08/29/2024
Ok y’all we have to discuss diet! This is going to be a long post albeit an important one. At the end of the day I am an advocate for the horse. So I will try to help them be happy and comfortable to the best of my ability. But I also try to walk a fine line between between “bossy know it all Hoof Care provider” and said advocate lol. Diet is extremely important! For horses to grow strong healthy feet they need movement, a good diet, and quality hoof care in that order of importance. So a good diet makes up at least 1/3 of that recipe for helping a horse have the best hooves possible. They say for humans abs are made in the kitchen. Well for horses hooves are made in the feed room lol.
Here are some things I have discovered through continuing education, personal research, and personal experimentation. I read recently the only short cuts to entrepreneurial success is to learn from other people’s failures and choose not to repeat them. So basically do what they succeeded with last instead of what they failed with first. I have failed a lot over the years so please take advantage of my experiences, take that short cut and jump ahead!
Throw stones at me now because I used to feed SafeChoice, sweet feed, calf manna, and even red cell 😱. But at the time before the age of the Internet and Google, I did what my friends and mentors recommended. I trusted their opinions and followed them. As a byproduct I ended up with a horse that needed 4 corrective steel shoes, was a hard keeper, and was so crazy I could barely handle or ride her. That horse was really the one that began my horsemanship journey. I failed her in almost every way possible. So from then on I started researching and learning a better way to do things. I researched training, hoof care, and all things related to diet. And now I feel the need to share some of the things I have learned.
First of all some great resources about how to safely feed your horse are the ECIR Group, Dr. Kellons Nutrition courses, the safergrass.org website, the Facebook group Hoof Care and Rehabilitation, the Facebook group Equine Nutrition. Loads of mind blowing information in all of those sources that will help you learn to understand what horses should eat, how they properly process those feeds, their daily dietary requirements, and what ingredients safely fulfill those needs.
The next few items of discussion may or may not be specific to where I live and trim in Northwest Arkansas. When in doubt research the things I have shared in this post:
In general we have high iron and manganese in this area. Both minerals compete for absorption with copper and zinc. Copper and zinc are minerals that are needed in high quantities for horses to grow healthy hooves. Throw out those red mineral blocks and Himalayan salt lick’s. Both are high in iron and will do more harm than good to your horses bodies and hooves.
Salt blocks need to be replaced with loose salt or used in addition to them. Any type of mineral or salt block was originally created for cattle because they have rough tongues and can usually lick enough off of a block to meet their daily dietary requirements. Horses have smooth tongues and cannot. When it’s hot and they are sweating all day they may need to consume up to 4-6 tablespoons of salt a day! There is no way they can get that much salt off of a block. So either add some loose salt to their feed or provide free access to it in their shelter or stall.
Commercial horse feeds were originally created to find a way to package and sell by-product ingredients that would normally just be thrown away. Instead they decided to package it as horse feed and make some money off of it. Since horses are not a species that are raised for human consumption in the US this industry is not heavily regulated. While things have improved over the years most commercial feeds are still sub par and some are just plain harmful. There are very few labeling regulations in place and many companies still find their way around those regulations. Do you know how protein is measured in horse feeds? They take a sample of the feed, burn it, then measure the amount of nitrogen in that sample. So when a feed label says 16% protein that doesn’t mean anything more than when they measured it contained 16% nitrogen. It does not mean that the feed contains a quality protein source that is an absorbable form for horses. It does not mean that the protein contains the 3 limiting amino acids, lysine, methionine, and threonine which are essential in the right ratios to build strong healthy hooves.
Horses have a very interesting and different digestive tract. They can’t throw up because the don’t have reverse peristaltic contractions. They are an herbivore with a digestive tract designed halfway between an omnivore like pigs and a ruminator like cows with the design flaws of both lol. If they eat something harmful they can not throw it up. It must pass all the way through their digestive tract before exiting their body. Since forage goes into their true stomach first they are more susceptible to stomach upset and ulcers. Their stomach is very small therefore they are designed to be constant grazers. If a horse goes longer than 4 hours without consuming forage they may start to have gut issues. They ferment their food at the very end of their digestive tract in the large intestine. Cows, sheep and goats do this first. Actually the micro biome in the hind gut is what breaks down the cellulose in forage into a form that is absorbable for the horse. If the microbes in that biome are killed off by inflammatory feeds the horses no longer has the ability to process forage properly greatly reducing the calories and nutrients they should get from their hay.
Forage should always be a horses 1st and main source of calories and nutrients with supplements a very far off 2nd. The majority of horses can actually live happy healthy lives on just quality forage and salt!
Like most commercial feeds sold at feed stores, Safe choice is not safe. They were all tested by the ECIR group and starch and sugar were on average around 20%. Horses without metabolic issues should consume feeds that are no higher than 15%. Metabolic horses no higher than 10%.
Sweet feed is absolute crap for horses. I don’t know of a more PC way to say it. It is highly inflammatory and contains very little nutritional value. It would be comparable to us eating cake and candy all day.
The only commercial complete feed I feel I can safely recommend for most horses is Triple Crown lite. Not the complete or the senior feed. The lite tested around 10% for starch and sugar and has an ok mineral profile.
A much better option is to order a quality vitamin/mineral supplement. The ones I am personally using and currently recommend for our area are KIS Trace low selenium or Vermont Blend no selenium. I recommend soaked timothy pellets as a carrier for the vitamins and minerals. In the winter I recommending adding 2,000 I U’s of natural vitamin E as well. I am not a nutritionist, I’m just sharing information about products I have seen improve my personal horses and my clients horses hooves.
The best vitamin/mineral supplement to feed your horses is one created by a nutritionist that is balanced to the hay you feed. You can test your forage through a company called equianalytical. I know this is not a feasible option for many horse owners but it’s still the best option regardless.
The safest forage with the healthiest nutrition profile in our area is usually Bermuda hay. In some cases, it may contain too much starch and sugar for horses with metabolic issues and will need to be soaked before feeding. The only way to know the starch and sugar content of the hay is to have it tested.
Prairie grass hay is also usually a safe healthy option.
I don’t know anything about brome hay yet.
Mixed grass hay is one of the least reliable types of hay for horses. If it contains large amounts of Rye grass or fescue it can easily become a dangerous recipe for laminitis.
Alfalfa is trickier. Some horses can do fine when a percentage of their diet consists of Alfalfa. On paper this hay looks relatively safe, but when it is further digested in the large intestine the microbes can convert it into much higher levels of starch and sugar. This can make it very unsafe for metabolic horses. But some horses, especially those in heavy work can do just fine on it. Also if Alfalfa does make up a significant percentage of a horses diet the offset ca:p ratio needs to be considered and balanced. Over time it can also be the underlying cause of enterolithes - gastro-intestinal stones that if large enough can be life threatening.
Old hay is not good hay. It will not help your horse lose weight. It just deprives them of nutrients they need to fulfill their daily dietary requirements. Over time the nutrients in hay degrade. Most hay over a year old is sub par And over supplementing to compensate for poor quality hay is not good for the overall health of your horse.
Managing horses that live on pasture can be tricky. Hoof care professional and mentor Ida Hammer says that when it comes to hooves nothing happens all of a sudden except for trauma. 90% of horses with laminitis are caused by metabolic issues, mechanical founder (supporting limb) and toxemia induced founder are much rarer comprising a mere 10% of laminitis cases. Metabolic horses usually start showing small signs of inflammation mostly in the spring and fall. Small signs of inflammation can include prominent growth rings on the hoof wall, bruising, stretched and discolored lamina, sore hooves on hard ground, and abscesses. If you horse is showing any of those physical symptoms they may need to have their grazing pasture time limited or removed all together. If limited horses should be turned out early morning and put up in a dry lot in the afternoon. The longer the sun is on the grass the more sugar it makes. The Sugar in the grass is at its highest levels right before the Sun goes down. So the worst time to turn out a horse that has suspected or known metabolic issues is at night.
Once again I am not an equine nutritionist. I am an avid learner and an advocate for the horse. I notice patterns. One pattern that I notice is the horses on better Nutrition have much better hooves. Laminitis is diet related, white line is diet related, abscesses are diet related, thrush is diet related, scratches/mud fever is diet related. Diet is very important!
Thanks for reading my book and happy horsing peeps 🤟.
(Photo shows new growth coming in on a clients horse after dietary changes were made.)
