What would you do next...mare not eating forage

[sammiea]

Litle bit worried about my mare...

Back end of Feb I finished my bale of haylage and dually opened another...next morning she hadnt touched it, wasnt overally suprised as she can be a bit "fussy" when i open new bale but 24hrs of realising thats your grub and she will scoff it down however 7 days later she is still refusing to eat it and had also refused normal hay both dry & soak so was getting concerned (my pony is fed from the same bale and is happily eating it & my friend buys off me and her horse is happily scoffing it to) that I called the vet to check her teeth although they werent due yet but thought best place to start as she was happily eating anything "short chop" ie hard feed & grass. Vet came and checked teeth low and behold cracked tooth and a lot of over growth were she has obviously been sore both myself & the vet were happy with the out come and vet said give her 2/3 days and she should pick up. Amazingly day 3 she is scoffing haylage again...day 4 fine...day 5...the stike begins again, stuck by my guns for couple of days but after that I was starting to think maybe its my haylage so brought a horsehage...she is scoffing it and emptying my pocket at the same time!!! Decided to ring the vet had chat and she is worried that it could be that the damaged tooth is damaged further up so sent me out some bute to do for 4 days to see if she picks up eating her normal forage, yesterday day & last night I gave her a mix of horsehage (just one section) and half section of her normal haylage...this morning horsehage all gone and some of the normal haylage. I guess the moment of truth will be today when i get back to the yard as i've left her with normal haylage only. Vet is suggesting taking her in for jaw xrays to check this tooth is ok if she picks up her eating whilst on the bute.

Both my hay & haylage are my own, of decent quality and from the same field baled ourselves and the same stuff she has been fed all winter and looks great on.

She is still in work and working well, she looks fab with a really glossy coat dispite it being half way between a clipped winter coat and a summer coat.

What WWYD?? She is baffling me

Haribos for those that get this far

 

[HazyXmas]

My usually piggy mare has just suddenly stopped eating her hay, i must admit that she has been on haylage all winter but she was getting far too fat on that so have just bought soft, sweet smelling meadow hay.
She won't touch it although everything else is wolfing it down. Have tried soaking it & dry but most of it is still left in the net in the morning.
I did wonder if it's just the fact that there is suddenly grass for her to eat after a very lean winter. She seems fine & looks gr8, could still lose some weight so maybe not eating much at night will help that?
I hope that you find out what is up with your girl.

 

[LaurenBay]

My Horse went on a hay strike too a couple of months ago. The other Horses were all eating it fine. I tried feeding it, wet, from floor, in net, in field etc and she wouldn't touch it! But was quite happy to eat her feed and grass. I fed her some Fast Fibre just to make sure her gut stayed healthy. I sold my hay in the end and got some more delieverd. I tried feeding a bit from hand from every bale to see what one she liked. She picked one and I got some of that, Haven't had a problem since. Fussy mare I try to go for the greener bales as thats what she prefers. Luckily the farmer doesn't mind me picking and choosing which bales I want