What do you feed your fatties?

S

Slightlyconfused

Go away, I'm reading
Joined
18 December 2010
Messages
11,365
Visit site
So one of ours is fat, its being handled soaked hay, off grass in the day etc.

The one thing we are struggling with is feed.

He has half a stubbs scoop of thunderbrooks chaff (i know its not well liked on here but he likes it and eats it) twice a day, it carrys his calmer in the morning, his gut supplement in the afternoon and a scoop of tb daily essentials twice a day. We will be stoppin this once we find a replacement.

Have been told to introduce speedi beet as if he eats it its a good way of getting fibre without the calories into him for weightlost.


What we would like is a general balancer in either pellet or power form that is low in calorie etc.

I haven't fed Bailys it years but used to have my old horses on the Low Cal and a bit of chaff and had no problem.

What do people use now?

Have been recommended Lamicore from Equifest, and apprently its what the PSSM groups use? Has anyone used that?

Nothing topspec as my previous horses heated up on it.
 
Mine usually get Honeychop Lite and Healthy with Spillers low cal balancer to carry pea protein for B and milk thistle for DP. In the winter they also get a smidge of a Dengie grass chaff to make it a bit more interesting but they only get a minuscule amount, just enough to carry the supplements. B is prone to laminitis even though he is slim and has ribs while DP has EMS and needs watching like a hawk. Not had any problems with Spillers at all and it’s low in iron.
 
My Arab's have grass chaff a few handfuls and a few wooden spoons of unmolassed sugar beet and about 10 spillers fibre nuts with progressive earth pro balance basic they won't eat the full amount so they get about a scoop of it which I think is enough.

Mine are good doers but they refuse to eat most supplements in there diet feed so the few nuts actually make a difference and a bag lasts me forever, I use them as treats as well but I think at such a low quantity it really won't make an impact but at least you get the supplements eaten and not wasted.

Maybe get tested for ems or cushings it can be present now in much younger horses.
 
I give one cup balancer, a handful of Honey chop lite and healthy chaff and a tiny bit, like a handful for the ponies and a small cup for the horse of Spillers quick soak fibre because it’s a dead certain way of getting cushings pills down!
 
Tb is quite sugary, I'd swap to something less sugary
Mine doesn't like chaff so I feed Allen and Page feeds - Fast Fibre is very low in sugar and starch
 
Sossigpoker said:
Tb is quite sugary, I'd swap to something less sugary
Mine doesn't like chaff so I feed Allen and Page feeds - Fast Fibre is very low in sugar and starch
Click to expand...


Problem is the horse doesnt like mash/wet type feeds. So A&P wont be suitible. Tried him with speedi beet and had to add more chaff to it to get him to eat all of it.
 
I feed mine hi-fi molasses free and a cup of linseed. (Linseed is for her skin as she gets quite itchy.) I dampen it with water and she’s happy to eat that with her supplements. Field mate will lick her bucket clean once she’s finished and would happily have her feed but she gets her own so must be tasty enough.
 
1/2 scoop of soaked grass nuts does 6 feeds (there's 3 fatties). Handful of chaff mixed in, with any supplements and a pelleted balancer. I find it hard to hide mineral powders in tiny feeds.

Currently on Bailey's performance balancer. Great coats & farrier happy with hooves.
 
Half a stubbs scoop twice a day of TB chaff should be around 35g of sugar, your supplements are probably negligible.

A 350g pony eats about 17kg of grass per day at 7.5% sugar, so say 600g sugar if out for 12 hours

Hay is around 10%-15% sugar so 3kg is maybe 300g-450g sugar a day. Soaking removes around 30% wsc so say 200g-300g if stabled for the other 12 hours.

So if we are worrying about sugar (which I would be) you can see that his bucket feed is the least of your problems.

Ideally you'd remove from grazing completely (track or arena or bare field not stabled 24/7) and feed soaked hay plus small feeds. In real life its probably easier to be in during the day with soaked hay and out overnight with muzzle.

Exercise itself isn't great for weightloss but it is an hour out of the day when they are doing something other than eating, and being fitter is never a bad thing.

Note all of the above from my ancient feed book and a few manufacturers websites, I am no expert! And it's late so possibly my maths is wrong but you get my point 🙂
 
Just noticed your point on lamicore. It didn't have any effect on my PSSM horse although the pony got the leftovers and looked good on it. It's a fair old cup of powder though and pretty hard to hide in a small bucket feed.

Tbh if you just fed the RDA of one of the pellet balancers and nothing else in the bucket that would be ok. They're more appetising than the powders
 
SEL said:
Just noticed your point on lamicore. It didn't have any effect on my PSSM horse although the pony got the leftovers and looked good on it. It's a fair old cup of powder though and pretty hard to hide in a small bucket feed.

Tbh if you just fed the RDA of one of the pellet balancers and nothing else in the bucket that would be ok. They're more appetising than the powders
Click to expand...
This is what I do. RDA of blue chip native balancer, my c loves it. Looks like he has barely anything and doesn’t look very appealing at all but he goes mad for it. Once he goes on the summer grass he won’t be on anything though, apart from a scoop of chaff before ridden work and travelling
 
I make my own concoction now after trial & error to make up something to carry meds/supplement that he’s happy to eat 🙄
So basically 2 parts Honey Chop light and healthy, 1 part Spillars lite & lean balancer and 1 part D&H pasture mix that has a sniff of molasses in and seems to be very appealing to him. Bit of a pain to get it all mixed into the feed bin (I’m on full livery so not making feeds up) but he literally gets a handful of this mixture morning and night so he gets something when others are fed, and it lasts a loooooong time.
 
Mine gets his balancer and a little bran and a small amount of myoplast he can’t eat chop or soaked forage because of his teeth he gets a small amount of Timothy / fescue haylege .

Exercise is key to horses maintaining weight I can’t exercise my old boy he’s not sound enough so getting the horse moving more is very very important .
Horses are designed to move a lot looking for food something most of us can’t really mimic in domestic life with out work.
 
I would just feed what you are already but see if you can get away with a quarter of a scoop per feed. It's such a small amount that I wouldnt personally stress about the ingredients.
 
Mine isn't too much of a fatty currently although puts on weight very easily so has to be closely monitored. He does really well on Spillers molasses free fibre (chaff) and Spillers daily balancer (he also has a joint supplement).
 
Ive got a heavy weight trad cob and treat her like a lamanitic ... she's never had it but cant stand big obese ponies.

She gets a small scoop of allen & page fast fibre , morning and pm with a powdered vit & min suppliment and a bit of garlic granules.

Shes worked probably 4 days a week at the mo , out 24/7 on a pretty bare paddock and gets hay popped in overnight (normally about a small nets worth).

She's the type that balloons come spring/summer and so far this year it's working well at keeping the weight down (new yard that understands the requirement to manage grazing wahooo ! :D )
 
Jambarissa said:
Half a stubbs scoop twice a day of TB chaff should be around 35g of sugar, your supplements are probably negligible.

A 350g pony eats about 17kg of grass per day at 7.5% sugar, so say 600g sugar if out for 12 hours

Hay is around 10%-15% sugar so 3kg is maybe 300g-450g sugar a day. Soaking removes around 30% wsc so say 200g-300g if stabled for the other 12 hours.

So if we are worrying about sugar (which I would be) you can see that his bucket feed is the least of your problems.

Ideally you'd remove from grazing completely (track or arena or bare field not stabled 24/7) and feed soaked hay plus small feeds. In real life its probably easier to be in during the day with soaked hay and out overnight with muzzle.

Exercise itself isn't great for weightloss but it is an hour out of the day when they are doing something other than eating, and being fitter is never a bad thing.

Note all of the above from my ancient feed book and a few manufacturers websites, I am no expert! And it's late so possibly my maths is wrong but you get my point 🙂
Click to expand...


Thank you. He is un during the day, 7:30 am till 6/7 pm wirh 6kilos 10 hour soaked hay.
 
Thanks all, will have a good look through the replies.


Mine has tied up twice before (not the fat one🙃) and is type one neg. We treat which extra vit e, salt, keep him warmer than normal etc. I just as he is getting older wanted to give him something like a balancer. Though he is veru food sensative and not a foody horse at all.
 
Mine is on a handful of honeychop light&healthy and a small amount of Allan & Page Veteran Lite to carry the vitamins, salt and joint supplement - just enough to coat the chaff and get the powders to stick. He's going up on the weigh tape though, so I will make time to increase his execise.
 
Here's what I feed, a lo-cal pelleted balancer thats fed in tiny amounts:
www.feedmark.com

SlimAid™

Slimaid includes vitamins, minerals and amino acids for overweight horses and ponies on a restricted or low calorie diet, pelleted for easy feeding.
www.feedmark.com www.feedmark.com
 
Honeychop Lite & Healthy with Heygates Equibalancer - low calorie and affordable.
They're muzzled on grass at night, in for breakfast and turned out in corrals with hay in the day. Exerised 3-4 times a week. So far looking great considering all the grass we have!
 
My little fatty (who isn't fat any more) just gets Baileys Lo Cal, he's not allowed chaff any more because of his teeth. The rest is just hay. I put his Cushings meds into a bit of carrot, and he gets his Bute syringed in due to being able to detect the minutest amount hidden in a feed of chaff (which he can't even have now) and refusing to eat any of it.
When I was dieting him he got soaked hay mixed with straw to get the fibre up and the calories down.
I second the previous poster who suggested a Cushings test. Mine was diagnosed aged 12 and although he was quite slim it wasn't until he went on Prascend that the fat pads on his withers & above his tail disappeared.
 
All these people mentioning scoops/part scoops - I use a tablespoon of grass nuts, add water to soak so that they fluff up but are not wet and just tip the supplements on top, no mixing. They get eaten in one mouthful with a bit of a lick of the scoop/bowl to get the last of the grass nuts.

Works with both fussy and greedy beasties.

Very limited hay and grass with 24 hr access to a net of barley straw.
 
Will keep the cushings test in mind but the grass here is horribly good where as at his previous yard it wasnt that good and compared to last years where it was burnt off most of the summer its a lot more than normal.

Of we get no loss over the next little while we will look at metabolic issues. He is 8 so we are just going down the route of being taken off grass in the day and soaked hay up exercise more to see if that will crack it. I know age doesnt mean anything, we lost an 8 year old to lami induced cushings. Will just keep a close eye.
 
Pure Fibre Balance with supplements as required. All mine are on it even the shitland (a tiny handful). The Irish seems to be good doers! All are muzzled when out and have soaked hay at night bar one who has haylage due to hay allergy. They are all really good weight and can see rib outline. All in work bar the shitland who goes on 5k walks twice a week and free ranges 24/7 muzzled.

Would take bloods off yours just to check insulin levels.
 
Mine isn't fat at the moment but she was when I got her in June last year so she gets a small amount of Speedi-beet and I am taking her off Bailey's Perfect Balancer and putting her back on to Lo-Cal - she could live on thin air. Her grazing is restricted and I can't turn out overnight as she suffers from sweet itch so has to avoid being out at dusk and dawn. She has supplements so has to have something. I did find Bailey's Lo-Cal very good when she had it last summer when she did lose weight after I got her. The paddocks at my yard all have very high quality grass and it's shooting up at the moment.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top