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Post by specialized on Jan 21, 2013 15:54:01 GMT 1
It's really only as complex as we make it, most of us are feeding our horses as though they were performance horses in training or for some other reason need a very specialised diet. Most do very very well on a half decent basic diet, and that gives them all they need to do the work and maintain their systems. They can actually process most forage very efficiently, and all some possibly need to counteract any deficiencies is a supplement or two - we don't need to feed most of them as though they were top athletes. That's the marketing effect for the big feed companies. It has often been said that a moderately fit horse can compete at endurance up to 25 miles straight from the field without a specialist diet. Most horses kept fed up to the eyeballs in this country could never manage a 25 mile endurance ride and are being given enough rocket fuel to compete twice the distance if they ever got fit enough.
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Post by jen1 on Jan 21, 2013 17:10:52 GMT 1
, also I find a lot of younger folk dont make the connection between food and fat horses, a bit agei-st! I suppose the issue is that "hay" is a bit of a general term and can cover a whole manner of sins. Without doing an analysis it's hard to know exactly whats it your hay. Plus lots of suppliers cut from different fields in different areas so you may not know what you're getting from bale to bale and then of course you'd need to test from year to year as you don't know when it was cut and how the weather has effected the nutritional value ... tempted to rent a field and grow my own! hehe not really, yes if you want to take it out of context the choice is yours, however i do run my own yard and this is my experience,
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Post by marychick on Jan 21, 2013 17:24:05 GMT 1
oh Jen I was only joking!! hence the winky face!!!
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Post by mandal on Jan 21, 2013 17:57:27 GMT 1
Oh of course the basics of a forage diet is simple, but when you are having problems it often gets more complicated. I agree it appears many horses are fed far too many concentrates and not enough forage for energy. I read all the time of hyper horses. lol I imagine the majority of horses fed good forage (and enough of it) with appropriate mineral supplementation would do just fine and even better tbh.
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Post by marychick on Jan 21, 2013 18:14:35 GMT 1
Oh of course the basics of a forage diet is simple, but when you are having problems it often gets more complicated. I agree it appears many horses are fed far too many concentrates and not enough forage for energy. I read all the time of hyper horses. lol I imagine the majority of horses fed good forage (and enough of it) with appropriate mineral supplementation would do just fine and even better tbh. Completey agree Mandal ;D
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Post by shan on Jan 21, 2013 23:13:50 GMT 1
Did somebody mention 'good quality' hay? Sandy has been refusing the lovely, very good quality hay I've been driving a 14 mile trip to get her, (and even a bale of what Carl Hester feeds, which M-I-L kindly bought me), in favour of the farmer's hay from next door which is full of docks, dusty, leafy and generally looks vile. I've tried coarse & meadow and had some from another farm too, but no, she prefers the bog-standard rough-stuff which I have now given in to and got her a big bale of. Can anyone shed any light on this preference?
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Post by mandal on Jan 21, 2013 23:50:36 GMT 1
I think low sugar content is part of the reason they dislike some hays. Kathryn Watts has done a small study which showed this isn't the only factor but she has no conclusions from this study. www.safergrass.org/pdf/PalatabilityFinal.pdf
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Post by arabiangem on Jan 22, 2013 0:28:27 GMT 1
It's really only as complex as we make it, most of us are feeding our horses as though they were performance horses in training or for some other reason need a very specialised diet. Most do very very well on a half decent basic diet, and that gives them all they need to do the work and maintain their systems. They can actually process most forage very efficiently, and all some possibly need to counteract any deficiencies is a supplement or two - we don't need to feed most of them as though they were top athletes. That's the marketing effect for the big feed companies. It has often been said that a moderately fit horse can compete at endurance up to 25 miles straight from the field without a specialist diet. Most horses kept fed up to the eyeballs in this country could never manage a 25 mile endurance ride and are being given enough rocket fuel to compete twice the distance if they ever got fit enough. Marygold did/does, and to date Marjorie does indeed compete up to 50 km (30 miles) on grass only, supplemented by hay and a vitamin balancer as needed. It's only when Marygold was in training for 65km (40 miles) and over that she needed additional feed and then it was always forage based. FITNESS FIRST, then add feed appropriately. Same for humans. I run between 3 and 5 miles most days during the week, and anything up to 10 miles once at the weekend. Additional calorie consumption is only about 300 cal a day. NOT stuffing myself to counteract it, and I try and make it healthy(ish....).
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Post by Vanessa Witchy Weild on Jan 22, 2013 13:18:28 GMT 1
My Boy who is 19 this year has a scoop of nuts, carrot, Fibrebeet in the winter and hay and he looks blooming marvelous and he only gets fed once a day
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Post by specialized on Jan 22, 2013 22:00:02 GMT 1
Did somebody mention 'good quality' hay? Sandy has been refusing the lovely, very good quality hay I've been driving a 14 mile trip to get her, (and even a bale of what Carl Hester feeds, which M-I-L kindly bought me), in favour of the farmer's hay from next door which is full of docks, dusty, leafy and generally looks vile. I've tried coarse & meadow and had some from another farm too, but no, she prefers the bog-standard rough-stuff which I have now given in to and got her a big bale of. Can anyone shed any light on this preference? A horse is always likely to prefer fodder with variety, the problem with what we may consider to be good quality hay is that it is often made with a single species of grass - boring to a horse. We currently have 2 sorts from 2 of our fields - ryegrass stalky hay from a new ley and old field full of yellow rattle, english plantain and all sorts - guess which one they prefer.
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Post by laurac on Jan 22, 2013 22:24:49 GMT 1
my boys only get hay and one feed of unmollassed beet with suppliments in, comment from farrier last visit, 'wow he looks incredicably well' ;D and 'his feet look fantastic too'
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Post by mandal on Jan 22, 2013 23:28:31 GMT 1
and 'his feet look fantastic too' I'm thrilled to read this, hope they are performing fantastic or at least well too.
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Post by Deleted on Jan 23, 2013 11:38:56 GMT 1
my boys only get hay and one feed of unmollassed beet with suppliments in, comment from farrier last visit, 'wow he looks incredicably well' ;D and 'his feet look fantastic too' That's brilliant Laura I've just remembered BF's big toe crack that you had to rasp down, great to hear his feet have improved so much x I'm trying to get the balance right with my two, having one who is a better doer not working, and one who is a not quite such a good doer working I give hay to maintain Henry at a decent weight without letting him get fat, then have to top Talin up with hard feed to maintain his weight. Interestingly when Talin was on part livery I increased his workload a little, not massively and he lost a lot of weight very quickly without building much muscle. He was having ad-lib hay and even when he was out of work (after a month) he didn't put any weight back on, he was starting to look quite scrawny. Discussing this with a farmer friend he said their hay was probably too late cut to have any reasonable feed value and was probably very low in protein. Now he's back out 24/7 in a snow covered field he's having less hay and is maintaining his weight better, presumably because it's much better quality.
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Post by shan on Jan 23, 2013 22:15:56 GMT 1
Specialized - thanks, I never even thought of that, though the haylage place where I was buying from is a meadow/ryegrass mix, perhaps that's just not enough
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