Water retention/ hay belly

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hannahgeorge

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I'm normally a lurker on here but have decided to post to see if anyone else has experience in dealing with water retention. My 7yo has always had quite a large tummy since i bought him as a 3yo. He tends to look much better after exercise, and isn't fat as such. My vet picked up on it a year or two ago, and recommended I try partially replacing his hay (soaked) with alfalfa, as it apparently doesn't hold as much water in the gut. However, being the sensitive chap that he is, alfalfa makes him extremely itchy, so it's a no-go.

In the last few months he's become incredibly grumpy to groom and girth up, and hates me brushing any part of his tummy. I was convinced it must be gastric ulcers, so had him scoped, but this only showed a very small area of minor ulcers - three weeks on gastroguard has made no difference. Incidently after being starved for the scope he looked great, the tummy was gone and he wasn't tucked up as you'd expect. It made me realise just how much water he must be holding in his gut normally. He also had the Succeed faecal test which came back clear. Back and saddles are fine. This has led me to think he must be very uncomfortable purely due to being bloated.

He has ad lib good quality soaked hay, is turned out daily, hard feed consists of 3/4 scoop Baileys ultra grass, 1 mug Baileys lo-cal balancer and soya oil, 3 times a day. He is a good doer. He works five times a week - schooling/ hacking/ occasional jumping.

My vet spoke to a nutritionist who said his feed regime is good, all she could really recommend was exercises to strengthen his core muscles, such as fast work.

I'm thinking of trying dry/steamed hay, as at least he wouldn't be eating hay that's already holding water (although of course he will drink more). Also perhaps some sort of digestion supplement such as yea-sacc.

Cookies for reading this far! Can anybody suggest anything else I could try? I just want to make the poor boy more comfortable!
 
Have a read about hind gut ulcers/acidosis with the symptoms you describe. Yea sacc 1026 may help.

ps. Try adding some salt to his feeds, start small and increase up to a tablespoon for 15hh.
 
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Agree with amandap, the symptoms are similar.

My mare gets this with changes in the grass and I feed her bicarb mixed into linseed oil. Her droppings are not as loose anymore and she no longer gets agitated when I touch her right flanks (just below where the whirl is).

There is a thread on here about hind gut acidosis if you have a search.
 
Yes as I was reading your post about the belly I was thinking hind gut acidosis, that was before I even got to the bit about grumpiness! That also fits with the gastrogard not helping, in fact it could potentially make hind gut issues worse. Search for the thread on here and also google, there is some useful information. The Succeed faecal test isn't proven to be effective, and that would only show if blood from ulcers in poo and not if he has acidity without ulcers.

Treatment is difficult, it seems to vary from horse to horse. A digestive supplement is a good one to start with, such as Protexin gut balancer, maybe starting with Protexin quick fix. There is also Succeed, Equishure, Egusin, Gastro Plus, but it does seem to be trial and error what works for each horse.
 
Thanks for all your replies, it's definitely given me some food for thought.

Forgot to mention that I had read about acidosis on here a couple of months ago, and tried him on Equishure for a month, but noticed no difference in him. I guess like Fuzzypuff says, what works for one doesn't work for another, I think I'll have to work through the list of supplements etc until I find something that works.

I know I also shouldn't forget about really making sure he's working properly through his back to strengthen the core muscles - he's never been particularly enthusiastic about work, and although I don't let him 'lollop' along, sometimes I worry about pushing too hard if he's genuinely feeling uncomfortable. He seems to look better in the summer when he really benefits from hacking faster and more often.

Amandap- can I ask how salt works? He loves the Himalayan salt licks but I stopped giving them to him as he was getting through them so quickly I was worried he was getting too much salt. Perhaps he's trying to tell me something, and I should let him have one for a limited time each day. He's a 16hh eventing bred btw (but no one told him that - he's a bit of a scaredy cat about jumping!) slightly heavier stamp with some wb/id blood mixed in.
 
hannahgeorge said:
Amandap- can I ask how salt works? He loves the Himalayan salt licks but I stopped giving them to him as he was getting through them so quickly I was worried he was getting too much salt. Perhaps he's trying to tell me something, and I should let him have one for a limited time each day. He's a 16hh eventing bred btw (but no one told him that - he's a bit of a scaredy cat about jumping!) slightly heavier stamp with some wb/id blood mixed in.
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I can't do the science but sodium deficiency is fairly common and is needed to aid body electrolyte balance. There is also a school of thought and evidence from cattle research that there can be potassium spikes in grass especially in Spring. Horses can't take up from blocks very well as their tongues aren't rough and most blocks contain other minerals, so it is often better to add salt to feed and/or perhaps loose salt free choice. Salt wont cure his big belly but it may well help his systems in general and if you suspect he is retaining fluid.

The big belly can be due to gasses/bloating from excess sugars in grass (and even hay) spilling over into the hindgut. Sodium bicarb mentioned above is a cheap and simple thing to try.
 
It may be that something that he is eating is causing him to retain fluid. I'd strip his diet back to just hay for at east a week and monitor carefully for any improvement. I'm not sure of the point of feeding hard feed to a horse which is getting soaked hay but a few weeks a go we ran out of the oat straw chaff which we normally feed and 'had to' give our horses Graze-on Gold, which is a mixture of straw chaff, dried grass and soya oil. Two of them put on a massive amount of weight on the tape, even though their condition score was much the same as before. As soon as we went back to oat straw chaff, the extra 'weight' fe off again, within a week. We are pretty sure that the cause of the tape increase was fuid retention caused by the Graze-on Gold, which we won't use again.
I did wonder about hind-gut ulcers as I read your OP
 
Have you got any pictures of him? Some types are prone to looking like they have a big belly, though this is quite normal for an out at grass horse, the gut should always be filled with fibre, it's the way a horses digestion works at its best.

I have no experience of the ultra grass, is it pelleted or like lengths of dried grass? If pelleted you would help his digestion if you add chaff to the feed.

Someone mentioned feeding bicarbonate of soda to linseed oil, this is good for hind gut acidosis. May be worth a try.
 
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