On the subject of weight..........

MontyandZoom

MontyandZoom

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It's all well and good me moaning about horses being fat but I actually find it reallly hard to judge.

Monty carries his weight in a really wierd way. He's very old and dippy backed and he doesn't have alot of muscle since he is just a light hack.

Some people at my field think he looks like a cruelty case but I always go by the fatty bits either side of his tail and I think he did quite well this Winter, thinner than I'd like but good considering his type and age (he's in his late 20s and lives out). But now I'm worried I am the other way since I am used to my skinny tb.

Also, when I was commenting on the fat horses in my field (including the one that went down with lami) another friend said 'that's just his build because he's a cob'.

Maybe i have horsey body dismorphia too!

Does anyone have a picture of a cob that is a healthy weight so I can see?

I don't have a piccie of Monty with his new summer body but here is him in February at his thinnest:

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Hmm i'd be interested in seeing a pic of a healthy weight cob and maybe one of a show cob that people deem over weight?

The mare i ride is a LW cob and i find it hard to judge her condition.
 
Anywhere between 25 with bad teeth and 35 with ok teeth according to the dentist and vets........basically proper old!
 
PS - by gutter......do you mean the sort of 'apple-bum' effect. This was the main cause of argument between me and my friend.

I thought that a big-apple bum was too fat but she said it was just the way they are put together.......very prepared to be corrected though
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I darent post a pic of my Welsh D
she is fat... I do try and control her grazing and she is NEVER fed but still a porker
My Nf is also fat and my connemara is ok perhaps a lil tubby

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I am trying to post pic but i dont think it worked
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Then the dipped back is to be expected, which will accentuate his withers. He doesn't LOOK extremely ribby in your pics (but this is the problem with posting pics - someone PMd me earlier and asked me for pics of my healthy weight cob, but as I said, it is difficult to show in a picture what I mean when I say his ribs show when he moves). He also has his winter coat there, so difficult to see quite how ribby he was.

He looks to have a lovely coat in that picture and if it had been taken much later in the year, I'd have been concerned for how he might fair in winter tbh. However, taken in Feb of a pretty harsh winter, taking into account his age and lack of muscle, I think he's alright.
 
[ QUOTE ]
PS - by gutter......do you mean the sort of 'apple-bum' effect. This was the main cause of argument between me and my friend.

I thought that a big-apple bum was too fat but she said it was just the way they are put together.......very prepared to be corrected though
laugh.gif


[/ QUOTE ]

Cobs do tend to have big round bums... should be muscly rather than rippling, dimply fat. By gutter I mean when you stand behind and you look down their back, the dip in the middle. If it's huge...
 
Here is George last July. We had spent the whole summer concentrating on the mare who was ill, and George got far too big. This was taken the day after she was PTS... this was the day I took control of how he'd gotten. I was disgusted to have allowed him to get like this all because I was so preoccupied with the other horse. This is why I say I am not holier than thou, I know how hard it is and why I am not judgemental. I can scream from my soapbox about it if I want because I've been there and I know what fat looks like. He looks very shiny, very well and healthy and looked after... but he's OBESE and I still cringe when I look at these pics.

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I need to take more recent pics. He is very different looking now. Much trimmer, more muscled and goes like a bullet from a gun because he feels better, fitter and healthier and isn't carrying so much flab around.

I'd just like to say, though, that in terms of obesity on a scale, he was nowhere near as bad as some I have seen on forums and in real life! Some will look at the last pic and say he wasn't that bad, but I couldn't feel his ribs very well, he had a crest with some hard lumpy bits and he was just all dimply and flabby.

He is 18.
 
Link to your pic tedster:

http://www.ruralshots.com/2009%20Events/X%20Country%20Ride%2024th%20May/HTML/img_4336_std.jpg

Nice pony!

Monty doesn't put a huge amount of weight on in the Summer but so far enough to see him through the winter, he gets a belly and his bum gets a big rounder. I think the reason that people still think he is skinny is he never puts it on over his ribs. He also has a very shiny coat due to topspec balancer so they seem to show up more.

I think unfortunately he will continue to fare worse every winter, it's such a worry but, especially with lack of teeth, it is just a part of owning a mega-oldie.
 
God - never come to my field. There are 4 horses I can think of that are ALOT fatter than that.

You can imagine what poor old Monty boy looks like next to those - he looks like a toast rack!!

The only Summer photo i have on this computer is one of my mum riding him taken last year.

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Cob of healthy weight...
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and another...he's a bit fatter atm but this is what I aim for with him..if a little cleaner...lol

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