 
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