My horse is 'seriously underweight'

Also Fionam12 yes it is standard and acceptable practice to give horses who have nothing left some hay on this yard. That is unless there are specific reasons not to for example if the owner has stipulated a specific diet. Yard staff have also given the horse in question hay as have other liveries when he had none left by 7pm and was going to be in until morning. To be honest the op could have simply asked that no hay be put into him and it would not have happened again!
 
You Wont Forget Me said:
Just to clear things up at no point did i EVER leave my horse out in winter with no rugs and food!!!! And also he is not left everynight from 7 till 7 or 9 the next morning as most nights he isnt even in until 8 pm and is turned out at 6.30am!!

I have also taken on the advice given by many of you and the horse is now given a bigger haynet doubled up at night to last him longer and we are also working on his topline at the moment too, i will keep you updated on how we get on!
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That is good to hear - the most important thing is ensuring he isn't standing for hours with nothing to eat. Double netting will hopefully help!
 
I don't thinkits judgemental to comment on something when someone has actuaally asked for opinions.

I don't think the horse is skinny as such but from the information OP has given there were clearly issues which hopefully are now resolved.
 
Deleted now I have read some more of the thread. There are always 2 sides to a story and not everyone at a livery yard is out to get you!!! There can be a wealth of valuable free advice available too.
 
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There are always 2 sides to a story and not everyone at a livery yard is out to get you!!! There can be a wealth of valuable free advice available too.[/QUOTE]

Absolutely agree with this. I hate the idea of horses being in with no hay all night, even fatties can have well soaked hay for goodness sake. Not feeding/rugging due to not schooling well, Words fail me! , is the poor horse supposed to understand his "punishment" ?.
 
Completely agree with this. I hate the idea of horses being in with no hay all night, even fatties can have well soaked hay for goodness sake. Not feeding/rugging due to not schooling well, Words fail me! , is the poor horse supposed to understand his "punishment" ?.
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Perhaps she should have gone to bed without supper or bedclothes because she didn't ride him well?
 
Eventa said:
Also Fionam12 yes it is standard and acceptable practice to give horses who have nothing left some hay on this yard.
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Out of interest, is the hay on your yard part of your livery deal (therefore not costing extra) or do you use the livery's own supply to top up?

Also, changing the subject somewhat Eventa, I remember a while ago the same teenager having problems with her horse and one of her difficulties was your YO not allowing outside intsructors on the yard. That seems very harsh. Is there any reason for that please?




( Edited to say: apologies for my nosiness! Other peoples' yard systems and rules fascinate me!)
 
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Nettle123 said:
Like^^^^^
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Wagtail said:
Perhaps she should have gone to bed without supper or bedclothes because she didn't ride him well?
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Nettle123 said:
There are always 2 sides to a story and not everyone at a livery yard is out to get you!!! There can be a wealth of valuable free advice available too.
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Absolutely agree with this. I hate the idea of horses being in with no hay all night, even fatties can have well soaked hay for goodness sake. Not feeding/rugging due to not schooling well, Words fail me! , is the poor horse supposed to understand his "punishment" ?.[/QUOTE]

You Wont Forget Me said:
Just to clear things up at no point did i EVER leave my horse out in winter with no rugs and food!!!! And also he is not left everynight from 7 till 7 or 9 the next morning as most nights he isnt even in until 8 pm and is turned out at 6.30am!!

I have also taken on the advice given by many of you and the horse is now given a bigger haynet doubled up at night to last him longer and we are also working on his topline at the moment too, i will keep you updated on how we get on!
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Come on Ladies, the OP has totally denied the Leaving of her horse with no rugs or food as a punishment we only have this on hearsay from someone who says they are the lady who has been feeding the horse on the yard (for all we know Eventa may be a 65 year old man in a top floor flat in Wigan!)...The OP appears to have listened to advice and is working on getting her horse muscled and giving him more food...shall we maybe cut her a break now rather than go down the "Demon Teen" route again?
 
Wagtail said:
Perhaps she should have gone to bed without supper or bedclothes because she didn't ride him well?
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Please, was this necessary? :rolleyes:

Seems everyone's come out of this happy - would be interesting to see pics of the horse in a couple of months.

If it's 'standard practice' on most DIY yards for people to feed each other's horses, then I'm glad I'm not on one! No-one else's horse is my responsibilty, just like mine is no-one else's. If I thought a horse needed anything or was being deprived anything, I would raise it with the YO/YM and leave it at that, and if I found that anyone was giving my horse anything, or taking anything away, without my express consent I would be extremely unhappy.

Do It Yourself - the clue's in the name...
 
Chavhorse - love it !! 65 year old man in flat in Wigan ! you are right I for one certainly forget that people posting may not only embelish their experiences but may not be who they seem at all !!!!!!
 
FionaM12 said:
( Edited to say: apologies for my nosiness! Other peoples' yard systems and rules fascinate me!)
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Not an uncommon rule actually. Usually means the YO is an instructor and wants any lesson money themselves. Sometimes yards have a compromise and then make an additional charge for use of the school for this lesson time with external instructor.

Personally I would never be at such a yard unless i had specifically moved there to be at my trainers yard. I am an instructor and have met both the above scenarios at yards in my area.
 
Wagtail said:
Perhaps she should have gone to bed without supper or bedclothes because she didn't ride him well?
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Not dabbling in a bit of teen baiting are we wagtail:eek: i didn't think you agreed with that kind of behaviour!


Come on Ladies, the OP has totally denied the Leaving of her horse with no rugs or food as a punishment we only have this on hearsay from someone who says they are the lady who has been feeding the horse on the yard (for all we know Eventa may be a 65 year old man in a top floor flat in Wigan!)...The OP appears to have listened to advice and is working on getting her horse muscled and giving him more food...shall we maybe cut her a break now rather than go down the "Demon Teen" route again?
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Well said:)
 
Okay...
Firstly, no feed no rug situation!!(one word - facts :rolleyes:) This happened 2years ago when i had not long moved to this paticular yard, we had had a very bad week and on this paticular day he reared up several times and caught me on the way down, i was so annoyed and in the moment threw him back into his stabe (straw bed at this time) without his lw or mw rug i cant quite remember which it was and he already had a small pile of haylege in his stable, he was simply not given more or given his hard feed! It was also not in mid winter it was right at the start! Little does Eventa know, we returned to the yard later that evening and gave him his usual amount of haylege... now im not saying this was right i know it was a very bad move but learnt from it and would never do it again no matter how bad the situation was, but to claim i left my horse in mid winter with no food or rugs is simply out of order!!


And as far as getting professionals in to get an opinion, we have had vets, neutritionists (sp) and several v experianced horse owners opinions on his weight in the past and none wanted to see any more weight on him, yes he has much more muscle to build and we are working on it.

As for those saying about me being a typical teen ect i know i dont know everything no one does and i always take on advice, yes i will maybe speak to others about it first but never will i ignore someones advice completetly.

Lastly Mrs B.... do you know this horse.... yes he is 6, i have owned him since he was broken i know him inside out, he actually is as laid back as a 30 year old horse and the photo's you are talking about were also taken after an hour jumping session so i knew he was in a fine mood to just stand there and trusted him to do so.


i think thats all that was left for me to clear up
 
now im not saying this was right i know it was a very bad move but learnt from it and would never do it again no matter how bad the situation was,
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I look back in horror at my own idiocy from when I was young sometimes.
 
Faracat said:
I look back in horror at my own idiocy from when I was young sometimes.
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as i imagine we all do;) but i'll bet very few of us would have admitted it at the time:o
Well done OP on remaining calm and polite throughout all this, we don't all get it right all of the time, but as long as we can accept this and make moves to correct our mistakes then we're on the right path:)
 
You Wont Forget Me said:
And as far as getting professionals in to get an opinion, we have had vets, neutritionists (sp) and several v experianced horse owners opinions on his weight in the past and none wanted to see any more weight on him, yes he has much more muscle to build and we are working on it.
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I think most peoples point was that he won't get this muscle on what you were feeding him.

My 4 year sports horse old has one haynet a night plus the same ammount on the floor (He trashes the net if he has none on the floor, He likes to switch between the two) and never finishes all of that. He is out most days for 6 - 8 hours.

Muscle wise, Your horse looks to be on the same level as mine. Mine is 4 and unbroken - He has not done any work until last week. You cannot possibly argue that your horse is receiving enough when he is doing 6 days work and is in the same condition as a horse 2 years younger that has never been worked properly. I would question any professional who would argue this.

You seem to be taking the attitude that everyone is against you. Not the case. We were all young once, And sometimes hearing the cold hard truth is what you need. Plus, You did ask opinions. You can't do that expecting everybody to agree with you.
 
Queenofdiamonds said:
I think most peoples point was that he won't get this muscle on what you were feeding him.

My 4 year sports horse old has one haynet a night plus the same ammount on the floor (He trashes the net if he has none on the floor, He likes to switch between the two) and never finishes all of that. He is out most days for 6 - 8 hours.

Muscle wise, Your horse looks to be on the same level as mine. Mine is 4 and unbroken - He has not done any work until last week. You cannot possibly argue that your horse is receiving enough when he is doing 6 days work and is in the same condition as a horse 2 years younger that has never been worked properly. I would question any professional who would argue this.

You seem to be taking the attitude that everyone is against you. Not the case. We were all young once, And sometimes hearing the cold hard truth is what you need. Plus, You did ask opinions. You can't do that expecting everybody to agree with you.
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i am aware of this and this is why his forage has now been increased! I am certainly not taking that attitude i know that is not the case i am simply stating my point to the small minority who are being just a 'little' rude on the matter, i know i asked opinions and i have taken them all on board. As for the muscle situation we are working on it with him as i have also said previously
 
I also think in the ops defence she asked if the horse was underweight which I wouldn't say he was yes under muscled but she did say she knew that. And as I said in previous post and op pointed out the horse had 2 months box rest earlier on in the year I wouldn't expect loads of muscle on a horse that has box rest!
As she's pointed out how can she feed him the correct amount when others are feeding and she can't monitor his food.
Silly thing is if this horse was overweight everybody would be saying its so unhealthy I'd prefer the horse to be a bit lean than a bit fat, you can never win!!!
 
Sorry its not just his forage but his protien level. Yes, he needs to be kept grazing and shouldn't be without food for long periods. However, he will struggle to develop muscle without a good balencer. Think of him like a teenage boy all lanky and needing that extra to muscle up, grow and develop (and just think about how much they eat!). At the same time feed recommended amount and he shouldn't with his level of work turn into a chucky monkey! As I said before my boy struggled to muscle up and this has really helped and was on the advice of Spillers feeding specialist. Please look into the weigh bridges, they give great unbias advice...
 
Dukey said:
like a teenage boy all lanky and needing that extra to muscle up, grow and develop (and just think about how much they eat!).
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Surely at six he's not really a teenager, is he? He might fill out a bit, but he won't be growing will he?
 
No he's not seriously under weight. My explanation for feeding him would be his work load is making him expend more calories (energy) than he is taking in, the small amount of protein he is getting is being used as energy adn not for making muscle etc, yes he has been on box rest but to build his muscle he needs material for building it with, this material can only come from his food, i would be giving him around 8 - 10 kg of hay a night (if he was out all night he would be unrestricted ) and a good quality hard feed, my 3 year old is on a level grow mix (yes designed for young horses but also good for horses coming back from injury and the saracen level grow is non heating and designed for good doers. She has 500g of this (half a round scoop) 2 times a day and a round scoop of alfa a oil 2 times a day. He looks lovely btw and i have just moved from a yard where they were feeding my 2 year old and threatened to phone rspca, in end i called a vet out as i was now convinced these dairy farmers were right - vet said she looks perfect a rising 2 year old coming out of winter should look ribby, she was just covered with 3 or 4 on display in march come may shes shiny and lovely again, so i know how it feels to be scrutinised :) take care- enjoy your horse and cut the hands off the next person to feed him without your permission
my 3 year old for refernce
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Lol yes you are all right i am an old man and don't have horses or even know these people i just thought i would join in! Lmao. Anyway i have had my say and to be honest think this has come to a natural end! Please! Lol
 
You Wont Forget Me said:
i am aware of this and this is why his forage has now been increased! I am certainly not taking that attitude i know that is not the case i am simply stating my point to the small minority who are being just a 'little' rude on the matter, i know i asked opinions and i have taken them all on board. As for the muscle situation we are working on it with him as i have also said previously
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I said you *seem* to be. Even in this comment, You seem to be taking the defense, I am not digging at you. We all need advice from time to time. For heavens sake some of the most experienced horse owners i know will ask a second opinion from time to time even if it's just 'Do you think it'll be ok to turn out today?'.

I am glad you've taken them on board. I'm sorry if you feel i am being rude, I was just a little surprised at his muscle given how much work he does is all. I don't intend to insult anybody.
 
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