Is it possible for a horse to lose weight without restrictive measures?

[Horsegirl25]

Just a thought that popped into my head today!
Do you think it is possible for a horse to lose weight without muzzling them or restricting grazing i.e track system etc. Can weight loss be achieved by reducing amount of hay they are eating while stables (if they get stabled) and steeping that hay? Could it be achieved with upping exercise?
I am not looking for advice (luckily) my boy is at a good weight currently lol, but just a random thought I had as I know some people don't like muzzles and don't have the option for a track system etc.

 

[IrishMilo]

Yes. 100%. I've managed to do it multiple times. The problem is, most people think arena work or a moderate hack will do it, and it really doesn't. Best thing for losing weight is galloping 3 or 4 times a week.

 

[Orangehorse]

Of course they will lose weight if they have less to eat than their body needs.
They will loose weight with fast exercise, but probably not with just an amble round the lanes.

 

[sport horse]

I knew a horse that had diabetes and was severely overweight. The owner soaked a very small amount of hay for 24 hours before feeding, they did use a muzzle in very limited grazing, and fed a small feed with multi vitamins. It was done under veterinary supervision and the horse lost weight over one year and was no longer diabetic. A lesson for those that love fatties to understand.

 

[HannahB]

Fast work on hills does wonders

 

[Horsegirl25]

Thanks everyone that's so interesting to hear. I am always straight to the muzzle and steeped hay for weight loss but it's interesting to hear how people have achieved without 'restrictive' measures!

 

[HopOnTrot]

Of course, I knew a pony that used to do Pony Racing and they had to be fed a lot extra as they were race fit. That was just a little 13.2 Welsh pony so not a blood type at all.

 

[Fieldlife]

100% but it's not ideal to try and work an overweight horse too hard, especially in summer if ground hard.

Best plan is to keep them in a decent amount of work all year round, and slightly increase the work when the grass is good.

I dont have ponies. But I do think working horses fairly hard, and travelling them regularly significantly protects them for issues with grass sugar and putting on too much weight.

(It is not the travelling per say, but being away in the lorry keeping their balance and out competing all day, does tend to slightly drop a horse's weight IME, even with unlimited access to hay.)

 

[ElleSkywalkingintheair]

The best ways I've found to get a horse to lose weight is turn it out 24/7 in the winter or send it swimming. I've had various different tracks over the years, as well as muzzling, weighing all feed, soaking hay, upping exercise etc and none of them have worked nearly half as well.

Swimming is great in emergency situations as long as you can keep up with a fair amount of exercise after and is very good for recovering lami horses.

 

[Goldenstar]

If you work them hard enough long enough often enough yes .
However you would lame a lot of horses working that hard when they are fat .
Mine will hunt living out in winter on very restricted forage and maintain weight well .

 

[Vodkagirly]

It depends why they got fat in the first place. Eg if they are on ad lib haylage, measuring hay would help. If they aren't being worked, more exercise will help, could be longer or more intense (speed or pole-work). If they are on 24/7 turn out, stabling or track will help. Rough/hilly turn out is better than lush flat fields but it all depends what is possible for the owner. Clipping and under rugging are options.
Often it's a combination of things to get the right results.

 

[Jenko109]

Of course.

That said, most people's idea of 'hard work' is actually light to medium at best and not enough to keep the average good doer trim.

 

[TheHairyOne]

My sister bought a hugely overweight and very unfit horse years ago and we obviously had to slim him down, but couldnt work him hard initally due to him having zero fitness. Tried the small paddock/soaked hay/no grass route and it was hard work to get it to shift.

He then kept going through the tape of his little paddock so we threw him out with the rest of the boys. Movement was clearly more important than limited diet as they walked the weight off him keeping him out of the herd!

 

[Horsegirl25]

Of course.

That said, most people's idea of 'hard work' is actually light to medium at best and not enough to keep the average good doer trim.

That's interesting, what would you class as hard work compared to someone thinking their horse is in hard work but isn't actually?

 

[Fieldlife]

That's interesting, what would you class as hard work compared to someone thinking their horse is in hard work but isn't actually?

My horse is 17hh - he schools, does raised poles. groundwork, hacks, trec, working equitation.

We box out 6-8 times a month all year round - clinics, summer trec, low level endurance, agility, dressage, poles, gallops, beach etc.

It is a 50 minute round hacking trip to our home school for groundwork / schooling.

We tend to hack for 1.5 to 2 hours 2-4 times a week, which include hill work and a reasonable amount mostly trotting and cantering (lucky to have amazing hacking with lots of grass gallops).

He has a wide variety of work but does something most days. Probably travels 2-3 hours in lorry most weeks.

I would say he is medium work (he rarely exceeds a brisk canter), but most of my fellow liveries / trainers / bodyworkers etc. think he is in hard work.

He is probably in hard work from his perspective as he is a more heavily built larger horse, and travelling to say a summer trec competition, doing the POR and PTV and travelling back tires him, and he needs a few days off. Even though he is fit, and it isnt physically that much work. He is not duracell bunny type like some of the more TB blood horses I have had. Working him harder would probably be detrimental to him.

 

[Fieldlife]

this is a pretty good definition - https://dengie.com/news-articles/feed-advice/assessing-your-horses-workload/

 

[Jenko109]

I think a lot of people consider a horse who is ridden six days a week, as not being in light work, without really considering what that work consists of.

If you are hacking five days a week for an hour each time, mostly in walk with some trots and canters here and there and then maybe having a lesson once a week, your horse is in light work. It does not matter that he is ridden six days a week, it is still light work.

I would expect a good doer to still put on weight easily with this amount of work.

 

[Horsegirl25]

Ohhh interesting reading that guys. It is now making me second guess if my horse is actually in light work rather than medium

 

[McGrools]

That's interesting, what would you class as hard work compared to someone thinking their horse is in hard work but isn't actually?

I have just got back a Welsh pony that was my daughter’s first pony and he is very fat! To shift the weight I am getting him puffing and blowing at least once a day preferable twice a day either on the lunge or with small jockey on board cantering and gradually reintroducing jumping and galloping. He is looking much better 3 weeks on. Mind you this is a forward fast pony that likes to work. It would be harder to achieve with a lazier pony

 

[SilverLinings]

Traditionally hard work would generally include hunters hunting at least 2 days per week every week through the season (and being kept fit in between), competitive endurance horses, and the level of work that professional upper-level event horses are doing to keep and stay fit. I would also include competitive driving trials horses at the higher levels. In the past it would also include haulage horses, commercial coach horses, pit ponies, taxi cab horses and engine horses etc.

Medium work was classed as lower level competition horses and active PC and RC ponies/horses: working 6 days/wk, some canter/gallop in most (or almost) every session, exercise intensity raising the heart and respiratory rates. Hill work and/or jumping and/or some interval training would usually be part of their training. In the past this would have included things like children's hunting ponies and gentlemen's carriage horses.

Light work is anything working 6 days/week mostly in walk and trot for <2hrs/day, or working 3 days a week or less at any intensity (obviously they shouldn't be working at high intensity if they are resting for more of the week that they are working. Historically this would also have included children's riding ponies and ladies' hacks.

Most of the ideas behind work levels stem from the days when working horses worked for 8+ hours a day, and it was hard physical work. The classification of 'hard' work was below but near to the limit at which the horse could sustain good health and condition when carried out long term. Working more than that (which many horses did) started to be more widely labelled as cruelty from the late 1800s onward.

A more scientific approach to feeding developed from around 1900 when the vast majority of horses had a job, so feed company (and Pony Club) guidelines still broadly reflect that understanding of work levels. As the vast majority of horses are now kept for leisure and not worked daily I think it might be helpful if the terminology in general use was adjusted to aid understanding by owners.

I think the biggest problem may be that if a leisure owner (with no wider experience of working with horses) keeps their horse on a yard of say 10+ horses, if their horse works harder than the others they will think it means they are in hard work even if they technically aren't. Judgements are made based on the other horses an owner knows, rather than the exercise/fitness potential of horses in general.

 

[Wishfilly]

If you think about the amount of work horses do in e.g. riding schools/trekking centres, they may be doing 3-4 hours a day, 5 days a week. Yes, not all of that will be fast work, but it may well involve some cantering and jumping multiple times a week, and at some trekking centres they will be doing long, fast canters daily. I'm not saying that's necessarily a desirable amount of work for a horse, but compared to that, most of our horses are in light work. To me, hard work is a horse that's seriously fit for competition like endurance/eventing, or else a "working" horse doing a lot each day.

I think horses only really lose weight through work if they are elevating their heart rate each time they work (significantly) or else doing several hours of slower work- but then if you are hacking for e.g. 3 hours a day, that's 3 hours a day the horse also isn't eating, or isn't eating much, so you are also restricting their food intake too.

 

[santas_spotty_pony]

Yes it can - regular exercise and ad lib soaked hay definitely works. I have never used a muzzle in my life! Slow and steady work is better for burning calories than fast work.

 

[scats]

If you can commit to regular cardio work for them, then yes I think you can.

But for what the majority of us (I suspect) do- light schooling a few times a week and some hacking- I don’t think that’s enough to cut it without some other intervention.

 

[SEL]

I did have a situation where my "not in work" horse was doing more than the "in work" horses on a livery yard. She was being led out daily, walked over poles and in hand work.

My littlest cob has an old tendon injury which means I'm careful what I do. She stays fit on a combination of hacking (walk & canter) for around 5-9 miles 3 times a week, but lives on a grass track with strip grazing too otherwise the work wouldn't be enough.

 

[Horsegirl25]

Traditionally hard work would generally include hunters hunting at least 2 days per week every week through the season (and being kept fit in between), competitive endurance horses, and the level of work that professional upper-level event horses are doing to keep and stay fit. I would also include competitive driving trials horses at the higher levels. In the past it would also include haulage horses, commercial coach horses, pit ponies, taxi cab horses and engine horses etc.

Medium work was classed as lower level competition horses and active PC and RC ponies/horses: working 6 days/wk, some canter/gallop in most (or almost) every session, exercise intensity raising the heart and respiratory rates. Hill work and/or jumping and/or some interval training would usually be part of their training. In the past this would have included things like children's hunting ponies and gentlemen's carriage horses.

Light work is anything working 6 days/week mostly in walk and trot for <2hrs/day, or working 3 days a week or less at any intensity (obviously they shouldn't be working at high intensity if they are resting for more of the week that they are working. Historically this would also have included children's riding ponies and ladies' hacks.

Most of the ideas behind work levels stem from the days when working horses worked for 8+ hours a day, and it was hard physical work. The classification of 'hard' work was below but near to the limit at which the horse could sustain good health and condition when carried out long term. Working more than that (which many horses did) started to be more widely labelled as cruelty from the late 1800s onward.

A more scientific approach to feeding developed from around 1900 when the vast majority of horses had a job, so feed company (and Pony Club) guidelines still broadly reflect that understanding of work levels. As the vast majority of horses are now kept for leisure and not worked daily I think it might be helpful if the terminology in general use was adjusted to aid understanding by owners.

I think the biggest problem may be that if a leisure owner (with no wider experience of working with horses) keeps their horse on a yard of say 10+ horses, if their horse works harder than the others they will think it means they are in hard work even if they technically aren't. Judgements are made based on the other horses an owner knows, rather than the exercise/fitness potential of horses in general.

Thank you, that was a brilliant way of explaining it!

 

[maya2008]

I’ve done it on poor grazing - took being ridden twice a day with canter work in both sessions. Pony wouldn’t wear a muzzle so needs must!

 

[Needtoretire]

Track system remembering to back fence, lots of walking up steep hills, forage provided by 60% late cut hay mixed through with 40% barley or oat straw. Worked a treat for my good doer, he munched all day and lost weight.

I would be very wary of restricting a lot of long forage, it is a quick way to get gas colic and displacement.

 

[webble]

Yes definitely, hill work and calories in vs calories out

 

[BronsonNutter]

Slow and steady work is better for burning calories than fast work.

I'm not sure this is correct; horses don't raise their heart rates that much in walk from rest. Higher intensity work (e.g. canter intervals) pushing to the point of almost being at anaerobic respiration would be more effective.
The only upside of slow and steady work vs 'harder' work from a weight loss perspective is that a 3 hour walk hack is 3 hours without eating.

I think the best way of getting a horse to lose weight lies somewhere in the middle of dietary management AND exercise. However, so many of the obese horses I see are either already laminitic, lame through other reasons, or belong to people who just can't seem to exercise them hard (time, their own physical limitations as a rider, lack of facilities etc, any excuse!) so we do often have to rely on diet. And medication, unfortunately, although that is not meant to be a sticking plaster nor long term solution for not managing good doers well.

 

[Pearlsacarolsinger]

Just a thought that popped into my head today!
Do you think it is possible for a horse to lose weight without muzzling them or restricting grazing i.e track system etc. Can weight loss be achieved by reducing amount of hay they are eating while stables (if they get stabled) and steeping that hay? Could it be achieved with upping exercise?
I am not looking for advice (luckily) my boy is at a good weight currently lol, but just a random thought I had as I know some people don't like muzzles and don't have the option for a track system etc.

Yes, I bought an obese Draft mare. She had been fed a cheap mollassed mix and only put out to graze every other day in winter. I bought her in the January, put her out with our herd every day, in over night with some haylage and a trug full of plain oat straw chaff. A couple of years of that regime and she lost a lot of weight. She had been off the tape when I first weighed her and got down to about 800kg.