Pasture Mix - can it make them hot headed

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djlynwood

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Can D&H Pasture Mix make horses hot headed?

The horse I ride is fed on Pasture Mix and Alfa A and my trainer has said that this could be the reason he is becoming very sharp as it contains a lot of starch.

Has anyone else experienced this?
 
Yes, some horses cannot take any kind of mix at all without becoming very very silly....
Do you need to feed a mix alongside the alfa A? Why not just alfa A with vits and mins or replace the mix with hi fi cubes?
 
My TB was loopy with any sort of mix - cubes were much better suited to her as she was a hot head anyway without any help.
Ditto above, swop for High Fibre cubes and even from Alfa A to Hi Fi instead
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Yes!! My otherwise chilled out warmblood goes loopy on Pasture Mix! I think some horses just don't get on with it.
 
Yes. It contains cereals. If your horse is the ideal weight then try to maintain it with fibre and oil, plenty of forage and warmth. I tend to repeat myself a lot and I know that some horses do need a mix, but I really do not think they are necessary in many cases, unless your horse is in very hard work. The vits and mins can come from a supplement or balancer (you can also get conditioning balancers) and the fibre, if using the correct products, will maintain the weight of horses in work.

Cereals - wheat, oats, barley, maize - can all make a horse lose its cool, and even so called non-heating mixes contain some for of cereal. Oil can also send a horse barmy, especially if introduced too quickly, so do it slowly if you introduce it (if horse needs it).
 
Thanks for your replys.

I Ride this horse for someone who does not have the time and Im looking to do so long term. I asked the owner about his feed as I thought it may have something to do with his sharp behaviour. He has been on this mix for years.

The first few times I rode him, he was forward but not a loon. Now he is forward and a loon. he is getting fitter but its like his mind spirals till he get himself worked up.

My trainer is convinced its the mix and going by what you have all said, its worth me asking the owner again. He is a very young 19 year old.
 
Either the mix, which as has been pointed out is high in starch, or the Alfa may do it, I have had hores react badly to AlfaA.
 
Hi excuse me whilst I piggy back this thread.....my mare is a poor doer and I'm very hesitant to add anything heating: but she really needs the calories to keep her weight on.

I feed her on Hi-Fi Lite (1kg), with Dengie Alfa A Cubes (1/2 kg)(soaked) and a couple on handfulls of Ride and Relax (1=3/4kg) per day and she is super fizzy! She's on Pink Powder and i'm coming to the end of the pot: it hasn't really done much for her that I can see as yet.

If I were to remove the Ride and Relax and Pink Powder what would you suggest I swap her onto? Bailey's Lo Cal? A & P Calm and Condition?
 
Yep, any kind of mix sends mine abolutely barking (or is it bucking?) mad!

Re Bugly - have you tried D&H conditioning cubes?

Our lads (17.2hh warmblood and 14.2h Welsh -> tricky to find feeds that suit both!) lost a bit of wheight before coming in for the winter - quickly picked it up again just with Dengie Hi-Fi and D&H Conditioning Cubes. Plus it gives a bit of shine and doesn't heat (well, at least it doesn't heat ours).
 
As a general guide the higher the starch level in a feed the more heating it will be, even if it is barley free, oat free etc. Pasture Mix contains 26% starch, same as most instant energy or competition mixes. i would suggest something cereal free based on fibre and oil such as Bailey's Outshine, Spillers Slow Release Energy Cubes, or a Winergy product maybe the Low Energy, all of these products are oil based so a low releasing source of energy rather than in fits and starts from a cereal that can cause the sharp behavior.
 
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Yep, any kind of mix sends mine abolutely barking (or is it bucking?) mad!

Re Bugly - have you tried D&H conditioning cubes?

Our lads (17.2hh warmblood and 14.2h Welsh -> tricky to find feeds that suit both!) lost a bit of wheight before coming in for the winter - quickly picked it up again just with Dengie Hi-Fi and D&H Conditioning Cubes. Plus it gives a bit of shine and doesn't heat (well, at least it doesn't heat ours).

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yes i have: with little success, i just couldn't;t get any weight on her with them, i was feeding a bag a week and then foundCalm and Condition which was great. Thanks for the idea though. i think i might try the Spillers Slow Release Energy cubes.
 
The only thing you have to be careful with when choosing a new feed, particularly with a horse prone to excitability, is that the feed does not contain barley, maize etc. These ingredients can be hidden in foods you wouldn't expect them to be in.

Like I said, a conditioning balancer would help, as would an appropriate level of oil added to the feed. Also Alfabeet is a conditioning fibre feed. Oil can still make them fizz, so be careful if you do add it. Also be careful if you use Alfa A Oil as not all horses will eat it - my WB would throw his bowl across the stable in a strop.
 
PS, some feed companies, like spillers, do not list ingredients on their site (and I couldn't find it on the bag either), so you may need to phone them. They tend to say a feed is non-heating if it doesn't contain oats, but don't mention the other cereals that the feed does contain that aren't seen to be fizzing feeds, but can be!
 
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Hi excuse me whilst I piggy back this thread.....my mare is a poor doer and I'm very hesitant to add anything heating: but she really needs the calories to keep her weight on.

I feed her on Hi-Fi Lite (1kg), with Dengie Alfa A Cubes (1/2 kg)(soaked) and a couple on handfulls of Ride and Relax (1=3/4kg) per day and she is super fizzy! She's on Pink Powder and i'm coming to the end of the pot: it hasn't really done much for her that I can see as yet.

If I were to remove the Ride and Relax and Pink Powder what would you suggest I swap her onto? Bailey's Lo Cal? A & P Calm and Condition?

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Is there a good reason why you use Hifi Lite with a mare who is a poor doer? If she is in work and drops off in winter she may well be better off on a maintenance feed like Alfa A. Some people have seen their horse react to Alfa A but it is rare, and no horse I have ever fed it has. Alongside the Alfa A, give her Alfabeet if she needs to gain condition or speedibeet or similar if you want to maintain it (you can gain weight on speedibeet but you need such a lot because it is 80% water - I prefer quality over quantity for horses with poor appetites like mine). Just a scoop of each is enough (depending on her size - if she is smaller than mine then she may only need half of each 2x a day. A balancer should make her glow from the inside out if fed in the right quantities, so look for an alternative conditioning balancer or switch to a gen purpose vit and min supplement for her general health. You can then add oil (I use veg oil from rapeseed) to her feed accordingly - my boy is 17.3hh and gets 400ml a day. Introduce slowly so that she doesn't go mad on it, and use only in winter. You probably only need the vit and min supp in winter as well unless she is in a lot or her hay is poor. Apart from that, she needs ad lib hay or haylage (haylage is better for poor doers and has a high protein level so you won't really need a balancer as such, just the vits and mins).

So to summarise, in winter, I would be giving her 2 feeds a day of: a scoop of AlfaA, a scoop of either Alfabeet or speedibeet or similar, vits and mins supplement, maybe vegetable oil (this will help her coat as well). You can then reduce the amounts for summer or cut it out completely if she is out 24/7. But you need to give her plenty of hay or haylage as that will help her hold her weight. Spillers conditioning cubes didn't hot my boy up when he was on them short term to get a bit of weight on him, but they can some horses as they DO contain cereals; it is just a virtue that he's pretty dopey whatever you give him!. He is 17.3hh and now gets: 1 scoop (400g) Alfa A, 1 (1.6kg) scoop Alfabeet, 1 mug BOSS, 3/4 cup F4F (but swapping to vits and mins and Naf Biotin soon), 200ml veg oil - twice a day. He has as much hay as he can eat, which is very good quality stuff.

I would then weigh tape her weekly and if she really starts to drop off despite feeding conditioning fibre feeds and adlib forage, you could consider a mix, but talk to the feed companies and choose something with the least heating ingredients possible.
 
I would highly recommend Winergy Equilibrium - low starch high in fibre. It comes in different energy levels, I just use the low energy on my horse who tends to be quite sensitive. He looks fantastic and his temperament seems to have levelled out (I also give him Magic calmer). Although the Winergy seems expensive (a £10 bag lasts 6 days in winter and a bit longer in summer) you don't feed anything else so I think the price is reasonable.
 
cereals tend to provide a little more exhuberance that one would normally want demonstrated! i have always fed cubes to the ones iwth attitde and bringing them on to a low startch/magnesium mix when ready
 
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Bugly why feed hi fi lite why not ordinary hi fi or alpha A?

Sugar beet (unmollassed) and Lo cal (for the low starch not calories)

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Because Alfa A is slightly molassed.....so Hi Fi Lite is less heating (as totally unmolassed). My other horse is arthritic and I have been advised to feed him lower sugar feeds to help his arthritis: it has been working fine for both of them.

I had read about the Winergy product and I was keen to try it but no one near me stocks it. At work so i'm going to read the rest of the posts in details at lunch time........
 
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