Hungry Horse - Advice

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BFG

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My horse is 18hh ISH and is looking amazing at the moment he is prone to loosing weight but touch wood hasn’t done yet. He is schooled/hacked/competed (dressage) 6 days a week and is out during to day (in at night) on good grass. He is on 10kg of good haylage at night and a 5kg net when he comes in to be ridden. He is on one feed a day of Allen and Paige Calm and Condition and moly chop.

As i said he looks amazing and has the right amount of energy and i know he is well but he is eating everything in site and that is not like him he is the type that stops eating when he is full even if that means leaving his hard feed.

Now i am not too worried but was just wondering if there was anything else i could be giving him to fill him up?????

Hot Chocolate is marshmallows in for anyone bothering to read all this.....

Beth
 
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That's a lot of horse to feed.
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Ad lib hay?
 
Hi I’ve got one that’s just the same with his appetite but heading into winter he always get more hungry, I think it’s nature’s way of telling them to stock up for winter when in the wild there would be less food available.
Maybe try giving him some hay that’s been soaked for 12 hours just to fill him up.
 
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More haylage! the grass is starting to drop off. I would also mention is his worming up to date?

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Yep full up to date last wormed on 4th Sept with Equimax to cover tape worm and is due on the 30th Oct with strong id P. Also due a worm count so might do that before the next worming just in case.
 
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shocked.gif
That's a lot of horse to feed.
wink.gif


Ad lib hay?

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Tell me about it he weights approx 800kg but i don’t have a weight tape big enough so it is only a guess. That said there isn’t an ounce of fat on the horse he is a lean mean fighting machine... lol

Ad lib hay – he is on haylage would you give him hay as well as a top up?
 
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Hi I’ve got one that’s just the same with his appetite but heading into winter he always get more hungry, I think it’s nature’s way of telling them to stock up for winter when in the wild there would be less food available.
Maybe try giving him some hay that’s been soaked for 12 hours just to fill him up.

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So that he is getting bulk not goodness..... good idea.
 
Can he have hay? If so I would give him ad lib hay overnight instead of hayledge - you say he is prone to dropping weight, so there shoudl be no problem with doing this. Alternatively you could give 50 - 50 hay and hayledge if you want him to have the more fattening forage.

Our clydesdale is only a little one at 16.2, but she happily will get through a bale of hay a day when on the winter paddock (very little grass).

Our two also have two feeds a day which are large fibre based (simple systems). The cooler weather we are starting to have is also making them more hungry and I am putting out more hay for this reason now.

Finally can you not change from the moly chop to a something that is less/no sugar and more fibre, ready grass, just grass etc so you can give him again more fibre when he is fed. Mine get two scoops twice a day of just grass and green gold now that the grass has gone.
 
My brain has always been set to feed for weight because he doesn’t normally eat enough i need to make what he has count so yes i could drop the moly and put him on ready grass and yes he can have hay the main reason he is on haylage is because hay never filled him up so he would eat so much hay i couldn’t keep up with him.

I think i might put him on a hay haylage mix so that he can have the amount of haylage he is on then the hay as a back up if he is hungry.

Do you think 15kg of good haylage and grass is too much?
 
If he is not putting weight on and not going loopy, then no it is not too much.

I would give him the hayledge and hay either in two different nets or mixed up if you find he only eats the hay - my cob is the only one I know who will rather eat hay than hayledge.

If you are worried about weight dropping off, why not try some spillars conditioning cubes in with the ready grass or similar chaff? I personally hate molassed chaffs - D&H do their version of Just Grass (called also Just Grass) and also Fibregy which before I went onto SS, I used to feed to my WB who went mental on sugary feeds so she could have a "big" feed but stay sane.
 
He is on Calm and Condition which works well for him and if he drops weight i put him on 2 feeds and sugar beet.

I was just concerned that he was getting too much protein from the haylage, he loves hey and loves it really wet too so i think i will give him his usual haylage then give him a hay net as well so if he is still hungry he can eat that.

I don’t know what i will do if he eats all that as well, i have never known him to eat everything that is put in front of him. I cant keep up.

Thanks for all your advise everyone.
 
How old he is - any chance of a growth spurt? My two are now 5 and Stinky is bum up again and is a real hungry hippo at the moment. I have noticed they both eat more when doing this. My WB was the same and she kept growing until 7.
 
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I would imagine its just the colder weather.
I would feed hay/or haylage ad lib. As much as he can eat.

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Thanks i better apply for another mortgage then.
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Could you bulk his haylage out with good quality oat/barley straw?

I do this with my Cob as he ends up too fat if he has access to as much hay as he can eat, but I like him to have ab lib forage if he is in or has no grass?

It keeps him full/occupied without piling on even more pounds!!
 
i would add a couple of scoops of alph a to his feeds. if he is not fat then up his long stem fibre(hay/haylage/alpha/grass/sugarbeet) they do usually have a fill level? grass has shrunk well back in last few days and he is a very big boy!
 
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