Owners of Lami prone pones!

La Fiaba

La Fiaba

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I have been offered a pony who is prone to lami and will most likely take her on as she is perfect for us all other respects. My question is:

Do I have to soak hay? I don't like soaking hay as it ferments, especially in the summer when we're at 40 degrees. Would I be better just giving smaller portion of hay/straw in small holed net? (Have seen some old threads on this some people saying must soak for 24 hours, others saying 20mins is fine).

Keeping off grass and lots of exercise is no problem, but I know it takes more than that to keep on top of lami, so if anyone has any other useful info or links to good websites I (and the pony!) would be very grateful. Cheers me dears :)
 
Having a lami prone pony I wouldn't take on one who is lami prone now! It's very stressful keeping an eye on pulses/grass/footyness
 
Argh phone posted before it was finished ..

Keeping a horse in restricted grazing/stabled alot/careful feeding/trimming and very big vets bills if they do get laminitis it all adds up to a big expense and headache!
 
I'm not sure if there is a right and a wrong thing to do regarding soaking hay - I do soak it, come rain, shine or deep freeze! Yes, its a pain, but I am happier soaking - for 24hrs! In the summer I just tend to put it in the shade, and change the water - I've got freezer packs I put in too to help keep it cold and slow down the fermentation, rinse well etc. I feed straw as well, mixed in well with the soaked hay - never caused me a problem but I know that's always a discussion point too! I personally wouldn't be put off a lami pony, they just take a bit of managing.
 
I have one and wouldn't be put off either - Concussion on the road did it for my boy a couple of months ago, but i had it under control within a week.
5 days box rest and bute.

He now has a small restricted grazing paddock with a hay & straw net.
I don't soak his hay and never have as he won't eat it. Plus we have seed hay not meadow so it isn't as rich.
He doesn't get treats or carrots but i feed magnesium oxide which made a huge difference to him.

He doesn't wear shoes so see's the farrier every 8-10 weeks for his usual trim.
 
As long as it is balanced with a balancer and something with higher protein like alfalfa and the pony has good teeth/good doer then oat straw (chopped or whole) can be a good middle ground. (higher sugar than 12 hour soaked hay but a lot lower than unsoaked hay).

If you could get some that might be an option.

At least the heat should mean your grass is less dangerous!
 
I have 2 ponies very prone to laminitis. Both can get away with slightly different management though, it depends on the pony. One of mine I've kept lami-free for years now by simply having him out on a small paddock of roughly 1/2 an acre (very short and never fertilised grass),the grass isnt enough to keep weight on him (especially now he's old) so he has access to hay at all times. The hay being fed in a small holed haylage net - I dont soak. My shetland is super sensitive though so during lami season she lives in our medium sized hardcored yard (where she mills about with open access to the stables etc.) and is given access to a haylage net of hay (again, not soaked) at all times, so basically she lives on nothing but hay and 2 feeds a day all year round except in winter when she can go out on grass fine.

I'd definately ask the owner how they manage it and try to replicate. Remember not to do too much work on hard ground either as that can cause lami too.
 
I have one. The previous owner didn't tell me he was laminitic, which she should ahve done.

He has had: concusive laminitis, stress laminitis, and grass induced (sugars) laminitis - though that might have been the too many carrots he was getting!

We've managed it through him being in for a day and a night and out for a day and a night.

This summer, due to the herd set-up, he's going to be out 24/7 with a muzzle on.

We've tried a muzzle before, but he just stood and sulked; we're trying it this time as due to the yard set-up, there will be too much grass for even just one day and night stint without.

We would put him in a bare-ish paddock, but he will jump out, either to get grass or to join his mates.

We once had him in a paddock, with five foot high criss-crossed electric tape fencing, and he got out. Repeatedly.

I would buy a laminitic pony, but be prepared to have to manage it.

As to hay, mine have always had ad lib hay. When he's had a bout of laminitis, then it's been soaked for twelve hours - it's to make sure he has forage going through his gut and not stressing.
 
Thank you everyone for sharing your experiences, has given me some more to think about, doh! I will speak to the owner again as I am a bit worried about the 'concusive' laminitis as that would be difficult to work around tbh.

And yes, our summer grazing is none existant anyway, hence why I'm not worried about the grass for now!
 
Careful management is the key, and finding out the underlying cause.

Any pony can get laminitis, so you could go out and buy a different one and it could get it next week - so if this one is perfect in all other ways, snap it up and manage it as you would any pony that could get lami, rather than worry too much.

But you need to know why this one got it in the first place.

Was it overweight? I know people say once they have had it they are more prone, but I think it is easier because you are more careful.

I had one pony who was anything but your typical lami type, he got acute laminitis in February, and it was due to hormones, so I was completely caught out even though I was managing another one with it! Either way, forewarned is forearmed.

The soaking hay question crops up a lot, but so much depends on the quality of the hay. If it is a late cut, from meadow hay, it won't need so much soaking, whereas if it is an early cut rye/seed crop, you would need to soak it for longer. Find a friendly farmer and make sure you buy meadow. Over here I can buy a guaranteed low sugar haylage which tides me over when I don't want or can't soak hay - do you have such stuff where you are?



ps re the soaking, I was told to change the water regularly to help dissolve the sugar - that would work for you rather than leave it to stew! Or soak overnight when the temperature is lower. 12 hours should be plenty - after 24 there wouldn't be much point feeding it, you might as well shred cardboard :)
 
We don't get haylage as it would just ferment and the hay dries so quickly there is no need for it, but I did notice alfalfa was suggested and I've got that coming out of my ears!

Last year I tried soaking hay overnight for the pony we had on loan, it still went rank and when I spoke to her owner she said she prefered I gave her non-soaked hay, just less of it. That pony had never had lami as far as we know but did get fat on thin air so we managed as if she would get lami if got too fat.

Our hay is very variable quality, it is hard to descibe how it works over here but it seems farmers don't know much about growing good hay and just cut any fields with grass growing in them. I suppose the good thing about it is the grass is not too rich or over fertilised. We get a lot of hay/straw mixed bales too. The alfalfa crops are excellent though.

Thank again for replies :)
 
It baffles me why people would soak hay for so long!! There are studies shown that sugar is the first thing to leach out of hay as it is the main water soluble thing in hay (then potassium)!!!

http://www.safergrass.org/pdf/SoakReport2.pdf

I give normal hay unless horse is acutely laminitic, mixed with barley straw. He eats it fine, lots of fibre, less sugar, as long as he is getting fibre to his digestive system, taht is all that matters.
 
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