Too few poos :(

B

Beatrice5

Well-Known Member
Joined
20 November 2009
Messages
1,276
Location
Somerset
Visit site
Little man is on box and small yard rest as had a slight Lami flare up and under the instruction of my vet is on a wedge of soaked hay 8am and 8pm and a smattering of straw to pick at. He gets two small Hifi Molass free feeds with his bute. He is not moving very much and I am worried as he is only doing about 5 poo's in a 24hr period and they are quite small and firm.

I am worried as Laminitus recovery needs them to move to aid recovery and as he isn't inclined to move much his guts seems to be slowing right down which surely isn't good for his recovery and detoxing.

I am due to speak to the vet again Monday but this is just to pick peoples brains in the short term. Would he be better to go out muzzled so he mooches around the field ? His field shelter is deeply bedded and he has a small yard with rubber mats on. He walks better on the soft sqwidgy mud so I could make him a mud patch to walk about on. Or do I walk him in hand on the mud a few times a day ?
 
He is probably hardly drinking, soaking the hay will make him less thirsty, he really needs to get more fluids in if the droppings are that firm, some well soaked speedibeet or fast fibre really sloppy should help or put loads of water with the hifi so it is like a soup he should be hungry enough to drink any extra liquid, putting a little flavouring in his water may help or even a piece of apple to bob around may get him drinking more.
Colic or kidney problems are a real risk if they are so restricted with soaked hay being their main feed, get some fluid in ASAP.
 
I'd check how much you are feeding by weight; a section of hay can vary a huge amount between bales. For weight loss you want to be feeding a total of 1.5% of bodyweight, soaked hay should be moist enough, so I'd suspect a lack of fibre may be the issue, but it would do no harm to increase fluids in case.
 
could you not soak the hay for longer and give him more? my friends lami and cushings pony has hay soaked for 24 hours but quite a bit of it so she still keeps occupied and still plenty of fibre to digest
 
Speedibeet squash kept my very long term box rest horse hydrated. He had 2 normal water buckets and 2 squash (big horse). The squash would all be gone and one of the normal water buckets over night in the depth of winter. He was on soaked hay and haylage. No hard feed other than unmollassed chaff, speedibeet and linseed plus a mineral supplement and a calmer. Eleven months in a barn

I used 2 handfuls of beet in a 2 1/2 gallon stable bucket. If it was below freezing I made it with tepid water.
 
touchstone said:
I'd check how much you are feeding by weight; a section of hay can vary a huge amount between bales. For weight loss you want to be feeding a total of 1.5% of bodyweight, soaked hay should be moist enough, so I'd suspect a lack of fibre may be the issue, but it would do no harm to increase fluids in case.
Click to expand...

Agree with you on weighing, tho For gentle weight loss all the vets I spoke to said 2-2.5% of body weight, and my pony lost 60kg steadily doing that, personally I wouldn't go down to 1.5% with a native due to the risk of acute illness if they have too little forage.

OP I would recommend the fast fibre slop route, it is also very good to put the supplements in and horses generally love it. I use it for my big chap whose drinking drops off in the winter and he has done much much better since I made him big messy dinners with it, it's low in starch and sugar so def safe to feed to lami and it only takes 90 secs to soak. It's a nice change from the straw and stuff too for them and you can use warm water in cold weather which they love.

He shouldn't really be on grass till sound but if you have a mud paddock then that might be ok, or else muzzle and out. Once well enough, the movement thing is critical to recovery so you are right to try to balance things.

I would also put pink powder in his feed, that also really helps my chap (and have tried stopping it and it def makes a difference )

Good luck :-)
 
lachlanandmarcus said:
Agree with you on weighing, tho For gentle weight loss all the vets I spoke to said 2-2.5% of body weight, and my pony lost 60kg steadily doing that, personally I wouldn't go down to 1.5% with a native due to the risk of acute illness if they have too little forage.
Click to expand...

For an overweight pony 1.5% of current bodyweight is fine; it should be 2% of ideal bodyweight that is fed, mine would certainly maintain weight at 2% of current bodyweight quite happily. :) Some vets are even suggesting 1% of current bodyweight is fed, but that needs to be under vet supervision. Recent research has shown that horses have been fine on this amount and not developed hyperlipaemia.
 
Last edited:
Thank you have purchsed some fast fibre and am making it into soup ;) His hay is soaked for 12 hours and I plan to get a weigh gadget as don't have one atm.

He very slowly ate some sloppy speedi beet and chaff this morning but I think dribbled out more than he swallowed and looked not very pleased with me. I tried the apple slices in his water and he has managed to remove the apple slices but not consumed hardly any water.

I plan to make his a small mud patch to stand in although it is so horrid today I have left him in as I think he would be very unimpressed stood out in the rain in mud.

Greenguard muzzle didn't work so will borrow a friends shires muzzle and see if that works. Vet said today I could graze him for 5 mins twice a day to get some fluids into him.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top