What do you feed your horse?

K

kirstyhoneyb

Well-Known Member
Joined
27 July 2009
Messages
76
Visit site
Im looking to get a horse in September (when the kids have gone back to school) Ive not owned a horse (well pony) for getting on 18 years since I stopped show jumping.
We used to feed ours bran and sugarbeet and wondered what most people feed now.
 
I feed soaked oats and alfa cubes to everything that isn't nursing a foal, huge mineral licks and hay always available and that's it.
 
Ali - 25yr old 14.2 arab - hacks and PC once per week: 16+ mix, sugar beet, dengie Senior and superflex. Hay and a bucket of veteran mollichaff at night.

Paddy - 6yr old 15.3 ISH - ridden daily & comp every other week: pasture mix, sugar beet, alfa a and pink powder - apple chaff to bulk out his feed and hay.
 
Top Spec Comprehensive - 600g
3 handfuls speedibeet
1 large round bowl scoop of Alfa -A orig
in the winter he gets topspec conditioning flakes too
 
Well my horse is a good doer and lives off thin air so his diet is 100% hay and some grass and he has a couple of handfuls of hi fi lite chaff in a bucket for his supplement to go into.
 
17.2 8 yr old ISH - countrywide maintenance nuts, just grass & sugar beet
17.1 10 yr WB/TB - countrywide stud & conditioning mix, just grass & Sugar beet
17.2 10 yr ISH - c/w stud & cond mix, just grass, sugar beet,
17.3 6 yr ISH - spillers cond cubes, just grass (doesn't like sugar beet, can't eat mix)
16.3 16 yr old - c/w stud/cond mix (handful to add joint supplement to)

keep it simple! the only reason for the nuts/cubes is that both those horses react to barley so can't have mixes - cubes don't contain barley, mixes do.
 
24 yr old 14.1hh part bred arab

Dengie HiFi Lite, Speedybeet, D@H Pasture Mix, Garlic, Mobifor (glucosamine), and Baileys No4 (winter). The amounts vary throughout the year according to the amount of grass. She also gets about 16-20lbs of good quality hay per day, depending on the time of year. She's not the best doer in the winter, but never looks her age!
 
18 YO 16hh tb - Allen & Page Old faithfuls special blend, Graze on & sugarbeet + joint supp

8 YO 13.2hh native - Happy hoof

12 month old 13.2 Appy - D&H Suregrow (balancer) Graze on & sugarbeet.

x
 
141.1hh 18 year old who gets hacked out for around two hours 4 times a week; Dengie Good Doer, Pasture Mix and Speedi-beet. Out 24/7 on not much grazing, but is a cob so nothing else!

12.3hh NF and Shetland get a handful of Good Doer and Bailey's low-cal.
 
i feed basic mix in summer and mix, oats and sugar beet in winter,maybe when you get your horse contact one of the feed companies they help you find the best feed for the type,work load,condition of your horse.i have used them a few times.
 
Sisters ponies (18 y.o. 13hh welshie and 11 y.o. 14.1hh native type) get handful of happy hoof + gp supplement all year round. My lad (8 y.o. 15.3hh TB) has happy hoof in summer and alpha oil in winter plus F4F and sunflower seeds. They all live out with hay in the field from around Dec - Feb depending on weather.
 
I have 19yr old 14.2, lammi prone with rotation
She currently gets
spillers happy hoof
spillers high fibre cubes
kwik beet
veg oil -as advised by vet
cod liver oil -as advised by vet
garlic
magnesium

Depends on the horse and their age. when my girl was young she mostly got just hay when needed as she used to be more of a good doer. Some younger types need hardly anything on top of the grass
 
Well one horse, who is a veteran and needs help with condition, gets sugar beet and barley in addition to grazing and top quality haylage.

The other two get a handful of high fibre cubes!

So you can see different horses need very different diets! I would suggest when you get your new horse, you ask the owners what they feed it (don't forget to ask what it gets in terms of grazing and hay/haylage as well, as this is the most important part of the diet). If the current diet is working for the horse - ie it is in good condition, has another energy for its work, and keeps a sane head, then I would continue to feed what the old owners did! (Assuming the horse will have the same workload).
 
It depends so much on the horse!

Current horse has whatever cheap chaff is on offer (about 3/4 of a Stubbs scoop) and a handful or two of high fibre nuts. He only gets fed so that he can have his joint supplement, otherwise I wouldn't feed him at all in summer. In the winter, if I manage to get out hunting like I plan/hope to then he will probably have some sugar beet added to that and electrolytes.

Old mare used to have Molichaff with economy mix. Welsh pony before that had cheap Hi-Fi type chaff, economy mix and Speedibeet in winter.
 
It depends on the horse, type, age workload etc.

My horse gets Allen & Page fast fibre, ride and relax and mollychaff. I have to avoid a high protein/sugar and alfalfa diet for him.
 
My 4yr old 15.3hh ISH mare is in relatively light work, but is still being worked 5x a week, either hacking, short schooling sessions, lunging or loose schooling. She was also a bit light in condition when I brought her, so she is on 800g of Alfa Oil, 500g of Speedibeet, 2kg of Topspec cool conditioning cubes and 550g of topspec comprehensive supplement a day. This is a fibre and oil diet (combined with ad lib grass/hay) and she is starting to look fab on it
smile.gif
 
17.2hh 23 yr old Hanoverian - Castle Condition and Show Cubes, Countrywide M-Chaff, Baileys Outshine and Equivite Body Builder Milk Pellets as he's a nightmare to keep weight on!

Everything else - Red Mills Cool 'n' Cooked Mix, Countrywide M-Chaff

All live out in summer, and turned out from 7am - dark in winter, on ad-lib haylage.

To bulk horses up we use Baileys Outshine and Milk Pellets, and a half pint of corn oil a day added to their usual feed.
Good luck!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top