Tell me about your experience with gastric ulcers?

[Kezzabell2]

can you tell me what your horse behaviour changes were when they developed gastric ulcers? how you identified them etc?

After numerous issues with my boy, someone has questioned whether it might be ulcers that are upsetting him!

I'd kind of ruled it out because he's out 24/7, with plenty of grazing and doesn't struggle with his weight!

but a friend said that her horse never struggled weight wise either!

Hes not been on any hard feed since the winter and has recently become unhappy with having his girth done up, so I have a new saddle fitter coming on Thursday! he also getting very annoyed when I put my leg on and push him forward! it started with canter and is now with trot too!

I've not ridden since Monday as I thought it was a saddle issue! just been walking in hand or a bit on the lunge. yesterday we had ear pinning every time he started to trot! today I gave him some fast fibre before hand and he was like a different horse, no ear pinning at all!

 

[Fruitcake]

My horse certainly wasn't a prime suspect for ulcers. Lives out 24-7, holds his weight well. (Actually a bit of a chunk), not fed any 'hard feed' or anything cereal based, always looks the picture of Heath with lovely shiny coat. He does crib though.

Before he was diagnosed with upcers, he had a couple of incidents of mild colic that the vet just put down to spasmodic colic but, when one rumbled on for days, vet recommended he was scoped mainly to check for a possible foreign body in stomach as they didn't suspect ulcers!
Looking back, I suppose there were a few signs: He could tend to seem 'lazy' when ridden and, a couple of weeks before he was diagnosed, he did bolt off on a ride after displaying some strange behaviour, pawing etc.

Even after numerous courses of Gastroguard, scopes have shown him to still have low grade ulcers. Vet thinks that he's one of the horses that are genetically predisposed to ulcers and advised that it was something to be managed rather than cured.

As his management was already very 'ulcer friendly', we couldn't really change that much but he gets a supplement from vets and a couple of handfuls of chaff before he works. I also changed his feed from Happy Hoof (as it apparently still contains molasses) to plain Greengold and he now gets a vit and mineral supplement rather than a balancer as they can have bulkers in them.

 

[EEquine]

My little 14hh pony suffered from bad grade four ulcers. Before we realised he was very sluggish when I rode him and was constantly napping. He refused and ran out at jumps (which was extremely unlike him) and would often take off at random moments. thankfully we realised, got them scoped and now he is fine.

 

[TigerTail]

Ive put all of mine on a course of chios mastic which gets the stomach to produce lots of mucous, coating and protecting the stomach allowing ulcers to heal if they're there - its cheap and no harmful side effects like you get with omeprazole - 2 out of 3 of mine are far more chilled and not fussing over being girthed now so guessing they had something going on

http://intelligenthorsecare.co.uk/h...os-mastic-mastiha/p/37664193/category=2563424