Horses with gastric 'issues' - supplements you can syringe?

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Scarlett

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We recently took arrival of a new ex-racer to reschool. He's a dude and looking like a keeper but a fussy eater. He arrived 2 weeks ago and we were already warned that he wouldn't eat chaff, and we soon found out that he won't eat anything that is wet so no beet etc. He loves his haylage though and has been eating us out of house and home in haynets. His weight etc are good so plan to just keep feeding him hay, hay and more hay.

However I'm conscious that he seems to have a 'sore' belly. He is sensitive to it being brushed or girthed and he is very, very mouthy. I'm not going to rush into having him scoped etc as it may well be the change of lifestyle/feed - both our other TB's get powdered Brewers Yeast in their feeds which works a treat and ideally this is the way we'll go with him if we can get him to eat it - but I'd like to get something into him just to try and help him out. I've seen a Protexin paste in a syringe but I'm interested to know if anyone has tried it or can suggest anything else that comes in a pre-prepared syringe or liquid that could be syringed?

He'll now eat Readigrass quite happily, and dry grass nuts but neither are much use when trying to feed a powdered supplement!

Thanks! :)
 
Maybe try some linseed meal - it's a little bit of magic.

My chap tended to be a bit unhappy in the tummy department until we dropped all grains, used a forage based diet, and included linseed.

Lots of mucilage in linseed meal.
 
Personally, I would get him scoped. There is a very high chance he has ulcers if he's an ex-racer. Sadly they are more likely to have them than not.

I'm pretty convinced my horse has ulcers he's being scoped on Tuesday, along with other reviews. He's been off his feed, not eating his Alfa A and balancer but happily eating haylege and hay.

If he has gastric ulcers this can be treated and then, providing his diet is well maintained, they may never come back. I may work out more cost effective to get them checked and treated before trying out supplements.

Best of luck :)
 
Azbo - I totally get what you mean and appreciate you taking the time to reply.Ii have 2 other ex-racers currently, another my friend owns who lives with us and have taken on a half a dozen or so others who I have rehomed, they all showed signs of tummy upset when they arrived but with a pure fibre, low startch diet, lots of hay and some Brewers Yeast its never proven to be an issue and always something we have been able to control easily. My only issue with this one is not being able to get him to eat Brewers Yeast as well as I would like, thus asking for other suggestions. If his symptoms continue then I will get him scoped, definately, but I'd like to get him settled and into our routine first before making that phonecall to the vets.
 
No worries, perhaps add it to water and syringe it straight into the mouth? We were advised to do this by our vet for a rather large dose of various tablets for head shaking. Turns out he would happily eat them in his tea!

Anyway, I hope you find a solution. Best of luck :)
 
I hope you get to the bottom of it & he's happier soon....fingers crossed it just amplified by the stress of moving, tho having TBs, once colic prone, I'm not naive enough to think its just that. All the best for settling him tho...just wanted to ask you, where do you buy your brewers yeast and how much do you feed? I remember Mum used to have a large jar from Boots the chemist & I merrily ate them, can't seem to get it for horses near me(unless I'm blind/can't see for looking) just wondered if you were crushing human tablets or actually found horse ones? won't just be me that appreciates it i can assure you!best of luck & hope it all resolves without too much expense x
 
Hello!

Gastroguard :)

Amazing stuff for gastric ulcers - I agree with Azbo, a lot of racehorses have gastric ulcers from eating lots or cereal feeds and doing mental amounts of exercise - this would explain why your other horses have been fine after coming out of racing and then feeding loads and loads of hay. Can't remember if Gastroguard is prescription only or not, but if it isn't I don't think it's too expensive and would be worth a shot for a little while.

If not, continuing your plan of feeding him hay, hay and more hay will probably be just fine :)
 
Hey L, B had a course of gastroguard following his colic in feb, as a precaution as he had to be starved for almost a week :-( now I had no cause at all to think he had ulcers as he really had no symptoms (though he's always been on a high fibre diet with me) and my vets agreed BUT after the course he put on condition that I had always struggled to get on him, he always looked well but just lacked that sparkle.

He's been fine since but I have stripped his diet down even further to pure fibre and cut out a lot, he doesn't get alfalfa now as apparantly that can be quite acidic and I also give him some charcoal a couple of times a week now which is meant to help too. This has actually really helped as he can have quite a runny bum but now be does pellets (sad I know being pleased about my horses poo's!). I feed him speedibeet
 
Hey L, B had a course of gastroguard following his colic in feb, as a precaution as he had to be starved for almost a week :-( now I had no cause at all to think he had ulcers as he really had no symptoms (though he's always been on a high fibre diet with me) and my vets agreed BUT after the course he put on condition that I had always struggled to get on him, he always looked well but just lacked that sparkle.

He's been fine since but I have stripped his diet down even further to pure fibre and cut out a lot, he doesn't get alfalfa now as apparantly that can be quite acidic and I also give him some charcoal a couple of times a week now which is meant to help too. This has actually really helped as he can have quite a runny bum but now be does pellets (sad I know being pleased about my horses poo's!). I feed him speedibeet, fast fibre and linseed, with ad lib soaked hay and he looks great and tummy seems happy too. He doesn't like sloppy food either so instead of wetting the fast fibre like you are meant to, I just mix it with the speedibeet and it absorbs the water from there and the whole lot turns into a crumbly feed which he hoovers up, so may be worth trying that as its a great base to add his supplements too!
 
Sianage while I agree GastroGuard is good stuff it's also damn expensive, you're looking at at least a 4 week course at nearly £200 a week - for that price you want to be sure you're dealing with ulcers!

My ideas:
- some people seem to get very good results with Succeed http://www.succeed-equine.com/digestive-conditioning-program/ , can't say it made any difference to mine though
- Coligone liquid may help
- I think Rite-Trac is in pellet form, you could call Saracen & ask, & again I've heard good things about this
- could you mix up a powdered supplement with something like yoghurt & syringe it down him?

I hope you come up with something. If the Protexin syringe you're thinking of is Quick Fix then I've found it brilliant stuff if my lad with a sensitive stomach gets very loose droppings but not the right thing if you're thinking the problem is ulcers. It's worth a try though as it's fairly cheap & shouldn't do any harm.
 
Sorry can't advise with the syringe but have heard gastro guard is meant to be good, if somewhat prohibitive on price.

If you believe him to have gastric ulcers you should take him off the ready grass onto an Alfa A chaff (Dengie do one with oil) as it is slightly more beneficial than the ready grass and has fibre nuts in it. Also try Allen & Page fast fibre which horses seem to love, especially if you mix it into the feed whilst warm and it makes it more palatable. Also not give any cereal based diets (I know you are not) and either take him off the haylage (awful lot of acid in haylage) or put him on something to counteract the haylage (NAF haylage balancer).

I have done those changes for my horse, and also introduced slippery elm powder to line the stomach lining, and meadowsweet herb to soak up the excess acid.

Really the main things to consider are to alter the PH in the gut to acceptable levels by replacing the old regime with fibre, fibre and yet more fibre.
 
Applecart14 - thanks for that but I'm not willing yet to feed him different feeds from my other TB's, I buy my feed in bulk at the beginning of the month. Its all Simple Systems so fibre, fibre and more fibre and my others look and go incredibly well on it inc the one who is also believed to have ulcers when he arrived but now shows no sysmptoms at all and hasnt for years, I see no reason why he won't once he has settled. I dislike Dengie products due to a run in with a particularly agressive Dengie Rep at a local store who told me I was 'stupid' for not feeding my sensitive TB's molasses. Its a shame as the Molasses free Alfa-A looked interesting, but I'd rather avoid alfalfa to begin with if I am honest as I've seen horses react badly to that too. His diet is dried grass with grass nuts, a horses natural feedstuff, I believe thats the best option for him. Very glad though you found a solution for your horse that suits you and him, I shall bare it in mind should my boy not improve.

I'm unable to get hay, we can only get haylage delivered to our yard, it's not 'wet' haylage though, its baled but its soft and dry.

Will check out the slipery elm and meadow sweet, thanks for that - I believe my local feed shop sells them.

The good news is that over the last few days he's eating a lot better and even eat some soaked grass nuts last night - yay - and we have been mixing brewers yeast into his buckets of readigrass and he has licked his buckets clean, his droppings are also much healthier. Planning to try him with some purabeet over the weekend and see what he thinks.

I've also found a local supplier of pelleted Protexin so plan to go get that over the weekend if they are open.

Thank you very much for your input people - much appreciated!
 
I believe that even dry haylage contains a lot of acidity (I think the wet/dry matter of haylage isn't a crucial factor - its more the way it is made which gives it the acidity). Hope you get it sorted Scarlett, sorry to hear about the Dengie Rep, they are very much the hard sell aren't they (reps in general)? LOL x
 
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