Article about not reducing forage to reduce weight

Tsavo
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Article about not reducing forage to reduce weight

Postby Tsavo » Mon Aug 14, 2017 12:11 pm

https://www.americanfarriers.com/articl ... es-fat-deu

Hmmm. The only way we have gotten significant weight of my horse was dry-lotting him. I knew that was stressful but the weight was worse.

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Re: Article about not reducing forage to reduce weight

Postby Dreamer » Mon Aug 14, 2017 12:31 pm

I really struggle with this. I have a chubby ulcer horse and try to keep hay in front of him most of the time. He does need to loose weight but has not gained more since having hay in front of him more. I recommend the Greedy Feeder hay net, large size has 1" holes and can fit a whole bale. I have used many brands and this is my favorite.

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Chisamba
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Re: Article about not reducing forage to reduce weight

Postby Chisamba » Mon Aug 14, 2017 1:45 pm

Ever since I lost my fat pony to vitamin deficiency I go about overweight horses completely differently.

I give free choice hay and really hit them with multivitamins aggressively for 3 months. I will scatter the hay I mean strewn it across a wide area and give first cutting.

Luna taught me that if a horse is fat, and has been fat, but is a greedy eater, they are probably lacking a vital nutrient.

Once my fat horses catch up on their nutritional imbalance , and have food available, they have all settled down to be more normal grazers and less overweight.

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Re: Article about not reducing forage to reduce weight

Postby Tsavo » Mon Aug 14, 2017 3:57 pm

That is a very interesting observation, Chisamba. Maybe many fat horses are deficient in some micro nutrient.

Which vitamin was your pony deficient in?

My horse gets balancer and is on grass so I think he is okay but I can't be sure.

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Chisamba
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Re: Article about not reducing forage to reduce weight

Postby Chisamba » Mon Aug 14, 2017 5:10 pm

She started showing neurological deficits so alarm bells went off for EVH, negative, lymes, negative, EPM, negative. I had moved her to my quarantine barn, and she was sick, wobbling around, and eating voraciously.

Then she became unable to swallow. I made the final call and was standing holding her and having a good cry, and the whole time she was gobbling the green grass. She couldn't swallow so it was falling out if her mouth as quickly as she was chewing.

Anyway, after her death, which was still a mystery, I discovered similar symptoms in another horse which was diagnosed as extremely vitamin deficient. Some research immediately matched her symptoms to vitamin E deficiency. My vet had been away for the crisis so at his next visit I discussed it with him and we agreed. It turns out this area is not naturally plentiful in Vit E, and so I got some highly digestible bio efficient sips from Kentucky.

Now Luna was a rescue, feet neglected, teeth in terrible shape, but she had been on grass and was overweight. Being a pony with a crested neck she was put on diet. I too feed a balancer.

In hindsight, she was always hungry. Always looking for food, and I missed the clues. Like any stupid biased fattist I called her greedy, and increased her exercise.

She was a good sweet pony and a lovely thing, but she would pull out of kids hands to grab green grass.

I didn't hear her. I was a horrible owner and my. Lesson was learned at her expense.

I try to share the story often even though it's an epic fail, in case it benefits another fat pony somewhere.

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Chisamba
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Re: Article about not reducing forage to reduce weight

Postby Chisamba » Mon Aug 14, 2017 5:26 pm

There are a few potential reasons why horses could be E deficient. It breaks down easy do even if it's in green grass, it does not survive the hay in process, this us also true of processed feeds. Some area are more notably deficient than others

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Re: Article about not reducing forage to reduce weight

Postby Tsavo » Mon Aug 14, 2017 6:28 pm

Very important testimonial, Chisamba. Thanks for posting it. Maybe it should be a sticky post at the top because of the potential to help others.

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Re: Article about not reducing forage to reduce weight

Postby kande50 » Tue Aug 15, 2017 10:46 am

The one overweight mule I have got that way on free choice hay in the winter, so I'm not sure how giving him free choice forage in the summer when his calorie needs are lower would help with controlling his weight? I know I can't turn him out on pasture because he'd get obese, and he destroys slow feed hay nets so they're of little use, so he gets a couple hours a day on pasture and then small amounts of hay the rest of the time.

It's also possible that I could be misreading how overweight he is, because he's heavily muscled and has a hay belly so may not actually be any fatter than the lighter muscled horses who have flatter bellies?

I've had our hay analyzed and the deficiencies were all mineral deficiencies, which should be balanced out by the custom supplement I feed. I may collect more hay and revisit that though, as it wouldn't hurt to check to see how much variation there is in hay analyses from year to year.


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