Some feeding things i was told today

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little_pink_piggies

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Im not saying that they're right but it's just some general feeding opinions/research i was told today by a very respected vet...

1. We all waste our money buying pre/pro biotics... the best thing for a horses digestive system is brewers yeast (well done hho
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2. Ditto with electrolytes... studies have shown that the best thing for horses is NaCl (table salt) but they do still need the other salts, in smaller amounts though that are in the electrolytes sold commercially, so the best thing to do appareantly is to mix 50%table salt and 50%electrolytes to benefit horse more and save us money.

3. The best oils to feed horses due to the balances of nutritional values are corn oil or linseed oil.

4. Following on from above, horses can digest oil despite not having a gall bladder (hence why it needs to be introduced gradually).

5. Again along the oil theme, the majority of studies are now saying that the best diet for horses is a fat and fibre diet. (fat introduced gradually). Especialy for event/endurance horses as horses can only store enough glycogen in their muscles for 5 mins hard work at a time, so after which they are burning fat. So by teaching a horse to digest fat and burn it sooner it makes it easier and therefore you are creating a horse with better stamina and fitness. Appareantly when Chris Bartle won Badminton, Word Perfect was being fed on soaked pony nuts, linseed oil, cooking salt and adlib haylage...

understand that some of these are contraversial opinions, and i'm not saying that they are right just found them interesting
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also, feeding gastric ulcer horses hay/haylage doesnt really make a difference, the fact that they lik eit is much more inportant so they chew and produce a smuch saliva as possible
 
Aren't you just an oracle of knowledge...

[ QUOTE ]
studies have shown that the best thing for horses is NaCl (table salt)

[/ QUOTE ] Well I've been doing that for as long as I can remember; put in all their AM feeds.
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Appareantly when Chris Bartle won Badminton, Word Perfect was being fed on soaked pony nuts, linseed oil, cooking salt and adlib haylage...

[/ QUOTE ] A lot less expensive than what ours were on at peak fitness last year (and a long way off Badminton.) Three feeds a day... 1 1/2 racehorse cubes, sugarbeet, sunflower oil and alfa a
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I definately agree about the linseed oil and brewers yeast- with ad lib haylage alone with the linseed and the yeast, mine looked amazing on this. They hardly needed any hard feed at all!
I have a bag here of pure linseed which I boil up and put in their feeds (much cheaper than buying linseed oil itself)

Really interesting to hear about the electrolytes and the haylage though! The haylage thing makes sense!
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There is research by Guelph University that was done before the Atlanta Olympics which found that horses fed a good quality electrolyte supplement before, during and after competition could perform for nearly 23% longer than those not fed an electrolyte. There are alot more salts lost in sweat than NaCl which is why supplements have been developed but you need to look at the label to check that they have other things like magnesium and calcium as well as sodium, potassium and chloride.

There a load of stuff about the glycogen sparing effect of oil on the Baileys web site as well as a bit about the gall bladder.

For those who are interested!!
 
Its true cerials are a totaly un-natural food for a horse. They are only fed them because it is traditional. Horses were simply fed what the farmer had on the farm. No more thought than that went iin to it.

Long term studies are showing that high oil, low sugar, low starch diets are better for ALL horses, not just those that are made ill by sugar and starch. Much less instances of colic, tieing up and other muscle and behavioral problems have been reported.

If you have a heavy horse, or a horse with draft horse or pony ancestory, you have a 50% chance of it suffering from EPSM at some point in its life. Statistics have shown that it is 50% even though some cases were sub clinical. Oil and fiber feeding is the way forward here.

Linseed oil is fine, but in high volume it can irritate the gut and cause colic. Horses find corn oil far more tasty... not that horses find oil tasty, hence the need to wean them on to it.

A horse can safely eat 25% of it its total daily intake of calories in the form of oil or fat.

For an average horse you can feed 1/4 a pint of oil before you have to start suplementing selenium.

If you want to know more about oil and fiber feeding look here... teh studies are to do with ERPSM horse, but the diet is benificial for all horses...
http://www.ruralheritage.com/search_zone.cgi?searchZone=content&search=epsm
 
"fancy name for tieing up" Not quite, although it can be a symptom of EPSM. EPSM or equine polysaccharide storage myopathy refers to a spectrum of problems encounterd by horses who are metabolicly different! They can not use energy from starches and sugars as they effectively poison the muscles in affected horses. A non EPSM horse might tie up and it has nothing to do with EPSM.

EPSM can be mild or acute, more and more muscular/motor problems in horses are being attributed to it. At one end of the scale the horse might have slight stiffness or be dfifficult to muscle up/keep muscled... at the other end of the scale the horse can wither away to the point that it has to be destroyed.

Although EPSM has been identified in most breeds of horses, heavy horses and ponies, or those with heavy horse ancestory are the most likely candidates.

There is no cure although the vast majority of EPSM horses can be re-habilitated and lead normal active lives through diet and exercise therapy. There is lots mopre info on this on Rural Heritage.
 
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