Tips for winter weight loss

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ThreeMusketeers

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For the horse, not for myself ;)

Hi all, I'm a long time lurker on the forums but have only just joined. I was hoping you could give me some advice on shifting stubborn weight before the spring grass comes through. I'd be really grateful for any thoughts or opinions!

The horse is a 15.2hh overgrown New Forest. He currently weightapes at around 510kg but was 580kg when I got him!! Fat neck, pockets behind shoulders and fat over the ribs. His bum isn't too fatty and no gutter down his back. He has been fat for pretty much all of his life so I know it'll take a while to get him slim again. He's currently out 11 hours during the day on a big but fairly sparse field. His head is down for most of the time so he's definitely finding little bits to eat. He then comes in to 6kg soaked hay overnight (triple netted) and 1kg in his Hayplay ball. Half a handful of chaff and the recommended amount of Topspec lite balancer plus some high fibre cubes in his treat ball.

He works 4 times a week due to uni commitments - usually 3x 45-60min hacks and 1x 45 min lesson in the school, mostly flatwork. He's not been broken in long so still building up the hacking. We only have roadwork here on the lanes so unfortunately can't do any fast work. Annoyingly it has been frozen for the last few days here so we couldn't use the school or go hacking and he's had to have a few days off which really isn't helping.

He hasn't lost any weight for the last month and I'm getting more and more worried about the spring grass approaching. Really hoping that you guys will have some ideas! Thanks in advance :)
 
The grass in the field this time of year is not going to have enough nutrients etc to keep his weight no matter how much they eat. Mine are out 24/7 and I have to give hay and a feed still so don't worry about that. When he is turnout, is the field flat or hilly? Is there the option for a more hilly field? I mean this won't make a huge difference but could help in the long run and if you can turn him out in a herd.
Lunging would be a quick way to do some hard exercise providing the school isn't frozen.
What chaff is he on? You could try him on something of lower calorie like happy hoof. However you want the energy for when you exercise him, so perhaps reduce the hay intake by 500g then more if you need. Try things and see what works for him. Good luck!
Ros
 
If you really want him to lose weight you will have to brutal. He needs 2and half% of his bodyweight daily which I calculate to be around 12 or 13 kg total. He may well be eating that in the field alone but you are giving him another 7kg of food in his stable.

I had a friend who 'inherited' a very overweight horse that as a result of its weight became diabetic. Under veterinary supervision she 'starved' it and eventually the diabetes resolved itself. She turned out in a grazing muzzle to limit grass intake and then fed a tiny net of hay (1 or 2kgx) soaked for 24 hours and a handful of chaff with vitamins/minerals etc. It took 12 months of this to get weight under control and the crest of the neck was the last fatty bit to go and by then the rest of the horse was skin and bone.

I stress this was under total veterinary supervision and I would not suggest you do it but it does show how difficult it is to remove fat!
 
I got weight off a mare that was obese when I bought her by feeding plain oat straw chaff in addition to a small amount of hay, which I didn't bother soaking. It did take a while bu we got so that she could have ad-lib hay overnight in the stable. She was never short of something to eat so didn't feel that she had to gorge when there was something available. She had been clipped out when I got her, so she wore a no fill rug on bad days and went out without as soon as the weather permitted.
 
sport horse said:
If you really want him to lose weight you will have to brutal. He needs 2and half% of his bodyweight daily which I calculate to be around 12 or 13 kg total. He may well be eating that in the field alone but you are giving him another 7kg of food in his stable.

I had a friend who 'inherited' a very overweight horse that as a result of its weight became diabetic. Under veterinary supervision she 'starved' it and eventually the diabetes resolved itself. She turned out in a grazing muzzle to limit grass intake and then fed a tiny net of hay (1 or 2kgx) soaked for 24 hours and a handful of chaff with vitamins/minerals etc. It took 12 months of this to get weight under control and the crest of the neck was the last fatty bit to go and by then the rest of the horse was skin and bone.

I stress this was under total veterinary supervision and I would not suggest you do it but it does show how difficult it is to remove fat!
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It's 1.5% for weight loss, not 2.5%. You need to cut the food intake. I feed my horses (all around 500kgs) 8kg of hay per day split into 4 feeds and they maintain their weight on that. They get no hard feed at all and are working lightly.
 
There is a tough talking metabolic specialist at Liverpool who gave me some notes when my fatty was first diagnosed with PSSM. Written in capitals is WALK IS NOT EXERCISE. Basically she was saying that the exercise I thought I was doing (mainly hacking) was nowhere near aerobic enough to shift the pounds.

So we got tasked with building up to 45 min of trot and canter work a day. That shifted the blubber.... Plus it showed me that most of my hacking was actually at a walk despite what I thought I was doing.
 
Replacing some of the hay with oat straw might help. It has helped my fatty who gorges (if given the chance) and means he has something to nibble on all night rather than stand there for 10 hours or so without anything (he can empty a double netted small holed net holding 5Kg hay in seconds!).

Definitely lunging with lots of trotting / canter work will help shift the weight. Incorporate raised poles too.
 
Cortez said:
It's 1.5% for weight loss, not 2.5%. You need to cut the food intake. I feed my horses (all around 500kgs) 8kg of hay per day split into 4 feeds and they maintain their weight on that. They get no hard feed at all and are working lightly.
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I will not argue with 1.5% for weight loss, but I think only under veterinary supervision.
 
ihatework said:
Clip as much as you dare off, and rug him lightly only.
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This

One of mine is having the winter off due to suspensory branch injury.
He had two full clips by the time we decided to turn away so we have either kept him naked or he is in a rain sheet if its dry but bitter wind as his coat hasnt fully come through but if its raining all day and cold he has a 100g.

Unfortunatly mine wont eat soaked hay and he has jusr recovered fron ulcers fore and hind so i have to keep him with adlib forage.

For a 16:3 with a good bit of bone horse he gets 10kilo of hay a night, a bucket with a few scoops of honey chop lite and healthy then a small token feed of tb chaff with his vit sup, fennel (helps with hind gut gassyness), ostraban (he is a hormonal mare in a geldings body) and his succeed and vit e oil.

He goes out on a bare ish paddock from 8amish till 3/4ish depending on the weather

I think he is loosing weight, i can now feel three, possibly four, ribs without digging for them 😂😂😂

We have spillers at the yard on sat so that will be interesting to see how much he has differed from this time last year when he was in work.
 
sport horse said:
If you really want him to lose weight you will have to brutal. He needs 2and half% of his bodyweight daily which I calculate to be around 12 or 13 kg total. He may well be eating that in the field alone but you are giving him another 7kg of food in his stable.

I had a friend who 'inherited' a very overweight horse that as a result of its weight became diabetic. Under veterinary supervision she 'starved' it and eventually the diabetes resolved itself. She turned out in a grazing muzzle to limit grass intake and then fed a tiny net of hay (1 or 2kgx) soaked for 24 hours and a handful of chaff with vitamins/minerals etc. It took 12 months of this to get weight under control and the crest of the neck was the last fatty bit to go and by then the rest of the horse was skin and bone.

I stress this was under total veterinary supervision and I would not suggest you do it but it does show how difficult it is to remove fat!
Click to expand...

You should never, ever starve a horse. It can cause hyperlipaemia.

For weight loss you really need to get an accurate weight measurement and then calculate the weight of food (dry weight) as either 1.5% of current weight, or 2% of target weight - *whichever is GREATER*. This means you will need to estimate how much grass he is eating during the day. Unfortunately at this time of year grass doesn’t contain much nutrition, but it does contain calories. One general way of estimating the amount of grass is estimating how much grass you could cut in one hour using a pair of kitchen scissors, then multiplying that by the number of hours turnout. Using 20% dry weight, divide your amount of “cut grass” by 5, then that is your very rough estimate of the amount of dry weight grass the horse is eating. Take that into account when weighing hay (80% dry weight).

If you give any hay replacers (grass nuts, chaff etc), this needs also be taken into account when calculating the weight of hay.

Unless built like a twig, 510kg is not unreasonable for a 15.2 horse. If he still has a crest and fat pads over his shoulders, then I would consider getting him tested for metabolic disorders (insulin resistance and/or equine metabolic syndrome)

You can soak the hay to remove NSC/ESC; feeding soaked hay, you should be adding a mineral and vitamin forage balancer to replace those lost during soaking.

When you have the diet really tight, then you will need to amount of exercise if he still isn’t losing weight. Exercising twice a day for 30 to 40 minutes is more efficient than 1 hour of general exercise for weightloss. But you must get the heart rate up into the aerobic range.

It can be a pain to have a horse who needs to lose weight, but it is possible 🙂
 
My two are on a diet this winter. They are out during the day on some old, rough grass with plenty of interest and shelter, hedges, small walls to hop over to get around etc. My cob is Irish clipped and unrugged (I do have rugs for him if needed) and the pony is muzzled. That is down to what suits them best, my cob is a hot horse with the coat of a yak who rarely notices the weather and he loathes muzzles, whereas the pony feels the cold more and puts up with muzzling. They come in to a feed of fast fibre and then spend the night in a barn / yard area with just clean straw to munch on. So far the weight is dropping nicely, it would be better if I could exercise more too but unfortunately at this time of the year that is out.
 
Thanks everyone for your replies! You’ve got me motivated again to shift the last bit of weight so I’m going to get tougher with his exercise and try to work him twice a day at the weekends too. Started well today with lunging W/T/C and raised poles :)

To answer a few questions, he’s on a fab hilly field with two friends who chase him around plenty so that should burn some calories! He was fully clipped (except legs) about a month ago and is out naked every day unless it’s below 5 degrees and raining consistently, in which case I allow him a rain sheet as the other liveries look at me like I’ve gone mad :D His handful of hard feed is just so that he gets his balancer. When I got him, he had full blood workup done for all metabolic and hormonal issues as part of the vetting so I think he’s just been very fat for a few years and now it’s taking a while to get it off again. He's already lost around 70kg but needs to lose more, especially going into spring. The weightape puts him at 510kg but the vet thinks he weighs more than that so I might contact the Spillers people and see if they can bring the weighbridge out in order to calculate a more accurate amount of forage for the day etc.

I’ve ordered a couple of the “Doubleze” Nibbleze nets for him to try as hopefully they will slow his eating down and then I can decrease his overnight ration. 1.5% would be around 7.5kg per day so if I could only give him 5kg overnight that would definitely help. I’m just a bit wary of ulcers so I like him to always have a little hay left in the morning. We are working closely with the vet and I’m a vet student myself so I worry about everything!!

Casey76 – That’s a really interesting rule! I’ll be out in the field with my scissors tomorrow and everyone on the yard will think I’ve finally lost it! Very useful, thank you.
 
You're feeding too much. To maintain weight on a good do-er out on sparse grazing daytimes, I'd only be giving 3 slices small bale hay (3-4kg) overnight, to lose weight I'd replace 1/2 that with straw. If you're worried about ulcers you could just give him 1/2 bale of straw instead, no hay. He won't run out because straw is uninteresting so he'll only eat it when he's actually hungry. You can't feed ad-lib hay to a good do-er, which is what you're doing if he's got some left in the morning, they just get fat.

Cut out the nuts in the treat ball, that's hard feed he doesn't need.

Swap the balancer for a powdered vitamin/mineral supplement, even a balancer can cause weight gain. If he won't eat the powdered supplement get him Slim-Aid pellets or Equimins original (the pelleted version), both are literally one tiny palm-full for a full dose.

Agree with others re the riding, he needs to trot and canter for most of the ride with just a warm up and cool down in walk and the odd break.

You're doing the right thing with the rugging/clipping. They're much easier to keep slim once they've lost the excess weight, because without that layer of fat keeping them warm they actually burn some calories. Aim to see ribs slightly by spring (don't worry they won't be visible for long :biggrin3: ).
 
Its probably just mine but I find they are programmed to lose most weight in March and April when the grass is at its lowest and the new stuff hasnt arrived yet. I keep mine out 24/7 and am still strip grazing they are losing weight slowly just now but I will likely panic that they have lost too much by April. The three of them have one slice of three year old hay between them spread across the dry part of their field. They are pretty much on a track system so they have to move from the water to the grass etc. Fat pony so far has lost 40kgs since her humungous arrival but still needs to lose more but she certainly looks much better I am hoping I have got her in time to save her from a life of misery and insulin resistance as she is only 2 and a half rising 3. I am hoping that we can get her to a slim 230 kgs by March so she can enjoy a track of grass over the summer she is about 12hh and very stocky build so that might be a dream. Laminitic boy is under 300 kgs for the first time for many years so he is certailny going in the right direction. I am not a fan of clip and leave cold as I personally think it stops them losing weight, mostly because I think it is cruel, they stand around in a huddle more and the metabolism slows down in an attempt to keep the core warm and as a result as soon as the grass comes they balloon. I am a fat person I am a fat person now because all my life I have been on a diet I was a much fatter person up to about three years ago when I gave up being on a diet and promptly lost over 5 stone. So feed for weight loss, exercise a lot more and keep him warm,not hot, would be my advice
 
you've already got lots of good advice. I have a new forest pony built like a tank who lives off fresh air! he is a nightmare to try and keep slim, especially as I can't exercise him often due to baby and very little child care plus winter darkness with no facilities. this year certainly seems to be more grass than last year- I think due to the mild October.

I know you are asking for winter tips, but come spring if possible (I know it depends on the yard) I was hugely consider a track system. It has helped my 3 keep their weight down last year as they have to move so much more. doing small areas of grazing just made mine fatter as they barely moved. also the middle is then rested for the winter.
 
Hmmm.... I know it looks like the generally accepted fact that grass contains no goodness in winter, however, research and evidence shows us different.

Perhaps when winters WERE harsh and temperatures plummeted for prolonged periods, that may be true, however, we only really get pockets of the cold snaps needed to lay grass dormant. If grass gets enough daylight and mild enough weather (the 8 degrees cut-off is a myth) the grass continues to produce sugar in response to stress. All plants do unless truly dormant, sugar is a good anti-freeze.

So, all our horses seem to be doing so well on this "sparse and dormant" grass... so much so that all the horses have put ON weight this winter. It's not good. They are coming in to lose weight. The vet that came a few weeks ago said laminitis is rife this winter in our area (SWE).

You should definitely NOT starve a horse unless you want a vets bill for hyperlipaemia or ulcers but you probably should start thinking about soaking all forage, muzzling for turnout (mine is certainly muzzled all the time on grazing which could be overnight) and ensuring they get enough nutrients via supplementation and double the exercise.

Also, bloated, rock hard horses do not always = fat... if they are showing other signs of health issues, difficulty moving, sweating, pain it could be laminitis or indeed a sugar induced muscles problem.
 
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