horse sensitive stomach? garlic / loCal

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L5ura

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hi

I was just wondering if anyone has any experience of either Bailey's LoCal or a Garlic powder supplement causing stomach discomfort in their horse?

I changed my mare's diet at the beginning of May and she is suddenly resisting my leg badly when riding, putting her ears back, biting and tossing her head. She is not normally in the least bit mare-ish so I was wondering if she could be in discomfort in her stomach and these are the only new things to her diet.

Thanks for reading and I would appreciate any comments/advice :)
 
A lot of people, including myself, would not recommend feeding garlic to horses.

Personally, if I was to feed a balancer, I would use Pink Powder and mix it with some HiFi or similar.
 
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thank you for your reply, why would you not recommend garlic?

I did some research before introducing the garlic and did read some controversy in relation to feeding garlic and the horse becoming anaemic. However, this seemed only to be the case in very large doses and i thought the conclusion was that the low levels generally fed are ok. The main reason i wanted to feed garlic was due to the respiratory benefits as she suffers with a dry hay cough. and then it is supposed to have other benefits such as antibacterial and natural fly repellent. but i have not managed to find anything surrounding any stomach upset/discomfort (so far!).

I have stopped the garlic since saturday as i thought this was more likely to be the cause of upset than the LoCal and will watch this space.

I feed the LoCal with a handful of a light chaff - reason for choosing was because i used to fed it to a horse i used to own and she did well on it - don't really know anything about Pink Powder
 
Lo-cal has aound 10% starch, baileys call this low but I don't compared to forages that the horse has evolved to eat.

Garlic thins the blood.

Therefore if the horse has gastric ulcers the starch could be irritating them, and the garlic thinning the blood could be causing the ulcers to bleed.

Just a thought?
 
woah that sounds scary!

have just searched H&H for info re ulcers and don't think she shows the symptoms or fits the bill for a horse likely to suffer from them. I loan her and the lady that owns her has had her since a 2 year old and has never known her to suffer from ulcers so hopefully this isn't the case (phew!)

thank you for your theory though

oh and i didn't know/hadn't heard that garlic thins the blood, that sounds a little worrying if she was to cut herself in the field :eek:
 
I WOULD NEVER FEED GARLIC NOW you can get behavioral problems and it comes from the family of onions which are poisonous to horses. my horses are happier and calmer since i stopped giving it 1 1/2 years ago ......
 
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