Formula 4 Feet and Magnesium Oxcide.

legaldancer

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I feed my laminitic formula 4 feet, mainly as a balancer and to hopefully keep the gut flora happy. Her feet have been damaged by laminitis but the horn quality isn't bad, ie not crumbly etc.

I have read on here about giving mag ox as a supplement to laminitics and wondered if it would do any harm to give her this also. I understand if they already receive sufficient magnesium in their diet it can't do any harm to over supplement as it were. I think F4F already contains some, but hope some knowledgeable folk on here could help. Would I just be wasting my money?

She is also is receiving salt daily, and is NOT a good doer.
 
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tallyho!

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Well, I am no expert but I feel that as a supplement, F4F has far too much of EVERYTHING in it adding mag ox is potential liver overload!

It markets itself as having mega amounts of bio active ingredients but a horse cannot actually use all of this.

Some of it is just urinated out, some excreted through sweat and poo. The rest just accumulates in the liver and receptor sites causing blockages.

Not just this supplement but some others too. Unless you know what you are supplementing, how do you know what you are adding or taking away?

If you know your horses daily requirements, then that is some way of knowing. Relying on Dr. eustace is not wise in my opinion.

May I suggest getting your forage tested so you do not waste money on generic supplements that claim to work miracles on your poorly horse. Then you will know exactly what you need and what you don't... Most often it is more important to know what you do NOT need.

Now with magnesium, you could actually be adding too little! I do not know the answer without knowing how much is being provided in feed and forage. The amount in F4F is tiny actually.

Oberon is the real expert as is CPTrayes. All I know is you need to be specific with laminitics. Broad spectrum is just not good enough.
 

legaldancer

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Thank you tallyho for your reply. I feed the recommended amount for her size, which is three quarters of a mug. I have no idea how much magnesium there is in F4F, but have read frequently that it is a valuable supplement for laminitics and barefoot horses.

I understand you can't 'overdose' with magnesium- is this correct? However, I would still like more information from the 'experts'.

I should add that she isn't suffering an acute attack at the moment and hasn't in the two and a half years I've owned her. She has been sound all that time but is shod.

She also had a liver function test last year as well as an IR test and was clear on both.
 

Goldenstar

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It's my understanding if they get two much magnesium they just pee it out, so you are only wasting money.
 

tallyho!

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Of course you cannot "overdose" on individual minerals. You can however block absorption by blocking one receptor site form one mineral with another. Therefore causing deficiency in one and an overload of another...

This is what happened to my laminitic. So much so, after 12 months on f4f he was nearly diagnosed with liver failure after an LFT. This was after an already intense 3 years of remedial shoeing.

Look I cannot tell you what to do.

All I can offer is my experience.

After a grazing analysis, the grass was mega high in phos and nitrates which helps calcium but not magnesium, copper and zinc. Great for cows... Not great for horses.

Just one more thing...,laminitis is an indication of many things that are going wrong in the horses body. If you can get the diet right it is most of the battle.
 
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