The death of common sense!!

I appreciate that feeding is a minefield, especially if you are new to it (and we all have to start somewhere) and the choice is bewildering. I stick to good old fashioned straights - sugar beet, oats, flax, sunflower seeds and alfa cubes. No mollasses.

One of the first things I learned about feeding was the old horseman's/BHS/PC mantra of

feed according to work done

The application of common sense also applies to treating each horse as an individual.
 
Enfys said:
I appreciate that feeding is a minefield, especially if you are new to it (and we all have to start somewhere) and the choice is bewildering. I stick to good old fashioned straights - sugar beet, oats, flax, sunflower seeds and alfa cubes. No mollasses.

One of the first things I learned about feeding was the old horseman's/BHS/PC mantra of

feed according to work done

The application of common sense also applies to treating each horse as an individual.
Click to expand...

Totally agree our hunters are fed straights and we were taught the same.
 
Had vet out the other week for jabs and we got talking about lami. I mentioned I was mildly concerned that my mare had dropped a little weight. He said its normal and healthy for horses to lose some weight over winter so they come into the spring grass a bit lean.
He also said recent research has said that unless there's an underlying disorder such as cushings that the cause of lami is fat ponies. Essentially thin ponies don't get lami (unless there's an underlying issue). Also that frosty grass doesn't make any difference. Essentially the only way to prevent lami is don't have a fat horse.
Luckily my girls weight is ok and I'm careful about her weight as she is a greedy guts.
 
Also feed is the answer to every problem: "my horse is lazy" the answer comes back "feed higher energy food"
My answer "how about shifting some of that weight so it feels more like moving"
My analogy is if you are a couch potato, shovelling more mars bars into your mouth will NOT make you feel like getting off your a**e and doing a fun run!
 
Tally ho, yes he probably does at times. But it's so hit and miss with what's going on with him I just keep my mouth shut. Take for instance when I first moved here. Being nice I said if this woman wanted I'd feed her horse for her in the mornings as I was always out early. Now keep in mind she varies in her lateness in getting here to feed so never fed at a certain time everyday. Most days 9 am sometimes 10 am. Evenings can then be 3pm and then again 6pm. All I did was carry the feed she left for him from tack room to stable. So later on that day he colicked. And there's only so many times I can listen to how I caused his colic.

It was my first time sharing a yard with other people and I quickly realised to keep my mouth shut and never offer anything.

Life is simpler this way!

Terri
 
I have had many comments made about my rising 20 TBXWelshD because she lives out 24/7 unrugged with two small feeds of hifi light & safe & sound twice a day in the winter with a haynet over night and hay if the ground is frosty. She looks really well and she chooses to life out, she could go into her stable if she wanted to but stays in the field. She is a very good doer and as she has had many health issues for over 10 years she is unable to be ridden but I do walk her in hand. People think I am cruel to her but she is happy and now free of pain and will enjoy the rest of her life however long that may be. She doesn't like being rugged and she is not under weight but would become very overweight if I treated her like some people think is correct. I just ignore the comments now but have in the past, thinking these people are more knowledgeable than me, have rugged her and fed her more and ended up with a laminitic, poorly horse.
 
I also wonder if the weight problems are down to ad lib forage when stabled - if either of mine had ad lib haylage they would be as fat as houses and not be able to do their 'job' (hunters).

Although I understand/agree that horses need constant access to forage, I have no concerns with mine having nothing to eat for a few hours overnight - I have owned horses for over 20 yrs and never had a problem because of this.

All our horses have their forage and hard feed weighed, which is adjusted according to their condition and work load as required.

We were taught back in 'ye olden days' that nature designed horses to loose weight in the winter, then to put it back on over the summer in store for the following winter.

With our modern lifestyles this no longer happens, so must surely contribute to the increase of laminitis and obesity cases.
 
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I completely agree with you. And I blame the feed and rug companies and their brilliant marketing strategies, which much of the 'horsey' press reinforce. And I speak as an owner who has just got her horse down to an acceptable weight after two yrs of ownership - she was massively obese when she arrived here, having been fed on cereals and kept in on ad-lib hay every other day, clipped and rugged even though barely ridden.
Here is she unclipped, out every day during daylight hours and fed on oat straw chaff to supplement her haylage ( and hasn't been ridden as much as I'd like because of the bad weather).
 
The adlib hay is within reason and oddly enough I don't have piggly wigglies when it comes to forage. They all get about a half a good small square flake when they come in. I feed roughly an hour later. Then another half to do them til 9 pm. Then they get about 1 1/2-2 flakes for the night. The leftovers get taken out to the field with some fresh.

Thing is I'm less likely to restrict forage so they can eat a bigger meal which is what some people do. It's forage first and then feed as needed. So ad lib, yes in a way but not just chucking all I can at them. They wouldn't eat it anyway. Too many people think feed first and if getting too fat cut their forage. Not anyone on here by the way. And I've not had a horse yet that when in heavy work didn't naturally back off their forage intake. At the racetrack back home horses had access to forage 24/7. They didn't eat as much as people would think. I come here and most racehorses didn't get much in the way of forage. I found it odd.

But that's the other thing. People always over estimate how much work horses actually do.

I am glad I have access to good rugs though because I couldn't deal with the clean up on a daily basis or even worse constant wet mud. No thanks. But like everything moderation is the key.

Terri
 
My TB needs ad lib hay over the winter but hard feed wise he only needs half a scoop of pony nuts per day. In the summer he just gets a handful and that is a tall ex racing Tb who competes most weekends and is ridden every day. On that basis I would think a native or cob would not need much in the way of feed at all.
You only have to look at our natives in the wild to realise that they would be better off with less feed rather than more and that if not clipped they don't need rugs.
The problem comes when people treat natives and cobs like they are l/w tb and wb competition horses without appreciating that they have a totally different metabolism.
Ive never fed the recommended rate of commercial feed. It costs a ridiculous amount and im pretty sure my nice calm horse would turn very fat and naughty!
 
I must say, i feed adlib hay, dee's hay bar is never empty, but she is not fat.

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Dee has a history of ulcers and if i didnt feed forage all the time, she would flare up. However, she is rather good at maintaining her weight since being ad lib on hay, but if i were to reduce it, she would drop weight like a stone.

So many times i hear people say 'oh you dont have to worry about lami, shes a warmblood!' Owners need to understand all horses can get Lami, not just little native ponies. But obesity causes a number of issues, not just lami. As Terri states, a horse can get collic, wear and tear on joints, pressure on the heart and lungs etc.

What has alarmed me since researching feeding for pregnant mares, the inconsistence between feed companies about what a mare should be fed and when, and each time it is written as though it is the gospal truth!

KISS - Keep It Simple Stupid. Horse have evolved to eat forage *fact*. A diet needs to be balanced in all the vitamins and minerals and trace minerals a horse requires, taking into account the quality of your grass and hay/haylege (soil sampling can help). There needs to be at least a basic knowlegde of what a horse requires at certain life stages i.e. in foal, lactating, weaning, yearling, etc. If in doubt, ask, not everyone can know everything. Im forever asking, because although i *knowish*, i want to be sure or if i am wrong, learn an alternative. :)

ETA - what i will say on the rug front, is every horse is different. Rugs can indeed make a horse less able to keep themselves warm by nto allowing the hair to raise up and trap air against the skin. However, you cannot compare one TB against another. Dee is a warmblood. Unfortunately she was clipped out fully a few months back (for veterinary reasons), and so has had to be rugged quite extensively to keep her warm. On pager, the forage diet she is on should produce enough heat during digestion to help her keep warm, but she is naturally a cold horse. I am frever feeling under her armpits to make sure she is warm enough. Roll on her coat growing back, i dont like having lots of rugs on horses as the weight on them and the restriction in my mind, cant be doing their shoulders any good. But it is a necessary *evil*.
 
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I wouldn't tar all feed companies with the same brush, two companies feed helplines I've spoken to in the past about my good do-er when I first got him very clearly and happily said no he doesn't need any sort of feed just maybe supplement vits and mins at certain times of year (mainly winter).

Sadly sometimes when you don't have much control over where you keep your horse and when conditions can change at livery yards, it can be difficult to sort appropriate grazing, etc, even when you're doing your hardest yourself to manage their weight and not always as easy to move them.

I also think people just don't read things these days, not many at the yard would know about percentages of food vs bodyweight that should be fed and yet people like the Blue Cross Fat Horse Slim and other places provide plenty of useful info and help to tackle the battle of the bulge!
 
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