Horse feed advice wanted for lacking condition

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bella hill

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Hi everyone,

I’m hoping for some feeding advice because I feel like I’ve tried quite a few things and I’m still not totally happy with my horse’s condition.

He’s a 16hh Irish Sport Horse x Connemara gelding. He can be quite sensitive to feeds (especially molasses or higher starch feeds) and he also has history of ulcers, so I try to keep his diet low starch and high fibre.

when we first got him he was just on chaff, but he was underweight so we moved him onto Baileys Lo-Cal balancer and alfalfa. However the molasses seemed to make him quite sharp. Over the summer he held weight better and was on Lo-Cal balancer and meadow cobs.

He has since moved yards, and forage is a bit more limited because he lives in a herd and they don’t feed large amounts of hay. This may be contributing to the issue which i am aware of and in the process of sorting out.

Since moving, I’ve tried a few different combinations:

  • Baileys No.24 Ease & Excel + baileys performance balancer – but this made him quite sharp however this could have been due to grass coming through at the time?
  • TopSpec Cool Balancer + Spillers Shine Condition Mix + Alfa-Beet but he lacked topline and energy which was extremely unusual for him.
  • Then switched the Alfa-Beet to Fibre-Beet, but his topline really dropped off, which I suspect may have been due to lack of protein??
Currently he is on:

  • Baileys No.21 Ease & Excel
  • TopSpec Comprehensive Balancer
  • Micronised linseed
  • Equine america uls gard
His weight and energy are fine, but his muscle/topline isn’t great, and I don’t really want to add more energy because he can get a bit silly on richer feeds and i am also aware the grass is starting to come through again. hes doing lots of hacking,polework,hillwork to try and build it up but i feel he would benefit from perhaps a higher protein feed as muscle and topline is still lacking.

Because he has ulcers I’m trying to keep things fibre based, and I’m also conscious that he probably isn’t getting as much forage/hay as ideal due to the herd setup which i guess coul be contributing to his topline and muscle as when he was on ad lib hay this was never an issue, however as i say im in the process of trying to sort this out, but it wont be a quick fix.

I’m wondering if I need to add something with higher quality protein or perhaps a hay replacer to increase fibre intake.

Has anyone had a similar horse and found something that worked well for topline and condition without adding too much energy?

Would love to hear what combinations have worked for others, especially for sensitive or ulcer-prone horses.

Thank you
 
Honestly..top line and muscle comes through work and horses on just forage develop well. I think I would feed Speedibeet or soaked grass nuts with a balancer, oil/linseed. Oats and boiled barley add good proteins but May fizz him up. There are many folk on here who are very expert with feeds and have up to the minute knowledge of the feeds available, I try to keep things as simple as possible.
 
I've fed Equerry Conditioning Mash for years and I find it puts condition on like nothing else without adding any fizz. It's cost effective too as it's a complete feed so you don't need to add anything else.
 
Allen and Page Soothe and Gain was brilliant for my big mare. I fed a lot less than the recommended and she looked fab. If you think it's a temporary blip you could just add grass nuts or Haycare as a partial hay replacer.
 
I liked Allen and Page muscle and focus with mine when he went through a similar stage of just needing a bit more protein without the sillies.

This winter though I had him on sainfoin chaff, a glug of oil and some Spillers conditioning cubes which did OK, but my hay is a bit higher in protein than normal.
 
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