Horse Struggling To Loose Weight: Correct Feed/Quantities? HELP!

amymay said:
I think it's difficult to tell from those photos about the his condition.

You are feeding a huge amount of competition mix, and as others say there are far better things out there to feed to a fat prone horse (which cobs are). I guess you're after a meaner, leaner xc machine - which is fine. It's just about tweaking his management.
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Here is a photo of him just the other day stood in the yard, where you can evidently see he is not overweight, he just looks 'right' :) Excuse the mane, its like wildfire!
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I am taking advice, I've had to re-look into my weight tape :) I'm also going to look into the amount of mix, but I'm not too worried as he's not putting weight on due to it and he's exactly where I want him :)
 
If you want the horse to lose weight, regardless of what he weighs now, feed him less and work him more, if he starts to lose weight, great...right track. If not, more work/less feed (obviously within reason, it won't do him any good to starve him)
My mare was 585 on a weightape...vet calculated her as 710kgs (she has since lost a LOT of weight) but weightapes aren't always the most accurate. Good for showing a difference over time though.
By your calculations you are feeding approx 7kgs of additional hard feed/roughage, which doesn't take into account what he is eating when he's grazing. Unverified source, but it is thought that horses can eat up to 0.5kg grass per hour while they are grazing. Yours probably isn't getting this much, but if your calculations are correct that would still put him well over the 1.5% of his bodyweight he should be eating a day in order to lose weight.
If you're worried about getting a good balance of vitamins and minerals in him, feed a balancer alongside your chaff/roughage and cut out the comp mix.
 
fabscd said:
If you want the horse to lose weight, regardless of what he weighs now, feed him less and work him more, if he starts to lose weight, great...right track. If not, more work/less feed (obviously within reason, it won't do him any good to starve him)
My mare was 585 on a weightape...vet calculated her as 710kgs (she has since lost a LOT of weight) but weightapes aren't always the most accurate. Good for showing a difference over time though.
By your calculations you are feeding approx 7kgs of additional hard feed/roughage, which doesn't take into account what he is eating when he's grazing. Unverified source, but it is thought that horses can eat up to 0.5kg grass per hour while they are grazing. Yours probably isn't getting this much, but if your calculations are correct that would still put him well over the 1.5% of his bodyweight he should be eating a day in order to lose weight.
If you're worried about getting a good balance of vitamins and minerals in him, feed a balancer alongside your chaff/roughage and cut out the comp mix.
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I'm just going to stop replying to this post now hahah. His turn out is timed for certain hours and he's on a short grass paddock which is grezed down as the other paddocks are very rich long grass and that's the last thing he needs before next weekend. I've tried all the other tricks in the book like working him more, feeding less, stabling during the day, trying different turn out paddocks and this is the only thing that works. He certainly isn't starved as he still leaves some of his hay overnight etc. He's fed it at a 75:25 ratio which is what he needs as regards forage and hard feed for the amount of work he's doing and competing. Everything is weighed out, he's loosing weight . I just put this post on and a lot of people got the wrong idea, so I'm going to end it :) As I said, hopefully it will pay off next weekend for the Badminton qualifier for the BE90 Champs. I've seen a lot worse cases in horses, rather than bone picking on this.
 
I think OP merely meant that on paper, her horse is overweight (or so she thought, though she misread the weigh tape or what have you), but she doesn't feel he is on looks. I think she has now realised the weigh tape is incorrect, and her horse is probably fine for the job he is doing.

Oh, and Toast - you aren't allowed to say that giving x,y.z amount of feed to x,y,z horse is ludicrous and excessive on this forum. It is down to each individual horse whether that amount is ludicrous or not, and it is not for anybody else to say otherwise. ;):D
 
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OP will totally agree with JFTD - feed companies are after your money and the majority have never done true experiments on our average run of the mill horses or ponies.

The research is done only on the racehorse feeds, the rest is just adapted to appeal to the customer. For example how many horses would voluntarily eat soy, soy husks and peanut hulls?

As you are in Pony Club you would have covered the basic feeds at C certificate level, these are the feeds that a good horse manager learns to use to their advantage. For the majority of horses they are ideal and can be adapted easily to individual horses. Re read this section in your manual and learn the purpose of each food. It will save you a small fortune to feed the basics.

We are currently dealing with high levels of laminitic horses, not just ponies, and others with metabolic problems and others suffering obesity. The reason is the feed manufacturers convincing people that they have to feed their horses.

Mine live off grass and only when in full work get hard feed, they are in excellent health.
 
Toast, Amymay etc - it's not exactly a huge amount of mix - 2kg per DAY is 1/2 stubbs scoop per feed which isn't a massive amount for an eventing pony. OP I think that you may have read the tape wrong, besides we're now coming in to the right time of year for you to get those extra KG's off. Just go down a rug weight and let him use his extra weight to keep warm.
 
Broke_But_Happy said:
Toast, Amymay etc - it's not exactly a huge amount of mix - 2kg per DAY is 1/2 stubbs scoop per feed which isn't a massive amount for an eventing pony. OP I think that you may have read the tape wrong, besides we're now coming in to the right time of year for you to get those extra KG's off. Just go down a rug weight and let him use his extra weight to keep warm.
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Thankyou :)

Yes, the tape was wrong. I used another today and he is about 475kg :) Before giving the amount of feed (2kg), I had checked with friends how much they used for their horse/pony and why and they have used the same amount/more etc. Due him needing 75% forage, and 25% hard feed that also fits in if hes getting 7-8kg of Forage and 2kg of hard feed. Which all adds up to 1-2% of his daily intake in bodyweight which is what every horse should be eating.
 
but your completely overlooking the fact that any kind of mix is too high in starch for cob... why would you choose to feed something that wasn't suitable?

Do some research... You are starting to sound I daresay... Trollish.
 
Says the one who doesnt know my horse, doesn't know his fitness levels, how he looks in 'real life' and is just generalising it from a picture as that is all I could supply. He is doing just fine, has lost weight, feels incredible, why can't people just bloody drop this subject now? If he was putting on weight/want making progress or felt worse I'd be concerned, but the FACT is I cannot fault anything so far.
 
but the thread title indicates you were struggling to get any more weight off him.. if you are 'doing great' then why the thread? You asked if what you were feeding was ok, im saying no. If you can't take criticism, dont ask for it
 
k_sandy93 said:
Says the one who doesnt know my horse, doesn't know his fitness levels, how he looks in 'real life' and is just generalising it from a picture as that is all I could supply. He is doing just fine, has lost weight, feels incredible, why can't people just bloody drop this subject now? If he was putting on weight/want making progress or felt worse I'd be concerned, but the FACT is I cannot fault anything so far.
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But you're the one who said he was fat and needed to lose weight.

You're the one who posted your feeding regime on t'internet for all to judge.

You're the one who asked for opinions on his regime.

You've only been given what you asked for. You don't get to control who responds and you will annoy people if you move the goalposts half way through a thread and dismiss all of the advice you've been given (pretty unilaterally, fwiw and that's not very common on here). You don't have to put it into practice, but you could accept it graciously rather than getting sniffy because people aren't telling you what you wanted to hear. You could even learn from the more experienced users on here, if you were even a little open to the idea.

If you wanted everyone to tell you "that's great, have a pat on the back", you came to the wrong place...
 
Okay, well first of all I never said he was fat. I said that from the beginning.

Correct, I did post it on the internet, and as you are aware you will get opinions in whichever direction you go. Welcome to the horsey community where everyone feels you should all follow by the same rules and regulations of whatever that may be, it's something you have to take if you want to be part of the Equestrian Sport. It's coming up 10 days to the big weekend anyway, I suppose to wrap this all up its working. If it wasn't, I'd be relating back to this post and taking's peoples advice. If its working at the moment, the last thing I want to do is change his feeding routine to potentially upset his stomach, and for it not to work, or for him not be quite where I want him.

Lets just all shrug our shoulders, forget about this. He's clearly healthy, and I will say it again this is working, at least he's not some horse just left out with no food or shelter, left in agony or lame which to be honest we should be worrying about more than if his feeding is "perfect" or not :) Hope this makes sense.
 
Which begs the question, what on earth compelled you to ask?

You're happy with his weight loss and you're happy with his performance. You're not bothered about changing anything. Now I don't care about what you're doing with your horse, but it is frustrating when people take the time to reply to a question and the response is dismissal of the entire issue, which has suddently ceased to exist.

So why did you ask for opinions? Can you really not see why you're annoying people here?
 
I compelled to ask, incase it wasn't going to work or I wasn't satisfied (which could have easily happened) and thus I could take advice from here. But turns out that isn't the question. T'is all.

If you are annoyed and feel I am "wasting" your time, just don't reply in the future. Pretty simple.
 
k_sandy93 said:
I compelled to ask, incase it wasn't going to work or I wasn't satisfied (which could have easily happened) and thus I could take advice from here. But turns out that isn't the question. T'is all.
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It's magically worked perfectly in 2 days? Christ, that is some impressive weight management :rolleyes3:
 
Toast said:
so in the space of two days since you asked, you've suddenly seen a difference?

Sounds to me like you just didn't like the criticism.
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Ah no, till 2 days ago it was still in the air, now it's suddenly clear it's working perfectly...

I reckon you're on the money with the last statement ;)
 
Nope, I have been seeing a slow improvement over the last week. It was not all in the air, I had published what I had been doing. Judging from what is written across the internet is always a bad sign, people can very easily misinterperate opinions.
 
Ok so ten days in you are concerned he isn't losing as much as you'd like so you ask for advice... You don't like to hear that what your doing isn't necessarily ideal so suddenly it's all working perfectly? Clever you! Get onto Bailey's.. I'm sure they won't turn down your so evident abundance of nutrition knowledge.
 
JFTD said:
But you're the one who said he was fat and needed to lose weight.

You're the one who posted your feeding regime on t'internet for all to judge.

You're the one who asked for opinions on his regime.

You've only been given what you asked for. You don't get to control who responds and you will annoy people if you move the goalposts half way through a thread and dismiss all of the advice you've been given (pretty unilaterally, fwiw and that's not very common on here). You don't have to put it into practice, but you could accept it graciously rather than getting sniffy because people aren't telling you what you wanted to hear. You could even learn from the more experienced users on here, if you were even a little open to the idea.

If you wanted everyone to tell you "that's great, have a pat on the back", you came to the wrong place...
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Oh right, so it's ok for someone to post their feeding regime on here and get peoples' 'opinions', but not peoples' rugging regimes?!! Mmm.
 
JFTD said:
Ah no, till 2 days ago it was still in the air, now it's suddenly clear it's working perfectly...

I reckon you're on the money with the last statement ;)
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I'm not being criticised at all if Im honest with you? I have listened to what you've said, and all Ive have generally said in return is that in the end it's not been needed as over the 10 days or so of stable management and diet routine it's worked. You gave some advice, which turns out in the end I didn't need (so Im sorry for putting this post up in the end I suppose, but I am not God and I cannot tell the future?). I don't know what you find so impossible about that?
I have said and tried to say again, what is wrong here? He is where I want him, he is bang on-perfect over the past 3 days since the feed has taken a while to get into his system with it being slow-release, hes not some animal left as a cruelty case? You appear to be the type of person who gets a thrill from a good wind-up.
 
If judgements based on things written on t'internet is such a bad idea, how did you expect anyone to give you any helpful advice before you decided it was working in the last 48 hours?
 
I'm just skipping over the arguments. I'm far too busy thinking 'WTF? Your feeding a welsh cob 2kg of competition mix every day!?!?!' :eek:

These '25:75' ratios and % are designed for TBs, not fat native ponies. And nobody with any sense feeds even near the amounts recommend by feed companies.

Having looked at your photo, it's hard to tell without touching hin but I think he's too fat for eventing. To be galloping at that speed for that length of time they need to be lean. Right now he looks in 'show condition'.

That is a ridiculous amount of starch and sugar to feeding a welsh. It's like Haribo for horses. There are far healthier ways to give them energy and calories.

(I'd also be interested to know what his feet look like with such a lot of sugar and starch being pumped into him)
 
JFTD said:
If judgements based on things written on t'internet is such a bad idea, how did you expect anyone to give you any helpful advice before you decided it was working in the last 48 hours?
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I said it's been working over the past 10 days, Ive seen a gradual improvement? Ive just said that.
 
k_sandy93 said:
I said it's been working over the past 10 days, Ive seen a gradual improvement? Ive just said that.
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So after 8 days, you thought the "gradual improvement" was insignificant enough that it might not be working, and thought you'd post on here for "help". In the last 48 hours, the "gradual improvement" has become significant enough that you now dismiss all suggestions as he's just grand and there's no issue here at all?

Fiiiine :)
 
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