Questions about rugging, poo eating and small exercises.

[JinglebellJessi & MistletoeMagic]

I'd love to pick your brains as most of these things are fairly new to me.

First off. Rugging.
Dearest skinny Prince has only had rugs on sporadically over the last few years, never really at the right time of year for the rug. As it stands he has a medium weight turnout (kindly donated by bestdogdash) but (i think) its abit too heavy or does he not need a rug at all? Having never really had one i'd think not but he's never really thrived through the cold so i want to give him the best headstart. so my question here is when to start rugging? and with what weight?

Second. Poo eating.
Prince has eaten his poo for a few years, i don't know if horses can get trapped in old routines but if he can, thats what he's doing. When he's eaten his dinner and got bored of the hay bale, he'll cast about in the poo, moving it around and then eat bits of it. He's on a few supplements so i don't think its a vitamin deficiency but i don't know. I accidentally left half a barrow of poo in the top corner and my sharer had to move it after he's eaten about half of it.

Third. Exercises.
Prince's old owner said he was prompted to exercise prince once a day. I've been doing laps in walk around the field and then one lap of trot on each rein. Takes around 15mins and he's no worse off after, if anything, more excited and 'hot'. As Prince has absolutely no muscle, what exercises would be good to get those muscles working alittle and just begin to bulk up?

Many thanks x

 

[zigzag]

After seeing the picutres of him yesterday, I wouldn't be exercising him at all, just let him put on weight to start with, If its very wet and raining I would be putting a lightweight rainsheet on him to stop him getting wet and cold. No suggestions on poo eating apart from poo picking , I would worm him and let the supplements take a few days to kick in then reassess

 

[snooples]

I agree with the lightweight rainsheet. Medium weight is very heavy for this time of year and if he gets used to that now then god knows how many rugs he might end up needing in the winter! Lightweigt rainsheets arent expensive and you can get them with neck covers too

 

[JinglebellJessi & MistletoeMagic]

After seeing the picutres of him yesterday, I wouldn't be exercising him at all, just let him put on weight to start with, If its very wet and raining I would be putting a lightweight rainsheet on him to stop him getting wet and cold. No suggestions on poo eating apart from poo picking , I would worm him and let the supplements take a few days to kick in then reassess

Okay, thanks. The exercises were suggested by the bhs officer but it does no harm for him to be in the field having a munch, i just wanted to work on his basic handling and kill 2 birds with one stone really

I'm picking the poo up as soon as he does it during the day but at night i can't be down there and in the morning you can see where he's done it then played with it. His mouth is also usually covered it in. makes his friendly kisses awkward. He's just been wormed last week with Eqimax and been on pink powder senior, fennel and biotin for the last week

I'm really hoping it's just an old habit, vet doesn't seem fussed. When i mentioned it she just said 'well thats no good' but in a cheery way.

 

[putasocinit]

Horses eat poo to correct the bacteria in their hind git, howver he probably ate it cos he was starving, if he was mine i would just keep on top of the poo picking, ad lib hay and let him enjoy, next year he will be a different horse, also light turnout rug and wormer, dont think he needs supps just a good diet, a multivit or something.

 

[FfionWinnie]

If he is deficient you won't cure him in a few weeks. Is likely to be habit tho, you might feed him a probiotic. With dogs you can feed various things to make the poo taste nasty (nastier!) to put them off it and get them out the habit, not sure about horses. Could you get him on longer (stemmy not lush) grazing then he may have his mind taken off doing it.