Winter faecal water syndrome

Interesting thread and I have followed it.

Choccy is 32 with worn teeth. He gets FWS in winter from stalkier hay especially, not in summer.

This summer he's been on hay due to lack of grass but he's also on fast fibre (he's previously been on. speedibeet and before that care&gain). teh fast fibre is fed with a scoop of Baileys senior 15 (looks like museli) and a mug of linseed, twice a day, and he has carrots and apples and oranges too. When the Baileys bag is empty I'm going to try a bag of cushcare to top the fastfibre and linseed with.

His bottom has been mainly clean all summer.
 
We have also been doing ok. Had a real soul destroying blip when I ran out of last years hay and this years wasn’t in. We had to buy some and it was really coarse which is never ideal!
We are now only eating hay, our own and 🤞 all seems good which is a huge relief!
It’s lovely not having to clean him up constantly.
I have also switched his food slightly, that may or may not have made any difference
 
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Goldenstar said:
H suffered from this feeding only Timothy forage helped and a supplement protexin gut sponge make the symptoms all but disappear.
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What did you use to feed the gut sponge? I remeber it being a pretty large amount of powder and finding it impossible to hide/feed. My pony is small though and has little in the way of feed, he's also not greedy so even if i have half a scoop of chaff he wouldnt eat it.
 
poiuytrewq said:
What did you use to feed the gut sponge? I remeber it being a pretty large amount of powder and finding it impossible to hide/feed. My pony is small though and has little in the way of feed, he's also not greedy so even if i have half a scoop of chaff he wouldnt eat it.
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I found I only needed to feed half the recommended amount for it to have the desired effect.
 
meleeka said:
I found I only needed to feed half the recommended amount for it to have the desired effect.
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Yes sure, My pony is tiny as well so wouldnt have needed the whole amount which i can't even remeber. I think at the time we were on a handful of nuts type feed to get a prascend in, so hiding any powder was inpossible. He now eats a bit of chaff and speedibeet and a balancer fairly willingly so that may be easier and worth another try IF we have issues again. 🤞 I really hope we are doing ok though, first time long termIn years.
 
The FWS is back for my mare. 😬
The haylage seems a bit richer and with the flush of grass, it has returned.

I used Think Pink (same as NAF's Pink Powder) last time which seemed to work but she wasn't on a feed balancer at the time.

She's fed Spillers Speedy-Mash Fibre and Spillers Daily Balancer. From what I can see, Think Pink also contains full spectrum vitamins and minerals so I don't want to overload it.

Is there an alternative? Am I better off maybe chucking a bit of bran in instead?
 
I thought about this thread the other day, when little cob fired out mostly water onto the road. We have added yeast, she's having a bucket a day of chaff and some very very rough, dry hay. Thankfully that has all taken us from actual water back to soft poos that leave her legs and tail clean and her stomach happier. She's living out on a starvation paddock - I have no idea how she is even getting enough grass for it to affect her that much!
 
Millie is getting this dreadfully at the moment. She does normal poos then fires out a random monstrosity of watery poo. It’s been a nightmare for the last couple of weeks.

She’s had this a few times in the past and it does seem to happen around September/October and then again Feb.
 
We have seen some 'loose' days, as the grass is coming and going like a yo-yo. Old Dobbin has been on supplementary feeding since June, as the grass was too short for him to graze properly. Ditching the low sugar diet and returning to sugar beet and chaff with molasses has worked for him. I add bran to the sugar beet in an effort to balance the calcium-phosphorous ratio. He has a meadow grass haylage as well, which now has to be chopped into 4" lengths for him, so he doesn't choke.
Thank you to all who take the time to contribute to this thread. It's really interesting to read about the variations in symptoms, causes and things that help.
 
Highmileagecob said:
We have seen some 'loose' days, as the grass is coming and going like a yo-yo. Old Dobbin has been on supplementary feeding since June, as the grass was too short for him to graze properly. Ditching the low sugar diet and returning to sugar beet and chaff with molasses has worked for him. I add bran to the sugar beet in an effort to balance the calcium-phosphorous ratio. He has a meadow grass haylage as well, which now has to be chopped into 4" lengths for him, so he doesn't choke.
Thank you to all who take the time to contribute to this thread. It's really interesting to read about the variations in symptoms, causes and things that help.
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Can you still buy a bottle of kaolin and morphine from the chemists?
Age-old standby for scouring foals, not personally used this to dry up scouring oldies, altho I remember one geriatric who was successfully treated - owner borrowed my largest syringe (!), plus changed pony’s hay.
 
Kaolin, gut sponge, psyllium husks appear to work for some, by absorbing the excess fluid. I tried to work out why it was happening, and had a gut biome done. This pointed to not enough long stalk fibre, and not enough diversity. Long stalk fibre was a bit tricky with a dentally challenged 30yo, but chopping up a quantity of meadow grass haylage in addition to his nets has helped 100% ryegrass haylage has been withdrawn. His gut sounds were quiet, and given the amount of liquid he was passing, it seemed obvious that digestion wasn't really happening as it should. Working on the basis that horses are hind gut fermenters, and sugar and yeast are needed for fermentation, I put molassed beet back into his diet, plus Fast Fibre, bran, grass chaff and molassed straw chaff. Last winter he had maybe four episodes of FWS which cleared up within 24 hours.
 
Exasperated said:
Can you still buy a bottle of kaolin and morphine from the chemists?
Age-old standby for scouring foals, not personally used this to dry up scouring oldies, altho I remember one geriatric who was successfully treated - owner borrowed my largest syringe (!), plus changed pony’s hay.
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ETA, asked a pharmacist friend, this has been banned because nefarious types were able to separate off the minuscule amount of morphine.....
However, kaolin and pectin ( also sold for child stomach upsets) is sold in horse and cattle concentrations, there are some proprietary brands. Definitely worth starting there, I should have thought, dry things up and try to work out the subsequent triggers.
 
We too have had a little set back. I was so excited this week when Mr P arrived home with some new hay to try and it was literally the softest finest hay I'd ever seen, thought perfect for FWS pony. Oddly not though, I was dissapointed and a bit confused by that one!
Its ALAWYS been a case of the coarser the hay the worse the issue for this particular pony.

Not really complaining though, I have an extra 13 bales of gorgeous hay..
 
I've only just found this thread and have found it really useful. I have been struggling with this with my little grey pony who is over 20 and has lost quite a few teeth. She had always been prone to diarrhoea which was sorted with Protexin quick fix for a few days and then she would be ok for a while. The last few weeks I just haven't been able to stop it. She had her teeth checked last week and there were no real issues other than missing a few so we decided it must be the long fibre as she has been having quite a bit of hay due to limited grass. I have taken her off that now and given her hay replacer and mash and gut sponge after reading about it on here. After a couple of days, she actually seems to have dried up, so am keeping everything crossed we may have found a solution. I didn't fancy going into winter having to wash her tail and back end all the time as it wouldn't be much fun for anyone!
 
poiuytrewq said:
We too have had a little set back. I was so excited this week when Mr P arrived home with some new hay to try and it was literally the softest finest hay I'd ever seen, thought perfect for FWS pony. Oddly not though, I was dissapointed and a bit confused by that one!
Its ALAWYS been a case of the coarser the hay the worse the issue for this particular pony.

Not really complaining though, I have an extra 13 bales of gorgeous hay..
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Are you able to chop it into shorter lengths? I use a pair of hand sheep shears. Old Dobbin's chewing ability is compromised, and I don't think his efforts reach the stomach in a suitable mushed up form. I now chop a full, pressed down trug bucket for him, and provide two full nets of unchopped, as well as his half bucket of soaked stuff.
 
I'm thinking about getting some brewers yeast or yeasacc and some bran. Although I'm reluctant to start two things at the same time because I won't know which one is working!

I have to feed haylage/wrapped hay. I can't feed chaff. I know that pro and prebiotics are in the Speedy Mash Fibre so I'm not sure I will need more but it's not fed at the recommended rate so perhaps a bit more would help.

She also gets oily herbs too which she's had for several years.

I just can't decide because whilst the bran might help solidify the poos, will it make her stomach more comfortable? Or should I get the brewers yeast? Or both? 🤦‍♀️
 
I could try chopping it yes, I do still have our own hay that he was ok on though but didn’t seem as nice, will probably just switch him back to that when I have space for a new bale here.
I’d certainly try chopping in the mean time, I was just typing he doesn’t eat a huge amount but then figured he’s out with two others over night and I’m not chopping all that!
Maybe it will help just chopping the day rations!
 
It's very much trial and error. The fibre needs to reach the foregut in a state that the hindgut can break down and digest. That is my understanding. We need more research on the workings of horse digestion, and in the meantime, I'm sure the feed companies will jump on the band wagon and produce a miracle cure....
 
Just to report that my 3 are still fine [touches wood]. My long term change was adding a lot of herbs, oily ones but also anti-inflammatory ones.

All horses have plenty of grass but are hungry, eating rather dry wrapped hay for a few hours a day and feeds of grass pellets, chop, equivita balancer and herbs.
 
My old boy's has just got really bad again out of nowhere :( Very squitty, nothing has changed at all. He is muzzled throughout the day as he has been for the last 6/7 years, out for longer now than ever( currently around 9/10 hours per day, longer in Summer), fed his usual Simple Systems fibre cubes, Honeychop chaff, A&P Veteran light and has plenty hay. I suppose the only thing I have added in the last month is a new joint supplement containing MSM, glucosamine, mussel etc. Currently,Protexin gut balancer and Zeolites aren't making much of a difference. His tail is needing washed every second day 😖, it can't be much fun for him.
 
holeymoley said:
My old boy's has just got really bad again out of nowhere :( Very squitty, nothing has changed at all. He is muzzled throughout the day as he has been for the last 6/7 years, out for longer now than ever( currently around 9/10 hours per day, longer in Summer), fed his usual Simple Systems fibre cubes, Honeychop chaff, A&P Veteran light and has plenty hay. I suppose the only thing I have added in the last month is a new joint supplement containing MSM, glucosamine, mussel etc. Currently,Protexin gut balancer and Zeolites aren't making much of a difference. His tail is needing washed every second day 😖, it can't be much fun for him.
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Sorry to hear that - I had exactly the same thing with my old pony. Everything crossed, she currently has solid poo - I removed all hay last weekend and am now just giving her hifi light, one of the Allen and Page mashes and fibre beet along with gut sponge and it seems to be working.
 
Marnie said:
Sorry to hear that - I had exactly the same thing with my old pony. Everything crossed, she currently has solid poo - I removed all hay last weekend and am now just giving her hifi light, one of the Allen and Page mashes and fibre beet along with gut sponge and it seems to be working.
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I like the sound of the gut sponge. But I worry he ends up too dry then colics. He's 23 so still eating away happily, no problems with teeth or anything.
 
I thought my old boy was eating well, as he cleared his nets every night, and didn't quid. Replacing a proportion of his fibre with soaked sugar beet and grass chaff made a difference for him. He's a greedy feeder, and my theory is that he just wasn't chewing properly. This year, another livery on the yard has switched to haylage and has sourced some quite dry hay like stuff, and asked if I would like to share. I will give it a try, and if he starts FWS again, then back to buying bagged veteran haylage from the feedstore. It has also crossed my mind that this could be linked to gut wall damage, as I have absolutely no idea about his worming history in the first seven years before I got him.
 
Highmileagecob said:
I thought my old boy was eating well, as he cleared his nets every night, and didn't quid. Replacing a proportion of his fibre with soaked sugar beet and grass chaff made a difference for him. He's a greedy feeder, and my theory is that he just wasn't chewing properly. This year, another livery on the yard has switched to haylage and has sourced some quite dry hay like stuff, and asked if I would like to share. I will give it a try, and if he starts FWS again, then back to buying bagged veteran haylage from the feedstore. It has also crossed my mind that this could be linked to gut wall damage, as I have absolutely no idea about his worming history in the first seven years before I got him.
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Interesting, I normally feed sugar beet in the colder months but I may start introducing now to see if it makes any difference. Gut damage is interesting, I've had my guy 20 years so know his worming history but not for the first 3 years of his life. He also took a very bad bout of laminitis 7 years ago where it was very touch and go and he was on a considerable amount of bute. I often wonder if there's been a bit of damage with the use of that. He's never shown any of the obvious signs of ulcers or anything.
 
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