Optimum length of grass for laminitis

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Sven

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OK I am very confused. First time I've had to deal with laminitis for my aged chap - not yet tested for cushings but has no other symptoms.

I thought that there was a school of thought that short "growing" grass had more fructose in it and that the longer older grass was OK. But then in reading the reams of info on the internet it now seems that long grass is just as bad if not worse.

I can't put him in a bare patch because a) I don't have one (but I guess I could make one) but b) he will basically run up and down the fence line because he wants to be somewhere else, in fact it was doing just this that helped bring on this current predicament.

So what do you suggest?
 
I think short stressed grass is Likely higher in sugar than longer, older stuff, but, if you consider it in terms of volumes a horse on sparse grazing is going to consume much less sugar than it will on lush/long grazing.
 
I think it sounds like a grazing muzzle would be your answer here. We have the same problem with my daughter's pony - the choice is either alone in small bare paddock, or muzzled, but out with the herd. At least with a muzzle you can be pretty sure that it will reduce their intake...unless they can remove it in 40 seconds like our Welsh cob...we find that the Greenguard muzzle is the best. They are horrible but they work.
 
There is no optimum length of grass for a laminitic. Optimum is none.

However you may find you get off with old, long grass under trees, mostly in the shade.
 
It also very much depends on the type of grass and rs management.

We have one field of half an acre which is 80% bare. Madam comes in footsore from it.

We have thirty acres of grazing with herd on knee deep grass. It's fertilised annually. She comes in more footsore.

We have a third field which is between the other two which has more grass but it is short and heavily worn by the herd during winter so quite stressed. She has been fine in here - I can only assume because it is an old quarry site the grass roots are stronger as soil is not plentiful (very rocky) and the increased requirements to navigate the field hole balance the grass sugars better.

All very odd!
 
I think that because the types of grasses, soils and management systems are so diverse, it is difficult if not impossible to talk about the optimum length of grass.

If you look at a field and think that any self respecting farmer would be proud of that, its bad for horses.
 
muckingoutmum said:
I think it sounds like a grazing muzzle would be your answer here. We have the same problem with my daughter's pony - the choice is either alone in small bare paddock, or muzzled, but out with the herd. At least with a muzzle you can be pretty sure that it will reduce their intake...unless they can remove it in 40 seconds like our Welsh cob...we find that the Greenguard muzzle is the best. They are horrible but they work.
Click to expand...

Thats funny my pony got the green guard muzzle off in record time so i sold all of mine and got dinky rugs ones
 
Thanks - I think - the field has "run away" a bit and there is a lot of long grass running to seed. I've used a grazing muzzle on the companion pony (Shetland) but he gave himself a sore eye trying to get it off - so not too keen on using one, but may be worth a go.

At the moment, due to something else I read about the worse time being between 8am and 4pm, they go out while I muck out first thing for about 40 minutes coming in around 7am and then go out for a couple of hours when I get back from work about 4.30. Not much of a life, the old guy doesn't mind as he loves his stable and sleeps a lot, but the Shetland is getting cabin fever (they can't be separated).

They are also fed (another cardinal sin apparently) hage as there is no hay to be had, and the old boy is a fussy old b***er and won't eat hay unless it is pristine. Rations have been cut by half. Up until recently the old boy was fed a veteran mix, but these mixes always make him put on weight so that has been binned and he is on a strictly fibre only diet of happy hoof and high fibre cubes and only a handful at that.

What really surprises me is that it is the 16.1 IDxTB that has laminitis and the Shetland is fine!

There is also a part of me that questions the diagnosis as there is really only one front foot that is affected - this foot has had a fractured pedal bone (age 6) and suffered a really deep cut from the frog through the heel (age 16) not to mention the suspected navicular at age 19 he is now 25.
 
Does this help?



http://equinecare-and-control.weebly.com/l.html

PASTURE FOR THE LAMINITIC
Pasture fructan levels are lowest in the morning so horses can
be allowed to graze until about 11am. Limit pasture access to 90
minutes only in spring and autumn. “Starvation” paddocks, strip
grazing and grazing muzzles can be used to limit pasture intake.
Do not allow laminitic horses to graze on stressed short grass,
frosted or drought recovering pastures as these may contain
high fructan levels. Avoid grazing in full sun during the day and as
much as possible during spring and autumn, especially after a dry
summer (ie times of high pasture growth).
Avoid ryegrass, phalaris and fescue dominant lush pastures which
are considered high risk pastures, as well as rapidly growing clover
in pastures in spring.
 
Well I was always told that it is the bodies/guts ability to deal with the sugars in any grass that is the key. If they are getting too much, whether that is short grass or long grass and they cannot cope with the sugars or the body is overloaded, they are likely to get laminitis. So I manage my lad on a basis of ensuring that overall on an ongoing basis his body does not have to deal with an overload. They way I do this for my horse is on an area during the day that is well grazed down to pickings of short grass and in at night on soaked hay throughout the entire year. If during the day he has somehow found more grass than is desirable then the being in at night totally off the grass seems to balance things out and I have managed him really well like this for a few years since he had laminitis. Coupled with exercise and no sugary treats at all.
 
I thought the theory was that horses have huge long jaws to help them grind up woody material - like old brown woody grass stems and scrub. Sheep nip at short grass but horses are more for longer browner older woodier things.
But keeping them in fields means it's pretty impossible to get that kind of vegetation as it'll always be quite trimmed. Also I think if the field is fertilised or is sown with one particular grass then it's not going to be good for the horse.

At home we've not been able to cut the hay until August for the past 2 years, various reasons. We thought the harvests had been ruined, that we'd have to buy in. But our horses actually look great, they survived the winter better than before (although maybe it was just lack of rain!).
Nearly all the seeds had fallen from the hay, the stalks were brown yellow, pretty fibrous. We've fed twice as much as normal, but they loved it and look more sort of resilient and bulky, and no tooth problems.
 
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