Weight gain feed suggestions

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Geordiegal

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As the title suggests really, horse is a 9 year old TB, ex racer (retired very early as was too slow) and became a broodmare.
I've had her since Friday and feeding her alpha a oil and conditioning mix.
Don't want anything to make her fizzy, someone has suggested red bag mash, has anyone used this?
She needs some meat on her as she's quite hippy and ribby at the minute.
Suggestions most welcome x
 
If she's just landed with you, I wouldn't want to start feeding her up yet. Any extra calories will be extra energy. Let her settle in, give her adlib good quality hay and turnout (the grass is coming through).
Give her some time and see how shes does on that and then equerry conditioning mash is a good one.
 
Agree that grass will probably help.

My ex racer picked up well on baileys ease and excel. As well as being ulcer friendly and conditioning it also incudes protexin so they get the most out of everything they eat. Mine got a better appetite for his hay while on it. In the winter I added some rice bran.

He's in no work now and doing quite well on cheap sugarbeet and haylage tho ?
 
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Bellaboo18 said:
If she's just landed with you, I wouldn't want to start feeding her up yet. Any extra calories will be extra energy. Let her settle in, give her adlib good quality hay and turnout (the grass is coming through).
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Ditto this, while she's new I'd just keep her on what she's used to and make sure she has plenty of hay and grass. Later on if you're still looking for something I found that micronised linseed really helped mine.
 
Also, I think a lot of the time people want a quick fix, whether it's to lose the weight or gain the weight. Then, odd choices are made. Oil, for one. I don't think oil is a good feed. No wild or semi-wild horse has access to oil other than what naturally occurs in grains and seeds.
 
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You might find as she gets fatter and feeling good the alpha a and mix will send her silly, I have Arabs and can't feed alfalfa or anything with molasses I would feed ad lib hay and change the feed to grass nuts or a basic grass chaff unmolassed sugar beet and linseed, I find a lot of hot blood horses don't cope well on high energy feed.
 
Ad lib hay/ haylage and a good few weeks/months of Dr Green. Then re assess. If she’s still not gaining anything then start adding extra to the hard feed. As someone else has said you might find the mix and alfa a is too much for her. I’ve used linseed on pretty much everything, it seems to be a safe option in all ways!
 
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Have teeth been done? You might find that hay/forage intake increases if they haven't been done for a while.

Then adlib hay and hopefully the grass is through soon.

I love Keyflow Pink Mash and although it's not the highest calorie feed it does seem to make a big difference. Perhaps because its aimed at (hind) gut health and ulcers.

I usually feed it alongside micronised linseed, salt, vit/mins (Progressive Earth Pro Balance) & unmolassed chaff (dengie meadow grass).

Dueing winter/when they need more I tend to add grass nuts. However one year the ex racer needed more and was being overfaced with the amount of grass nuts (split into 3 feeds) he needed. On the recommendations from here I tried Baileys Ease & Excel no.21 mix. It done the trick and I didnt notice any negative side affects feeding it to a barefoot/ulcer ex racer.

But I agree with the sentiment to go slow and stuff with forage. Personally I dont like feeding glugs of oil or mixes that are high in sugar and starch.
 
Teeth, wormcount, ad lib forage/as much good grass as you have would be my starting point.
Let her settle and see how she goes, if she still needs more you can always add it slowly.

My go to for weight is always micronised linseed and making sure your fibre sources are nutrient/calorie dense, so you don't have to rely on cereals so much, keeping sugar+starch less than 10% if they're sensitive, but no more than 15% regardless.
 
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