Please can I have some advice?

Mynyddcymro

Mynyddcymro

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Hi everyone, I could really do with some advice with regards to one of my section a ponies as I'm getting really down about everything!
The pony in question is overweight, yes she's big built but still fat.
After taking her out in hand this evening with my other section a who is a decent weight borderline fat I have realised just how slow and ploddy she is.
she is turned out during the day from 7 on a field with very little grass for a few hours then swapped across to a bare paddock until 4. She has then been coming into a small haynet and then gets another larger one at 9pm..
YO confronted (felt like it anyway) me this evening telling me that feeding so little hay is how cruelty cases begin. I feel like I've been punched in the stomach.
I am desperate to get her weight down and know I can't starve her but I thought she was having a net inbetween the 4pm one and the 9pm one, turns out she hasn't which is fine - had I of known she would have been having more hay at 4.
After weighing the 4pm net it turns out she was only getting about 1lb.. and then 5lb at 9.
YO has said I need to be giving a 4lb net at 4pm along with the 5lb at 9pm - that's nearly 10lb of hay for an overweight native pony who is still getting some grass. Does that seem a lot or about right? I'm just so paranoid about laminitis.
And before everyone jumps on me the exercise will now be increased to try and work off some of the extra hay!
Thanks for any help!
 
Agree to the additional hay but make sure it is soaked for long enough to get most of the sugars out.

It's difficult getting the weight off the little beasts.
 
You don't have to decrease the amount of hay you feed her, so long as you soak it for over an hour. It gets rid of all the sugars and will help take her weight down. Soaking for over night would be better, and that way she can graze on it. Also either use super small holes so it takes longer, or double up two normal haynets.
 
For weight loss you are looking at feeding 1.5% bodyweight per day. I guess a welsh sec A should be about the 250 - 275kg mark. Remember she will still be getting 'some' nutrition from her grazing.

As others have said, soaking hay will also help with weight loss.

:)
 
Thanks everyone, was considering soaking it, may slow her down, I've gone to the extent of not only double netting but using 4 nets over the top of the first to try and slow her down.
LaurenM - she gets either Loose schooled or lunged twice a week, I will be doubling this now though.
 
I have a welsh A gelding - I bought him last October as a 2yo and he was pretty large. He lived out day in at night on good grazing all last winter with a very small slice of hay at night and a handful of lami type feed (literally a handful) only at night all winter - no rug day or night through all that snow. He hardly lost a thing!

So, took him to a posh welshie show in May and the judge put us right down the line and said he was way too fat! So, put him in a very very bare paddock with NOTHING else except a measured portion of blue chip lami light for his vits and mins. It was the only way of losing the weight and he did lose it. We qualified for the Any Age Any Sex Small Breeds NPS home produced championship against a ring full of stallions and mares!

They survive on NOTHING trust me!
 
I have found with hardy natives the best way to get weight off if reducing as much hay as poss etc, is to clip in the winter and not quite rug enough to keep them warm. So they are a little cold all the time (not desperately cold, just enough that they're using extra calories for warmth). Also, oat straw to replace at least half of the hay is quite handy.
 
I think that 10lb of hay is way too much for a pony such as this!!!

I agree with the soaking of the hay for as long as possible and also feed in avery small-holed net, or double net it. I would have thought that around
6lbs would be quite sufficient - split in two. This equates to a good section of hay. If in doubt - consult your vet and then you can use what they advise as to ward-off the YO!
 
It is difficult to get the weight off a good doer, my vet said a haynet halfstraw/half hay at night, so they have something to nibble at, starve a pony/horse and then the wood fencing/stables start disappearing or anything else they can eat.
 
I struggle with my native as when he's hungry he's a nightmare. Mine gets an 8lb net at 9am will half 5 then goes out on a half acre bald paddock with another... I have been doing this for 3 months and only managed to shift 30kg. Work has been helpful but as he's a baby (3yo) I can't do much. Soaked hay he wouldn't eat at all and it used to make his bed wet dripping on it. The only other thing that worked was adding quality straw
 
It's taken me all winter to get my Clydies weight back to normal.

She comes in at 5pm and doesn't go out again until 8am. She gets the bucket bottom covered with some sugarbeet along with her ration balancer, she gets one slab/slice of meadow hay in a hay net with very small holes. In the day time she goes out onto a well grazed field.

10lbs of hay for a wee pony is excessive - One slice should be more than enough.

I would also step up the exercise considerably - she needs at least an hour daily - maybe one day off a week!

Lunge in a steady trot for half an hour and then take her out for a good active walk around the road.

TBH I would be leaving her out all night with no cover in the minimal grass area with her hay.
 
10lbs is way too much for a small pony that's a bit chubby!

My boy is 14hh native and he's ing 4kg net as well as minimal grass. He's been on a diet but is getting down to his relevant size. He's lost 80kg in the last year :)
 
Soak her hay and dont reduce it.
Increase the workload, lunge or loose school, or get a rider to work her.
If you cant reduce food without comprimising her gut, then youve got to up the exercise
 
BonneMaman said:
I have a welsh A gelding - I bought him last October as a 2yo and he was pretty large. He lived out day in at night on good grazing all last winter with a very small slice of hay at night and a handful of lami type feed (literally a handful) only at night all winter - no rug day or night through all that snow. He hardly lost a thing!

So, took him to a posh welshie show in May and the judge put us right down the line and said he was way too fat! So, put him in a very very bare paddock with NOTHING else except a measured portion of blue chip lami light for his vits and mins. It was the only way of losing the weight and he did lose it. We qualified for the Any Age Any Sex Small Breeds NPS home produced championship against a ring full of stallions and mares!

They survive on NOTHING trust me!
Click to expand...

Quite agree with the poster above.

My rather overweight cob was turned out at night and brought in during the day on 12hrs of soaked hay plus a cup full of Bluechip Lami-light and another cup full before turn-out in the evening. We would hack out for at least an hour 3/4 times a week or lunge in the school.

Gradually he did lose, not enough for my liking, but I hope he'll lose more over winter without rugging him.
 
My friends been having a simular problem with her sec A, basically it resulted in borderline laminitus - she had been on a postage stamp paddock pretty much all summer but managed to escape into the pony next doors paddock (2 postage stamps) and got borderline lami.

So my friend created a small yard area, put wood shavings down and pony now lives in there 24/7 all year round. She called the vet out about the laminitus and he said how much was she feeding her, she said 4 over flowing buckets (water buckets) of hay a day, 2 in AM, 2 PM. With this, he gasped in horror, and said she must only feed a MAX on 1 AM and 1 PM and NO grass...

So pony now has 2 buckets a day of haylidge and straw mixed (recommended by vet) and finally she is down to her normal weight - being ridden once/twice a week in the school. Unfortunately with these little ponies you have to be cruel to be kind, I think it would be more cruel of you to allow her to get laminitus through over feeding/grass than to not feed enough. Keep an eye on her weight, get the vets opinion on what weight she should be and aim to get her to that weight and stay there :) good luck :o

Ps) i should add this mare is quite prone to LAMI, however it does go to show how little these welsh mountain ponies need. After all they come from a place where they'd have to walk miles for more grass..
 
My good doer, prone to lami native pony mare (12.1hh) used to be in overnight, and out during the day. She was strip grazed on the paddock that had already been grazed down by my TB. Then overnight she came into a stable, had one section of hay and a small feed of happy hoof.

10lbs of hay is a massive amount for your pony. Your YO is wrong. Feeding 'so little' hay to an underweight large horse would not be right.
 
Say she weighs 250kg (see if you can get enough people on your yard together to have a feed company bring their weighbridge out to get an accurate weight)... you should be looking at giving her 4.6kg / 10.1lbs (1.85% of her bodyweight) of forage a day (and that includes the grazing) unless you have agrrement from a vet to reduce this further, the 1.85% will maintain her weight... to reduce her weight she also needs 20 minutes of fast work a day.

I would look at keeping her on the bare paddock and supplementing her with soaked hay during the day (try to give her in equal portions for the length of time she needs it... .83lbs every 2 hours.
Also soak her hay at night but make sure she gets a salt and vitamin supplement too. Is she stabled on straw? Straw is also a source of calories and can be around 3/4 nutritious as hay!
 
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