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Battling a weight problem
I breed Canadian horses and their tendency to be easy keepers is both a blessing and a curse. I am constantly trying to battle their weight and worry about weight related conditions such as insulin resistance, laminitis, and Cushings. Like with humans there are so many "diets" but what it really comes down to is a well balanced diet with the calorie intake appropriate for the activity level, and exercise.
The horse equivalent of the Canada Food Guide is the National Research Council (NRC)nutritional requirements. However working through it can be akin to upper level math since it is not just absolute requirements but balancing the ratios of certain nutrients since elevated levels of one may affect absorption of another. You have a few options: take a course on horse nutrition or seek the advice of a professional animal nutritionist, preferably one that does not have a vested interest in selling you a product. I found an excellent website www.feedxl.com that helps you balance your horse's diet based on the NRC guidelines. They have excellent support and advice by a qualified equine nutritionist. Check it out; chances are it will more than pay for itself.
By using the support of FeedXL, I realized that I was overfeeding and under-nourishing our horses. Most of the supplements that I was using were far off the mark of what was required. In many cases, I was just wasting my money. Hay or pasture provides the majority of nutrients in a horse's diet. I also realized that I was just shooting in the dark without a complete analysis of our hay. We analyzed our hay and will continue to do so every year. http://www.equi-analytical.com has been recommended as the most cost effective place to do so and we will use them in the future.
Our battle with our horse's weight continues but at least we are now making informed choices. Plus as a bonus I have cut our feed costs by hundreds of dollars and our horses are looking good.
Later
Laurie Maus
Hawk Hill Farm
www.hawkhillfarm.ca
The horse equivalent of the Canada Food Guide is the National Research Council (NRC)nutritional requirements. However working through it can be akin to upper level math since it is not just absolute requirements but balancing the ratios of certain nutrients since elevated levels of one may affect absorption of another. You have a few options: take a course on horse nutrition or seek the advice of a professional animal nutritionist, preferably one that does not have a vested interest in selling you a product. I found an excellent website www.feedxl.com that helps you balance your horse's diet based on the NRC guidelines. They have excellent support and advice by a qualified equine nutritionist. Check it out; chances are it will more than pay for itself.
By using the support of FeedXL, I realized that I was overfeeding and under-nourishing our horses. Most of the supplements that I was using were far off the mark of what was required. In many cases, I was just wasting my money. Hay or pasture provides the majority of nutrients in a horse's diet. I also realized that I was just shooting in the dark without a complete analysis of our hay. We analyzed our hay and will continue to do so every year. http://www.equi-analytical.com has been recommended as the most cost effective place to do so and we will use them in the future.
Our battle with our horse's weight continues but at least we are now making informed choices. Plus as a bonus I have cut our feed costs by hundreds of dollars and our horses are looking good.
Later
Laurie Maus
Hawk Hill Farm
www.hawkhillfarm.ca
Views: 58
Comment
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Comment by Jackie Cochran on June 21, 2010 at 11:26am
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Gee, it sounds like your horses can almost live on air! Some people would get after me because I kept weight off my horses, they thought that if the horse was not rolling in fat that I was starving them. The odd thing is that once a veterinarian got after me since he could see the outline of the first ribs, he thought that my shiny-coated, good hoofed, snorty, fiery and ever eager to go horses were too underweight--until I told him that it was to prevent founder. Guess he never saw any horses that were not way too overweight. Since I never had a horse founder and since their rear ribs were well covered with some fat I did not change my feeding practices. Even some vets can be wrong.
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Comment by Hawk Hill on June 21, 2010 at 10:32am
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Our horses are on no grain whatsoever. I give them their mineral supplement in about a cup of soaked beet pulp. They are on about 10 -12 lbs of hay and pasture that really is not much more than a green haze on the ground. Our hay has more soluble carbs than I would like but it is what it is. They really should be on a lot more exercise but time also constrains that. If the pasture starts growing in more. I will be putting one of our mares on a grazing muzzle. Last winter they were on free choice hay in round bales and got obese. They will not have access to round bales again.
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I once had some really feed efficient horses, and during the summer if I gave them grain (to put the salt in) I measured it by handfuls, the 600 lb. pony got one handful and my 800 lb. Paso Fino mare got three handfuls (I have small hands), plus around 12 lbs. of hay and/or very limited grazing (spring grass--I built up from 5 min. of grazing to around 2 hours in the summer when the grass was not so full of nutrition.) This was the only way I could keep the weight down since I could not work each horse for hours every day.
I use the crest test to make sure I did not feed too much, as the horse gains weight the crest gets harder. If the horse's crest feels as hard as a rock IMMEDIATELY put the horse on just hay, no pasture, no grain, otherwise the horse will founder. I like to see the first three ribs after the shoulder (just the outlines) otherwise the horse's crests would start getting too hard for my peace of mind. If I started seeing more ribs I would cautiously add to the grain (by handfuls, not pounds) or give a little more hay until I could just see the outlines of the first ribs after the shoulder.
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