Oats for barefoot and condition

ktj1891

ktj1891

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Are they safe to feed?
What oats do you buy?

I was looking on Thunderbrook website that said their oats are different to normal whole oats in that they are mature organic germinating oats and therefore lower in starch than most, they advise to soak them for 24 hours and that they are safe for laminitics.

Whats your experiences feeding oats, I am really considering putting my boy on oats, only think holding me back is the fact he is barefoot and cribs and that oats contain quite high starch levels!

Any tips, advices, experience appreciated!
 
My idea of a barefoot diet was based on fibre and oil + minerals .......... non molassed s/beet, micronised linseed and dengie non mo chaff.
I used oats for work, but only a pet scoop per feed to start off with, and only once doing more than light work.
Most people do not ask horses to do much more than light work. If they are doing ten hours ridden per week including some hard work, then you can justify oats.
I would not base the diet on oats, in the way I would for a horse hunting three days a week.
 
I feed all my horses oats .
They are big horses and they work they all are BF at times .
I have feed a hunting horse up to three kilos a day BF with no ill effects .
Oats are of course only part of a diet based on alfalfa chopped straw micronised linseed and speedibeet .
I would use them as part of the diet for a poor horse for weight gain as well .
I buy ATM D and H bruised oats .
You can soak before feeding if you wish I don't .
What work are doing with your horse ?
Some oats are lower starch than others so that ties in with what you have read .
 
Goldenstar said:
I feed all my horses oats .
They are big horses and they work they all are BF at times .
I have feed a hunting horse up to three kilos a day BF with no ill effects .
Oats are of course only part of a diet based on alfalfa chopped straw micronised linseed and speedibeet .
I would use them as part of the diet for a poor horse for weight gain as well .
I buy ATM D and H bruised oats .
You can soak before feeding if you wish I don't .
What work are doing with your horse ?
Some oats are lower starch than others so that ties in with what you have read .
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He is ridden 6 days a week, 2/3 days schooling and 3/4 days hacking. Schools for 30/40 mins and hacks for roughly 1 hr mainly in walk (building his feet up).

He is currently on approximately 2 kg copra, 500g linseed, 1 kg kwikbeet and FP balancer, so the oats would be gradually added to his current feed. I recently dropped ERS pellets and he has started to drop some weight, therefore, I was looking to see if he would benefit better from oats.
 
I feed my welsh oats (barefoot) for energy not condition though so that might not help you! (he doesn't get copra ;) ) - on the plan that oats give him more energy but not weight gain as he burns it off as he is being more energetic. He is in significantly more work than yours though - 6 days a week 3 hacks (usually 1 x 1 hour, 1 x 2 hour, 1 x 3 hour) all speeds, 1 x 1 hour schooling, 1 lunge session and 1 other depending on my life ;).
 
I feed oats to my cribber for condition and a bit of extra energy and they are FAB :D He isn't silly on them (sensitive TB soul) and he is putting on condition beautifully, plus it seems ot have helped reduce his cribbing, I buy micronised rolled oats as thats what I can get my hands on, tried ERS pellets but the volume costs was silly and they were sending him a bit silly

He is in work, lunged once a week, schooled twice, hacked 3 times for anywhere up to 2 hours at a time
 
ester said:
I feed my welsh oats (barefoot) for energy not condition though so that might not help you! (he doesn't get copra ;) ) - on the plan that oats give him more energy but not weight gain as he burns it off as he is being more energetic. He is in significantly more work than yours though - 6 days a week 3 hacks (usually 1 x 1 hour, 1 x 2 hour, 1 x 3 hour) all speeds, 1 x 1 hour schooling, 1 lunge session and 1 other depending on my life ;).
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His work will gradually increase, I have started him on the gallops now and as the weather is getting nicer he will be going for longer hacks, plus more and longer schooling sessions. He has a flatwork lessions fortnightly. He is very laid back so energy with the oats would be a good thing, if however, they wont add any condition, I am not sure what else I can try. He already gets two big bucket feeds and an extra lunch feed if he comes in earlier. He isnt really eating his hay atm so this may be where the problem lies, hopefully the grass will be coming through soon to help with his condition!
 
I wonder if he is getting too much boring bulk with the copra and the beet, I would cut the copra and replace with oats, it not a bad thing to going to spring a bit light, is the hay/haylage good enough quality, is he fussy about it normally?
I would certainly want him to eat his hay.
I think oats will give him condition, it is used for hunters in hard work, and main thing is to keep condition on them over the season.
He should lose fat but build condition with walking and oats.
 
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MrsD123 said:
I wonder if he is getting too much boring bulk with the copra and the beet, I would cut the copra and replace with oats, it not a bad thing to going to spring a bit light, is the hay/haylage good enough quality, is he fussy about it normally?
I would certainly want him to eat his hay.
I think oats will give him condition, it is used for hunters in hard work, and main thing is to keep condition on them over the season.
He should lose fat but build condition with walking and oats.
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He is a poor doer TB and I have always struggled with his weight, he hasnt been fussy with his hay before the bale I have now. I cannot see anything wrong with this bale, it looks and smells nice but it is very long, thick hay wheras his bale before was more thin, chopped, bitty and green. I just think he is being fussy or he has gone off hay all together and wants grass!!

Tbh he seems to be really enjoying his copra, he hasnt been on it that long, only about 2 months so far!
 
Our 2 TB's are BF and both on oats.

We feed rolled oats that have been soaked for 24 hours (easier to digest and that's the way the feed run works!).

Fig gets 2.5 scoops a day and CS gets 1.5 scoops a day.

Bock crunching sound, both in hard work and both positively blooming on them.

P1300819_zps8c6a4d6e.jpg

P1300951_zpsa64995fe.jpg


Fatty bum bums :)

I don't rate feeding any kind of beet. And if it were me I would replace with something fibre/oil based (Fig gets winergy conditioning) and see how he goes.

CS is on the other side of the scale, and although he suffers ulcers he is fed a high starch cereal based diet plus the oats and winergy high energy.
 
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I feed my barefoot horse whole oats that have been soaked. She is a very poor doer and a fussy eater and feeding oats has been great for condition, she is eating up and has enough energy for work but is manageable in the stable.
 
nikkimariet said:
Our 2 TB's are BF and both on oats.

We feed rolled oats that have been soaked for 24 hours (easier to digest and that's the way the feed run works!).

Fig gets 2.5 scoops a day and CS gets 1.5 scoops a day.

Bock crunching sound, both in hard work and both positively blooming on them.

P1300819_zps8c6a4d6e.jpg

P1300951_zpsa64995fe.jpg


Fatty bum bums :)

I don't rate feeding any kind of beet. And if it were me I would replace with something fibre/oil based (Fig gets winergy conditioning) and see how he goes.

CS is on the other side of the scale, and although he suffers ulcers he is fed a high starch cereal based diet plus the oats and winergy high energy.
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I wish every TB looked like yours.
 
You certainly have to be careful with boring bulk and some TBs .
Oats certainly work brilliantly on this type of issue with some horses .
I usually introduce it gradually starting with 250 grammes the first day 500 the second until I get to a kilo a day then I wait ten days or so and see what difference there is .
Then as I feel the need I add another half kilo and wait ten days and so on .
You won't want to be feeding more than three kilos of oats a day and at that level I would be feeding three perhaps four times daily.
You also have to be ready to cut back when work is reduced or stopped .
Oats and kwik beet would be my choice as kwikbeet is a good calcium source I have no idea if copra is .
My TB is so easy to keep looking fab if you add oats to his diet it suits him perfectly .
The other thing to consider with TBs is that some have small appetites for size and you have to be wary of filling them up with low calorie forage my first choice would be to provide a higher feed value forage .
 
I've fed copra and oats together to 2 tbs and a warmblood and they worked well in terms of weight and/or the right sort of energy depending on how much fed.

Copra is not high in calcium but has reasonable levels of phosphorus which suits the local conditions.
 
Goldenstar said:
The other thing to consider with TBs is that some have small appetites for size and you have to be wary of filling them up with low calorie forage my first choice would be to provide a higher feed value forage .
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Please try telling my TB that! ;)

On a serious note, mine has absolutely bloomed on whole soaked oats. She is never in much work as the likes of Fig and CS so gets around 1.5 scoops added to speedibeet, 2 mugs linseed and a min/vit sup. She obviously gets ad lib haylage too. I soak the oats overnight as that is what fits in with our routine!

After battling with her weight for a year we have finally got it right. I thoroughly believe that if your horse is not in hard work, a simple straights diet with ad lib haylage should be sufficient to maintain a healthy weight and it needn't cost ££££. IMO, you need to get the hindgut stabilized and efficient so that means fibre fibre fibre and oats and oil as a top up. Mine looks 1000X better on less feed but higher in fibre and oil than messing around with cubes and mixes!

This was her yesterday:

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And in the middle of winter fully clipped:

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ktj1891 said:
Are they safe to feed?
What oats do you buy?

I was looking on Thunderbrook website that said their oats are different to normal whole oats in that they are mature organic germinating oats and therefore lower in starch than most, they advise to soak them for 24 hours and that they are safe for laminitics.

Whats your experiences feeding oats, I am really considering putting my boy on oats, only think holding me back is the fact he is barefoot and cribs and that oats contain quite high starch levels!

Any tips, advices, experience appreciated!
Click to expand...

lf the oats are germinating they're actually malt...
 
"The general consensus is that oats can be fed unprocessed. As it is a larger grain, horses are capable of chewing the grain enough to break its seed coat, removing the need for physical processing. Studies have also found that oat starch is far easier to digest than corn or barley starch in an uncooked form. So oats can be fed whole and uncooked. However, whether oats can be fed unprocessed needs to be decided on a horse by horse basis. Observe your horse's manure closely when you are feeding him oats. If you observe whole oat grains in his manure, whole oats is not a suitable feed for this horse. It is important to make sure the oats you are observing in the manure are whole and not just undigested hulls. Do this by taking them from the manure and squeezing them. If they are whole you will observe the white starch oozing from the centre. If you want to feed oats specifically, but your horse doesn't digest them well, cracked, steam rolled and micronised oats can be purchased." from feed xl newletter
 
my boy has just moved onto tiger oats and gwf balancer (oat based) and he is positively starting to gleam. Both my two are BF and interestingly with both of them their persistent thrush is getting better without treatment as such (they both hate treatment).
 
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