what do you feed your oldies???

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jewel

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i notice in the post below that a few of you have oldies, just wanted to know what you fed them escpecially (sp) those with teeth problems? i.e don't eat hay or haylage anymore
 
Our old pony had dental problems and was also a laminitic. We fed her Spiller's Happy Hoof as a hay replacement. (We found that Hi Fi Lite was too coarse for her, but she ate the Happy Hoof just fine).

If teeth are so bad that they can't eat a chaff type food, then you can make a mash of fibre cubes. Contact the appropriate feed manufacturer for what quantities to feed dependent on the size of horse or pony.
 
he has still got all his teeth he eats alfa oil fine, it's just if you give him hay or haylage he seems to chew and chew then spits it out in the shape of a tennis ball
 
We had a 36 year old who unfortunately we lost to cancer. He had no teeth whatsoever but lived out 24/7 because he hated to live in. He chewed grass but spit it out in balls. He was fed twice a day on Baileys No. 1 and sugar beet in quite large quantities, On the day he was pts he looked magnificent and could eat it quite happily. He was quite a character and is still sadly missed.
 
Fibre pencils soaked with warm water to make a mush. Works with barley rings or topline cubes etc etc depending on if they need weight on, just fibre, energy and so on
 
ReadyGrass as a replacement for hay (when he's in at night during the winter), fairly normal feed twice a day but with Instant Linseed (Simple Systems) added.

He's fine when there's plenty of grass because he still has his front teeth but can't manage the long fibres of hay or haylage because he's short of molars.
 
Mine eats the same as my 5 yo ISH - 3/4 scoop calm & condition, 1/2 scoop top spec cond flakes, a cup of top spec feed balancer (hideously expensive) scoop & a half of alfa a & 3/4 scoop of speedi beet. Plus a cup of winter glow/summer shine herbs when the shop has then & ad lib hay.

She is 35, & the dentist came yesterday. She still has all her teeth, none of them are loose & apparently whatever she dies of, it won't be tooth related, so that's good news.
 
Mine is 28yrs old, and virtually retired bar the odd hack now and again.
He isn't in the condition i want him to be, but i feed him ready mash extra and sugabeet together because he can't chew to well.
Hopefully when the good grass comes through as well he'll pile on a few more pounds..But lots of people i know swear by Ready Mash Extra..
 
My 2 veterans (18 and 21 this year) can still eat hay easily so they get a lot of that obviously. Otherwise they both get 2 feeds a day (mainly because the other horses get some!). The 18yr old is prone to laminitis so is on a very strict diet of Speedi Beet, Simple Systems linseed and her supplements. The 21 yr old has also had lami many years ago so I still need to be careful with him - he just get Alfa A Oil with added Soya Oil and his supplements. He's only just started to look old this year so I may need to up his feed or change it to something a little more conditioning this year.
 
Our oldies years ago got a mix of stuff, one could eat Alfa A ok but not hay so he was fed a mix of Hi-Fibre, Stud cube, sugar beet and then we would put a couple of large scoops of Alfa A in a corner feed bucket in a field shelter for him for after (he was out 24/7 and lived to be 36 until we think he died of a heart attack. The old pony we had (god knows how old he was when he died - 40 ish?) He was fed a 'porridge' of soaked sugar beet, hi-fibre cubes and stud cubes. He did ok on that but never was one to keep weight on and couldn't eat Alfa A or hay.

The 2 old ones we have now (24 & 18) have sugar beet and allen & page Old Faithfuls Special Blend which seems to keep the weight on well but then they can also eat hay.
 
She gets 3-4 flakes of hay in a net at night, same again if shes in during the day.. pretty much feed her ad lib though.

Then she gets a small square scoop of economy mix at night & morning mixed with a headed round scoop of ready grass. I feed the RG in varying quantities thou depending how much shes out/what the grazing is like/how hungry she is etc.

She's also on Equiflex (excellent stuff!) and cod liver oil. Shes a 15 YO Native.
 
My 22 yr old is just about ok with his teeth though he doesn't have much spare left under the surface and I think he may soon start to struggle with haylage. All winter he's coped magnificently being in 8 hrs during the day and out 16 hrs at night, rugged up to the eyeballs. Stops him getting stiff. During the day, he gets through about 1.5 haynets of nice quality haylage, and there's grass bits to nibble on all during the night. He also has 2 feeds of 1 heaped round scoop Mollichaff Veteran chaff, cup of D&H pasture mix (just because my other horse has it) and a handful or two of D&H Alfalfa made damp with half a scoop of wet Kwikbeet. He positively thrives on this diet. Mollichaff Vetern is an oat-straw based feed packed with mint, nettles, antioxidants, vits, mins and a light coating of oil. He adores the taste of Veteran chaff (so do all the horses on the yard!) and his coat is so shiny you can see your face in it. I'd recommend it to anyone. The quality is superb. During the summer he is out 24/7 with just an occasional nibble on a haynet and a bowl of Veteran chaff/Kwikbeet if he's in for riding or to get out of the heat and flies for a bit.
 
My roughly in his 40's lad has, Top Spec Fibre plus (with hot water to make a soup), Top Spec Plus, Build Up, vits, minerals and Biotin.

He does still have a go at his hay and haylage, but I find his poo's have hay bits in it.

So, the Fibre plus was recommended and has worked a treat this winter.
 
Tanna, 43 this year, has stud and condition mix, fibre cubes and boiled barley and pink powder. for roughage he has a huge skip full twice a day of Alphafibre and molichaff mixed together although we have recently thought about buying a garden shredder ( one with metal blades not plastic disc cutters) to do our own chop for him. he does have a go at hay but mostly balls it up and spits it our pellet fashion!
Tanna for 43 looks fantastic. pic taken on one of the warm days last month when we could get rugs off for a few hours.
TANNA120208UNRUGGED.jpg


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