Help , I'm going dizzy looking at previous threads on feeding..

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samleigh

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Hi, posted last night re selling but have calmed down after my last few frights and decided as suggested to tweak a few things..this is why forums are fab, I'm not on a big yard with lots of knowledgeable people to chew the fat over problems, My horse is on Full livery at a v small but lovely yard, often there alone, the YO has put my TB on her Winter feed regime, he's lost his concentration, got opinionated and is very skittish/spooky. He's on 3 x spillers conditioning Fibre, 2 x Conditioning cube, 1 x Fibre beet & pink powder split over 2 feeds, Adlib Haylage.
If I cut the Spillers Conditioning fibre and swapped to HiFI with Micronised linseed
would this keep his condition & calmness, or my alternative is lose the pink powder and buy either Top spec Comprehensive feed balancer or Equilibra 500 + Omega 3 Feed Balancer, with reduced fibre and cubes.
(alfa a also sends him daft) Summer we changed him from Alfa to Mollichaff show shine but still had a bit too much energy especially if we did anything remotely exciting, I would like this sorting as I have BD regionals in a few weeks and don't want to do acrobatics half way thro..we had a couple of 3's last yr, for him improvising!
A good days work ;) today going thru all the old forums for tips, am I on the right track,
 
You have not got long to tweak the diet so rather than adding anything new I would just drop the chaff completely if that is what you suspect is giving him too much energy, he gets fibre beet and ad lib haylage so his fibre requirements are well catered for, if you are worried about weight loss either linseed or oil will give some extra calories without bulking up the feed quantity or really changing too much.
The time to make real changes and introduce new feeds or balancers is after the regionals.
 
What excercise and turnout is this horse getting?

It seems a lot of hard feed to me unless in heavy work....for example unless I have misunderstood your post, the horse is receiving 2 lots of conditioning feed before you add in the rest.
 
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samleigh said:
Hi, posted last night re selling but have calmed down after my last few frights and decided as suggested to tweak a few things..this is why forums are fab, I'm not on a big yard with lots of knowledgeable people to chew the fat over problems, My horse is on Full livery at a v small but lovely yard, often there alone, the YO has put my TB on her Winter feed regime, he's lost his concentration, got opinionated and is very skittish/spooky. He's on 3 x spillers conditioning Fibre, 2 x Conditioning cube, 1 x Fibre beet & pink powder split over 2 feeds, Adlib Haylage.
If I cut the Spillers Conditioning fibre and swapped to HiFI with Micronised linseed
would this keep his condition & calmness, or my alternative is lose the pink powder and buy either Top spec Comprehensive feed balancer or Equilibra 500 + Omega 3 Feed Balancer, with reduced fibre and cubes.
(alfa a also sends him daft) Summer we changed him from Alfa to Mollichaff show shine but still had a bit too much energy especially if we did anything remotely exciting, I would like this sorting as I have BD regionals in a few weeks and don't want to do acrobatics half way thro..we had a couple of 3's last yr, for him improvising!
A good days work ;) today going thru all the old forums for tips, am I on the right track,
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OK . . . and breathe ;).

Feeding doesn't need to be so complicated . . . but it IS a minefield. In your shoes, I would keep it as simple as possible - high fibre, low starch and sugar. Lots and lots of forage (good quality hay and haylage).

I've been round the houses wrt feed - but a little over a year ago, I overhauled Kal's feed and he has never looked (or felt) better. He isn't a particularly good do-er, is a bit of a stresshead, can't tolerate molasses - sends him right round the twist, and will drop weight like THAT if upset. In addition, we think he has had ulcers in the past, and at 14(ish) with upright conformation and a club foot needs all the joint help he can get.

So . . . I cut out all mixes, cut all supplements (at one point he was getting about six of the bloomin' things), and did some research on straights and high-fibre/oil feeds.

This is what he now gets (this is daily - so amounts split between breakfast and dinner):

- Summer

- one scoop Alfa A Molasses Free (I see that Alfa A sends yours potty - but I would have thought the Mollichaff would be too much for him too - all that molasses)
- 2/3rds scoop ERS Pellets
- 2/3rds scoop Blue Chip
- 1/3rd scoop Micronized Linseed
- pure MSM

Winter - as above, but plus Speedibeet and Bailey's No. 1.

For comparison purposes, Kali is a 16.3hh Polish sporthorse type - athletic build - worked (minimum) five days a week - competes (dressage, SJ, XC, Hunter Trials, hunting, clinics, etc.) on average twice a month - sometimes more.

So, yes, I would lose the Spillers AND the pink powder, put him on HiFi, add linseed and consider a balancer.

Good luck.

P
 
Thank you..will ask YO to start reducing the Chaff until its no more, its the only change he's had in his feed recently and altho he is sharp jumping he's always been an angel & on the lazier side for flat work, can usually work in canter on a long rein, nose on the ground with no worries wouldn't like to try it at the moment!
 
I would say at the moment he is in Moderate/Light work for TB, hacked once a week, schooled 3/4 times a week 30mins approx. I know his Energy levels are through the roof but a bit obsessed about him losing weight..
 
Sidney said:
What excercise and turnout is this horse getting?

It seems a lot of hard feed to me unless in heavy work....for example unless I have misunderstood your post, the horse is receiving 2 lots of conditioning feed before you add in the rest.
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Hi, I must have the only YO who over feeds! He's in light work for TB..3/4 times schooling 45mins & 1 hack per week.
 
samleigh said:
I would say at the moment he is in Moderate/Light work for TB, hacked once a week, schooled 3/4 times a week 30mins approx. I know his Energy levels are through the roof but a bit obsessed about him losing weight..
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That is very little work for the feed he is getting no wonder he is rather sharp, most horses, even tbs, could do that on grass and hay with a vitamin supplement, he should not drop weight if fed ad lib haylage and you cut back the feed usually they will just eat more haylage to make up the difference unless they are really picky poor doers.
 
It'll be hard to isolate the cause of his behaviour in just 3 weeks!

Alfalfa can send some of their rockers, so I'd be tempted to try removing that from the diet. The conditioning cubes could be a factor, they're relatively high in starch.

However, I'd be most concerned that the Spillers conditioning fibre and competition cubes are both complete feeds and fed alongside the pink powder you'll be trebling up on vitamins and minerals - not a good thing! This in itself may well be causing the sharpness you're experiencing.

Until regionals I'd scrap all the conditioning stuff. Just feed the alfalfa with the pink powder and a handful of the chaff.

Long term I personally think there are better balancers on the market and I prefer to base my horse's diet around speedi-beet (mainly as I have one with an alfalfa allergy!) and a good balancer (I like Pro-balance, from pro-earth on ebay). If more condition is required then I increase the amount of Micronised Linseed they get and/or add in Equi-jewel. If they're lacking energy they get oats . They get a handful of untreated chopped straw as a chaff to slow their eating down.
 
Sidney said:
What excercise and turnout is this horse getting?

It seems a lot of hard feed to me unless in heavy work....for example unless I have misunderstood your post, the horse is receiving 2 lots of conditioning feed before you add in the rest.
Click to expand...

Agree with this.

Feeding shouldn't be complicated.

Start with the basics and just afd what's needed gradually to see what is needed and what doesnt or isn't right for the horse.
 
Personally I would drop the cubes and make sure he is getting adlib hay (can you swap from haylege?) and a few hours turnout a day.
 
dianchi said:
Personally I would drop the cubes and make sure he is getting adlib hay (can you swap from haylege?) and a few hours turnout a day.
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Never thought of dropping the cubes, old fashioned always fed them 30yrs +, but yes he is getting 2 complete feeds, we have both hay & haylage on the yard, Have fed hay this winter briefly after the flood, but it made him cough so needed soaking, and with us having more than enough standing water and no proper drainage put him back on haylage as soon as it was delivered but its another thing to discuss/consider with YO this weekend.
 
So he is in light work but gets plenty of turnout...

If he was mine I would be looking at a highfibre diet/low energy diet, maybe a basic chaff, beet and a balancer or vit/min supplement, with ad lib forage.

Obviously without sitting on him or seeing a photo it is hard to appreciate his condition and needs, but I stand by the fact he is being given too much hard feed.

Good luck at the regionals!
 
If he was mine I'd cut out all hard feed and just give him fibrebeet with pink powder and linseed if concerned about him losing condition
 
Every horse is different, blah, blah, but I did do some research on feed for my overly-stressy, not very good doing, possibly ulcerish, thinking he was a springbok ginger ninja (7/8 TB, 1/8 ID). I too thought the alfa-a was blowing his mind, but was scared to remove the alfalfa because of its calcium content. So, swapped to hi-fi molasses-free and he seems to be ok. In the meantime, I had sourced the following alfalfa-free chaffs just in-case:

Honeychop Chopped Oat Straw - no molasses
Graze On
Pure Feeds Easy
Halleys Timothy Hay Chop
Ossi Chaff Plain and Simple

Hope these help.

I also feed micronised linseed - a mugful night and morning in with his 3/4 stubbs scoop of A&P Cool & Collected (low starch, low sugar, but slightly more calories than FF which he hated). A teaspoon of mag ox once a day - this is for his feet more than anything and, in a wink to his ulcerish tendencies, 25ml twice a day of Brewer's Yeast. It took a couple of weeks but what a difference! Ok, he does need to build up topline but he had a bit of an accident and pulled a glute so we've only walked and occasionally trotted in straight lines on light hacks for the last 8 weeks. But he is so chilled it's untrue, and looks pretty good for someone with minimal turnout except for 10m x 30m sand paddocks during the winter. The other upside is that my food bill has gone from astronomical to about £50/month (not including ad lib hay).
 
Your all fab, thank you..My YO is not going to complain if her feed bill goes down :-) Will order some Micronised Linseed, cut out the cubes completely, cut the spillers and stay with the fibre beet and pink powder, up the work and hopefully my sane horse will emerge again!
 
Does seem like a lot of hard feed for relatively little work... my lad is another poor doing TB with EPSM working six days a week (twice a day on three days a week) for an average of 1 hr per day, mix of jumping to 90cm, schooling prelim/novice, or hacking for 1.5-2 hrs (mostly trot and canter for fitness), and interval training in the summer (so higher end of light work I'd say).

He gets ad lib haylage (not too rich stuff, very nice), 24/7 turnout, and then hard feed is 1 scoop Alfa-A Oil, 2 cups Bailey's stud balancer, 2/3 scoop ERS pellets, and 2/3 scoop Fast Fibre daily, plus a vote &selenium supp, a joint supp, and a yeast supp split between 2 feeds (I cut the ERS out in summer and cut down the chaff and ff by half).

I think if they are getting plenty good quality forage, that is where most of the energy comes from - most horses in light work don't need much more than forage and a vit supp, maybe a bit of hard feed in winter especially if poor doers. It's WHAT you feed - I had terrible problems with weight in my lad last winter, and it was due to what I was feeding him - despite three big buckets of feed and ad lib haylage he was a hatrack, but this winter with relative little feed he looks good.

If he's getting conditioning chaff, try that, beet and a balancer, and if he feels lacking/starts to lose weight then maybe add in something like Staypower Cubes, which are low sugar/starch for a high energy cube.

Also worth thinking about feeding less high energy feed than more low energy feed, particularly when forage is the main dietary energy source. Just calculate your MJ/kg, and select for high fibre/high oil/low sugar/low starch.
 
if he drops condition on less feed what about winergy condition? it DOES have alfalfa in it but even our alfalfa intolerant chap seems to be ok with this for some reason! its calories from fibre and oil and shouldnt send him as sharp as the cubes? (i would feed spillers cubes if i wanted buzzy sharpness BTW, i have had past experience with them making horses v.sharp, conditioning, sports or competiton cubes-all the same result!!!)

fed alongside linseed i think you would keep him round but sane :)
 
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