TB summer diet

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doris2008

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I think I spend so much time worrying over winter keeping weight on my TB that when the grass comes through & he puts some weight on I am never sure what to change to (despite having him 6yrs!!):rolleyes:
He has wintered on alfa a oil, no 4 & ts conditioning flakes. He looking well for most of winter, but had 2 courses of antibiotics at the beginning of march which really knocked his condition off.
I kicked him out last week due to stabling issues, and boy has the grass belly reappeared! When he deflates you can see the ribs are beginning to disappear! Me thinks the conditioning feeds are no longer required. We have less horses than last year. Instead of 8 on the field, there are 3 on the bulk of it & 2 who will be separated onto what will be their starvation once eaten down! Last year he was fed a small amount of calm & condition throughout the season as there wasnt much grass.
So am not sure this year..I just want something to maintain his condition, low sugar, high fibre I guess. He will start coming back into work next week after 6 months off after taking shoes off.
Have tried balancers before but both the blue chip & top spec ones sent him a bit bonkers! Am thinking just high fibre cubes or something along those lines together with pink powder as a balancer which I feed as he has had digestive issues in the past.
What will your TB's be fed this summer if anything?
 
If he was mine, I think I would put him on Spiller's Response Slow Release Cubes to start with. These are grain-free with most of the calories coming from fibre and oil. They are lower in calories than the TS flakes and the No 4 but higher in calories than high fibre cubes, so are a good halfway house between the two. Then if he is still putting on condition, I would go down to the high fibre cubes.

Alternatively, you could feed Pink Powder (which is a source of vit/mins) alongside an unsupplemented fibre source such as unmollassed beet, grass chaff, alfalfa chaff etc.
 
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Ah god, I haven’t thought about it yet. He’s wintered on ½ a bale of hay at night, and a round scoop of speedibeet twice a day. He’s done little to no work recently but he is glowing. Added to his feed he gets a handful of black oil sunflower seeds (his coat is shining!), pink powder and magnesium (he’s barefoot). I’m hoping though I should be fine to feed this throughout summer as his level of exercise should increase.

As per one of my previous threads, he was having oil added to his feet but it appears to be sending him loopy!

I’m loathe to change things as my horse appears to be sensitive to sugar, cereals, alfalfa and oil!

We don’t have amazing grass but I’m grateful as I don’t want him having tonnes of lush grass in his first spring with no shoes on.
 
Ive done exactly the same thing with my old pony (Anglo Arab)! I spent most of winter finding a feed that helped her gain weight without blowing her mind. I found it and a few weeks later when the grass came through and she changed paddocks, she is huge!

Ive reduced the amount I am feeding as I believe that by reducing the amount you do actually reduced the calorie intake. I add a balancer (will be changing to Pink Powder once this is finished) just to make sure she has everything vit/min wise.

I am also after something that I can feed all year and just add something like sugar beet in winter for the extra weight gain.

I dont like the idea of feeding conditioning feeds all year if a horse doesnt need them and by reducung the conditioning feeds like I have done, I am reducing her fibre intake which I dont want to do. So......

I was recommended:

Summer - good chaff with vit/min supplement

Winter - good chaff, cooked linseed, sugarbeet and vit/min supplement.

Am going to try this and see what happens.

Also as TGM says Spillers Slow Release Cubes are meant to be fantastic with the bonus of being cereal free!
 
I always like to include fibre whether it is chaff/sugar beet/grass chop.

The decision is yours really as the SR cubes are already high in fibre (19%).

Speedi beet provides calories and fibre with very little sugar and no starch, so may be an idea and come winter, you could just increase the amounts.

Perhaps try the cubes first?

The grass is coming through thick and fast still!
 
You dont say what level of work you will be doing and this will obviously need to be taken into account along with how good your grazing is. My TB who does next to nothing all year round, just a bit of hacking and light schooling gets a very small handful of hifi twice a day just to have something to mix his garlic and magnesium in to and I struggle to get him to eat it tbh as he has about 3 acres of good grazing to himself. He has been out 24/7 for the last fortnight and looks in really good nick although he did hold his weight better this winter than last, due I think to just feeling more settled now hes been with me for longer. He doesnt tolerate sugar or cereal very well so, grass aside, he gets none of these in his diet.
 
MyBoyChe - thanks for your reply.
The answer to workload is I dont know! He hasnt been in full work since sept after taking shoes off. I gave him the winter off to settle into it. Then he had an absess. Now fully recovered its time to see how he copes barefoot. Measuring up for boots tonight for road work. He is field & arena sound & trots up sound on the road but stones are a big issue.
Ultimatley for now his workload will be light so no extra energy will be required!
 
Well My TB gets grass - and nothing more. He is nicely covered, fit to event and looks shiny. In fact all my horses get kicked out on to grass with no balances or anything else and they all thrive. However my soil/grass in analysed every year and is fertilised according to needs for horses so i know they are getting a balanced diet from the grass. We also make our own haylage so in winter he has as much haylage as he wants, plus 1 feed a day of simple Systems Lucinuts, pura beet and linseed plus brewers yeast, he keeps ccondition and fitness on that.
 
My 2 TB mares have just turned 4 and after being roughed off for the winter have now been back a week and are out on the grass at night and stabled during the day when they get soaked hay and a scoop of Hi Fi Original. Their condition did drop off during the winter but I can already see an improvement after being back 1 week. We have just started re-backing them so we don't want them bouncing off the walls! With this in mind they will not be getting any hard feed at all. I don't know of any hard feeds that aren't cereal based that will put on condition. I have used Bailey's N.O.1 over this winter on our Dutch Warmblood that we got in October. He needed more on him and this worked brilliantly along with good haylage. However it is wheat and so did give extra energy too, though this wasn't a problem. Would be interested to know if anyone has come across a hard feed which isn't cereal based that does actually put on condition!
 
Tori said:
My 2 TB mares have just turned 4 and after being roughed off for the winter have now been back a week and are out on the grass at night and stabled during the day when they get soaked hay and a scoop of Hi Fi Original. Their condition did drop off during the winter but I can already see an improvement after being back 1 week. We have just started re-backing them so we don't want them bouncing off the walls! With this in mind they will not be getting any hard feed at all. I don't know of any hard feeds that aren't cereal based that will put on condition. I have used Bailey's N.O.1 over this winter on our Dutch Warmblood that we got in October. He needed more on him and this worked brilliantly along with good haylage. However it is wheat and so did give extra energy too, though this wasn't a problem. Would be interested to know if anyone has come across a hard feed which isn't cereal based that does actually put on condition!
Click to expand...

There are lots of cereal free conditioning feeds.

Oil is good as this supplies 2 x the amount of calories compared to a mix or cube
Sugarbeet - Mollassed or unmollassed
Alfalfa (Alfa A oil is a good example of this
Grass Nuts
Top Spec Cool Condition cubes are cereal free
Grass Chaff
Cooked Linseed

Hope this helps :)
 
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