Horse Feed - Do you feed the recommended guide?

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Therightone

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On Bailey's website I found this -

Adding Chaff
Half a scoop or so is not providing a significant amount of additional fibre anyway and is merely adding to the overall size of the meal. Any compound feed should be fed at recommended levels and not reduced to allow for added chaff.


I always feed less than it says on the bag

Contrary to popular opinion, the feeding recommendations on a bag of mix or cubes are not inflated in order to get owners to feed more! Feeds are carefully formulated to ensure they deliver all the nutrients and calories a horse requires, alongside forage, within a manageable daily amount. This is calculated according to bodyweight and workload so feeding less could mean a horse misses out on essential nutrients.
 
I always feed by eye and confess that I wouldn't check the recommended amount, but mine just get lucie pellets - I have always had good doers :)
 
As above.

They would either get fat, risk getting laminitis, or have too much fizz!

The adage' feed according to work done' is worth taking into account also.
 
I don't feed any feeds with vits and mins added I feed straights and and add a supplement and one of the main reasons there's no way my horses need the amounts of hard feed you have to feed to get RDA of vits and mins .
However horses just like people manage perfectly well on diets that are less optimal in most situations .
 
I feed Spillers lite balancer at half the recommended amount. I have a good doer and this was advised by the Spillers nutritionist who told me that he would still get all the necessary vits and minerals from feeding half the recommended quantity. Therefore I have to assume that the guidelines on the packet are aimed at getting you to feed/buy more.
 
I feed a forage based diet and a handful of copra to carry his supplements. I also add half a scoop of oats, which actually despite me thinking it really wouldnt work, has added a bit of fizz and sparkle to my boy and hasnt lead to weight gain, probably because we have been able to up his work load now hes more forward. I've never known oats have that effect before, but I'm starting to think horses exist mainly to make me feel like an idiot! :lol:
 
No, never. If they don't need it I don't feed it. If I think a horse does need hard feed, it'll get an amount based on its weight and level of exercise. The type/combination of feed depends on the individual horse and what I think it needs.
 
I did when my horse was in work; he was fed Spillers conditioning cubes at the recommended rate with speedibeet and hi fi lite. This resulted in a huge bucket so was split into 3 feeds. He also had as lib hay but very little grazing (only out 4 hrs a day in summer and 3 times a week in winter) so he needed feeding. He is now retired and out 10 hrs a day in winter and 24/7 in summer and is so fat he gets nothing except supplements mixed with a handful of hi fi lite and is as fat as a pig. He also needed rugging up to the eyeballs and now only needs a medium in the worst of the weather (no longer clipped). Depends on the horse and what work they do and the environment. When mine was on a busy yard on livery he was quietly stressing on the inside which meant he always lost weight now he is semi-feral he can't keep the weight off, even in winter.
 
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Only time I have was when I was using a feed as a total hay replacer. Otherwise I do it by eye. So many people over feed then say a horse is dangerous.
 
Nope, never even read that bit of the bag, they only get fed to get vitamins into them. A wee bit of hifi molasses free and a sprinkling of fast fibre to make it tasty.
 
Our two geldings usually get the recommended amount, but then they hunt and event and need the extra calories. Whereas the pony, who is a good doer, would get fat easily on the recommended amount of most commercial cubes/mixes, so she either gets a token handful or gets a balancer.

However, if you are relying on a cube or mix to supply the recommended daily amount of vitamins and minerals then you should really either feed the recommended amount OR add a reduced amount of vit/min supplement or balancer to make up the shortfall. But much depends on the rest of the diet - if a horse or pony is on good, varied summer pasture it is unlikely to need as much supplementation as those on limited grazing and poor quality forage. The important point is to understand WHAT you are feeding and WHY you are feeding it!
 
My mare broke about a year ago and gained weight due to time off and reduced work. We reduced her feed to about a quarter scoop of pony nuts and some chaff, but as the situation went on I became concerned that she wasn't getting the vits and minerals. She's now on equi bites, which give her everything she needs with very few calories. If she's in when the other horses get fed I put them in a feed bowl with a big handful of chaff. If I want to feed her at other times I use them for "carrot" stretches.
 
I've recently moved my 16.2 3/4 TB 1/4 ID on to a forage only diet. he gets lots of turn out on plenty of grass although i guess it's losing some of it's goodness now we've had a couple of frosts. He gets a big net of haylage when he's in and 2 feeds of unmollased chaff with bluechip dynamic. He looks great and has bags of energy. If he starts to drop weight I'll add some speedibeet. I've come to the conclusion that I've overfed my horses in the past. I do wonder if we are being taken for a bit of a ride by feed companies and surely they are getting some vits and mins in the forage they are eating. Certainly looking around I see more fat horses than thin ones!
 
Ive never even looked at the reccommended feed. They are usually ridiculous amounts. I just have a little scoop i use and has done me well so far.
 
I feed less for horses that are out of work, youngsters, or overweight. However, I add a balancer so they still get the recommended minerals and vitamins. So for example, I feed pure feeds easy to most of the horses here, but they all need less than what is recommended. The pure feeds easy contains a balancer so feeding less than recommended would mean a shortfall. I therefore also by the pure feeds balance and add this to the recommended amount taking into account the amount they already have in their ration.
 
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