Ok, she LIKES her feed which is great. She could stand to gain 100-200lbs. She's a 4 year old TB mare who is approximately 16.1 (more towards the higher side) and weighs (I did the tape measure height/weight thing) 970lbs. She doesn't look horribly thin, but I am used to WBs who are easier keepers. She is getting a 12% Pelleted feed right now and NO vitamins though I AM trying to at LEAST introduce electrolytes as I am in Florida. NO way...she is certain its poision I'm sure. I have resorted to working in literally just a pinch of them each feeding which DOES seem to be working. What mare supplement do you recommend for broodmare purposes? And my hay. Well, she HATES that too. Its T & A too so it isn't junk. And I've sniffed it to check for icky smells (believe me...people say I could work for the FBI with the smells I can smell *L*). AND another problem in Florida...SAND. She won't touch bran mashes either. NO way. How can I introduce that? She has been wormed & had her teeth checked and did pass the vetting & BSE with flying colors. Any advice is greatly appreciated. :o)
Mary
Anonymous (63.15.74.157)
Posted on Saturday, May 26, 2001 - 10:48 pm:
Hey Mary, I have one of those finicky mares as well! Doesn't want anything but her feed---she will eat the Farnam Mare Plus supplement though (I haven't tried the other brands of mare supplements, always been happy w/the Mare Plus). As far as the bran mash---are you adding molasses to it? That helps alot, and I usually put a couple handfuls of sweet feed in too. If your weaning her onto the electrolytes doesn't work, just at least put her a small mineral block in her feed tub. I like to add corn oil to their feed, too (but my finicky mare wants no part of it...once in awhile I can slip some over on her...)It's great for their coat and gives them extra calories w/o the bulk of more feed, plus it does keep them "lubed up" inside! I can relate your "smelling"---If I don't think it smells good or TASTES good for that matter, I don't expect my horses to eat it either! Good luck with Miss Finicky!
Kelly (63.172.47.180)
Posted on Sunday, May 27, 2001 - 05:52 pm:
I have been using a new feed made by Acco. It is called their "Superior" feed line.
This feed is especially for horses that you would like to gain weight or that are poor keeepers. It comes in either a 10%-8 or a 14%-8 protien. The difference in this feed is that it has double the fat content ( most are 4% fat, this is 8%, hence, 14-8 or 10-8 )of any other feed. I like that you can feed less protien or grain altogether and still get the high fat content.
I have been feeding a few hard keepers and all my broodmares with "superior". I have seen improvements in short order. I highly recommend it. I also feed a supplement called Clovite, every horse LOVES it and eats this willingly. It has added vitamines and helps bring out a beautiful coat.
Mary several things come immediately to mind when reading your post. 1: picky eater 2: TB, 3: needs a couple hundred pounds. 4: concerns about sand ingestion.
OK first the picky eater, TB and weight concerns all strongly suggest a possibility of gastric ulcers. very common among TBs. Now that this is suspected, the next question is how to diagnose it. Other than the obvious and not so obvious symptoms. Well contrary to common belief. It is very difficult to make a definitive diagnosis even with the use of a scope to look at the stomach lining. The problem with this approach is that it has been proven in far to many cases that the procedure in and of it´s self can cause gastric ulcers. Simply by the fact that the stomach must be completely devoid of food stuff in order to effectively use the scope. When the stomach of a predisposed horse is without food for any length of time it will develop gastric ulcers very quickly. So in effect this procedure can and often does become a self fulfilling prophesy.
So you may ask, what is one to do to accurately diagnose this problem? Well it has in recent years been recognized that the most accurate diagnosis is the positive or negative results of treatment. Now you sure don´t want to start spending 12 or 13 hundred dollars with the use of Gastrogard for thirty days. If the horse don´t actually have gastric ulcers. So you have these other options. Cimetadine, Carafate, and a couple of other Acid inhibitors. The problem with these is that although they are not terribly expensive, they require several doses in a 24 hour period over several days or weeks to be effective. That last and IMHO most cost effective and medically safe approach is a product that is manufactured by Vita Royal called Nutrient Buffer. They can be found on the web at http://www.vitaroyal.com the product is a ph stabilizer and acts as a soothing coating agent at the same time. It is perfectly safe I have used it in virtually hundreds of cases of gastric ulcers in foals, many as young as 1 day old.
Now to the concerns for incidental ingestion of sand sufficient to cause sand colic. First of all please understand that horses do not incidentally ingest enough sand or dirt to cause any digestive problems. They have prehensile lips and are very capable of avoiding such a thing. If they ingest enough sand or dirt to cause a digestive problem it is because they are doing it intentionally. The reason that they do this is because they are lacking minerals in their diet. These are minerals that their body requires to maintain good health and they crave them when they are lacking in their diet. They cannot be supplied with that old red trace mineral salt block that is actually designed for cattle not horses. In order for a deficient horse to get enough minerals from one of those blocks to meet their needs they would literally have to wear their tongue out licking the thing. Aside from the fact that the salt that is in it would inhibit the absorbsion of the phosphorus and over dose on salt and they would still be deficient anyway. Feeding bran mashes will offer some small laxative effect as long as they are feed very wet. However feeding bran to often can leach calcium out of the system.
The simple solution to avoid sand colic is to provide a free choice source of complete minerals, preferably a balanced source and one that does not contain salt. The salt should be provided free choice as well, but separate from the minerals. These can be readily obtained from several commercial manufacturers, Purina, Moorman´s, the best one comes from Buckeye Mills in Dalton Ohio.
I agree with Kelly that a higher fat diet will aid in adding weight to your horse and that Clovite is a very good supplement. However I suspect that some of the more basic things need to be addressed in addition to nutritional changes.
HP
Kelly (63.172.47.224)
Posted on Monday, May 28, 2001 - 11:36 am:
Mary, I have witnessed the opening of a horses intestines which contained pounds of sand.
Horses absolulely do "accidentally" ingest sand or dirt while grazing or eating. Please make sure that your feed bins are large enough and high enough to catch and contain the feed that spills from the horses mouth while eating. Often, after eating, horses will "lip" around picking up pieces of grain. I would also limit grazing time when the pastures start to dry up.
At this time of year, when pastures start to get dry, and the weather heats up, many horses will not drink an adequate amount of water. The dry feed, sand or dirt, may become a dry obstruction in the intestine. Without the higher intake of water, this may well present itself as a colic. You are well served to be aware of the sand hazards, continue to be concerned and take precautionary measures.
As for the ulclers, it may well be a possibility, but considering her age (4years)that would not be my first guess. If she had been on the track or under training stress, ulcers may be a problem in a young horse. A poor worming program in the young horse would be a cause for intestinal damage, which could easily lead to ulcers from stress or drugs such a Bute.
The feed that I have mentioned is complete with additional minerals and vitamines included. I would add an additional access to salt in the hotter weather. Most of the blocks that are designed for cattle contain urea which is detrimantal to horses,so, should be avoided.
I have been very please with the changes in the poor keepers that I have put on the Acco "superior" feed, it makes feeding easier as well as benefiting my horses. I agree that a PH balanced additive is helpful with digestion I use a product called Sem Pak and it has stopped a colic cold in its tracks. I hope this helps.
Once again I can see it is necessary to defend and substantiate my statements with supportive facts.
First of all if read carefully my statement points out clearly that horses do in fact incidentally ingest sand and dirt. However as long as a horse is healthy and has sufficient mineral sources they will NOT ingest (ENOUGH) of either to cause any digestive problems. This can be best illustrated and substantiated by relating an incident that happened to me personally several years ago.
While managing a TB breeding farm in southern California. On which we had ~75 broodmares and other horses of various ages. They were in a high concentration environment with no pasture to speak of and they were being, and had been fed on the ground for a very long time before I came to the facility. The feed they were getting was dairy quality alfalfa free choice and a very poor quality of grain at levels enough to maintain reasonable body condition. They also had free choice red trace mineral salt blocks. After working here for barely two weeks I started to have what can be best described as a storm of colic cases. Often one or two a day and despite all attempts to treat them by traditional means 7 mares were lost in the first 10 days. Upon necropsy we found exactly what Kelly described. bowels loaded with dirt and sand. This was material that could have easily been avoided when eating if they chose to do so. Something had to be done or I feared we would loose the entire herd. The very next case I loaded into a trailer at the first symptoms and hauled her to a referral center 2 hours away.
The attending veterinarian was Alice De Groot, DVM, MS. ACVM Diplomat board certified in internal medicine and surgery. She treated the case surgically removing 11 pounds of sand and small gravel, the mare did survive. Upon questioning her about the possible causes for this problem the stated with out qualification. Horses do not incidentally ingest ENOUGH sand or dirt to cause digestive upset. She said that these horses were in fact eating dirt in an attempt to supply their carvings for minerals. I stated that I had never seen them eating dirt. She stated again that this was the cause and that if I would follow her instructions I could solve the problem. Well as crazy as it sounded I agreed. She instructed me to get some horse minerals, I argued that they had sufficient minerals available in the old red trace mineral salt blocks. She stated exactly what I did in the previous post about this source. It in effect is useless when it comes to supplying adequate minerals to deficient horses. She insisted that I get a horse mineral that was designed specifically for horses, and make it available FREE choice. She said do not attempt to feed it in portions. The horses will consume what they require then they will slow or stop consumption entirely when their requirements are met. I did as she suggested and purchased a pallet of Moorman´s Horse mineral blocks and set the entire pallet into the paddock with the mares. Surprisingly they consumed the entire pallet of blocks in less than a week. I purchased another and this time it took about ten days for them to consume the whole thing. I purchased another and they consumed about one third and then almost stopped all together. The long and the short of this is, I never had another case of sand colic, and have not to this day, some 25 years later and I have raised horses in very large numbers all over this country. However I always see to it that they have available free choice HORSE minerals.
BTW those horse continued to be fed the same way as always. The only change was the addition of free choice minerals.
Now to the issue of gastric ulcers. I have personally treated hundreds of cases of gastric ulcers quite successfully over the years, but I don´t expect my word to be taken for anything here either. So refer if you will to the research done by Dr. Noah Cohen, PhD at Texas A&M University about 7 years ago. That clearly states ~70% of all horses in any kind of training and a almost any age suffer from varying stages of gastric ulcers. Many are asymptomatic or the symptoms are so subtle that they are misinterpreted as something else, but the problem exists never the less. It is also, as stated by Dr. Cohen, these cases are exacerbated by intermittent roughage supply and stress. So a case that is asymptomatic may very well become symptomatic very quickly due to sudden changes in roughage supply or stress.
Thanks for the advice HP, but most of her problems are just 'settling in'. She's eating the hay now which is great. As you may have noticed, giving her vitamins is NOT really an option aside from a pinch more every day or so. If I do more than that...she goes off her feed. As to the salt block...you know the saying "you can lead a horse to water..." well, apparently it applies to salt blocks. I certainly can not FORCE her to lick it. :o) And another fact for Florida horses, they DO need traces of salt in their diets. They sweat a LOT here and its very, VERY hot.
I agree with you Kelly. I LIVE in Florida and unless you DO or HAVE, then its really hard to say much on the sand topic. Especially in lower Florida. We HAVE to add electrolytes and I double them on the days I KNOW its going to be extremely hot or we have rapid weather changes.
Any way, thanks for the feed advice and other wise...I certainly will look in to the Acco feeds.
:o)
BarnTroll (64.209.134.135)
Posted on Monday, May 28, 2001 - 11:13 pm:
Hello Mary, I’ve been away from my computer for a few days so I do hope this dose get to you.
We keep most the horses here in stalls & paddocks, since we confine them they don’t get to move as if they where in open range, or in the wild as they were intended to. They can ingest enough sand or dirt for it to become a problem in warmer weather. Especially since we’re getting closer to summer. Because they may lack enough water in their system during the heat of the day (which is needed for digestion) smaller amounts of sand or dirt attached to scrubby pasture, may well prove as a problem. With any horse being confined one should be aware of sand &/or dirt problems, it is a real concern.
In addition, Please remember that with summer coming, horses will drink more, but at different times of the day, if she has a water bucket. You might fill it up in the morning & she can drink it before the afternoon.
Since your question/topic was about feed, we’ve been using “Superior” feed as well. And we’ve seen great results; I suggest it, if you want to put some meat on her bones.
To Kelly- What exactly is Sem-Pac? I've heard talk about it, but I'm not sure what it is.
elkene (192.160.184.219)
Posted on Friday, June 01, 2001 - 01:03 pm:
I lived in So.California for 10 years and we used to feed psyllium (according to directions on can) for sand removal, and always electrolytes when it started getting hot. There were horses in our area that had coliced and had huge sand entroliths (sp?) removed, so I think that they do accidently ingest sand. I was in Los Angeles, I there are nothing but sandy corrals there!
Kelly (63.172.47.218)
Posted on Friday, June 01, 2001 - 05:44 pm:
Elkene, I spent 8 years in Palm Springs, Ca. I understand and have lived through some of the very same problems! It can be a very serious situation.
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