Platinum Feeds

25/01/2024

30 tons of white gold 😍🤩
'swhatyouputinthatcounts

23/11/2023

The quality of your ingredients determines your results.....

21/10/2023

The way to your horse's heart....and a ticket or 2😍

21/10/2023

110% lucerne.... if only you could smell this🤩🤩🤩

22/03/2023

https://www.facebook.com/328397467237487/posts/6020160854727758/?mibextid=wXkxqmO97sENsbrj

A healthy happy horse from the inside outThis week you get to ask veterinarian and nutrition enthusiast Dr Rissa Parker of Glen Austin Veterinary Clinic ever...

21/02/2023

26/11/2022

https://www.facebook.com/100044625032236/posts/468534527977378/?app=fbl

Why soak feeds? 💧

The natural diet of horses is grazing. Fresh forage is 70 – 80% water, so horses actually eat a lot of water. Even on very wet grazing, they still need to drink as well, as the food needs to be mixed with plenty of fluid to get through the small intestine’s 20 metres or so and numerous curves. In this part of the gut, the food (now called ingestate) is around 90% fluid. When a horse eats hay for instance, which is only 10 – 13% water, the horse has to chew a lot and this releases saliva which helps to add fluid to the mix. Water for the saliva comes from the blood, which in turn will draw on reserves in the large intestine, which needs to be replaced by drinking. Many horses dunk their hay in the water container, which is actually very sensible of them, albeit annoying for us as it will need cleaning out every day.

Dried, pelleted feeds are 10% water. Different feeds absorb different amounts of water – forages will take up 2.5 times their volume of water and beet pulp, 5 times. Straw is not very absorbent, taking up a lot less water and is one reason why it is not a favoured feed and has a reputation for causing impaction colic.

We always suggest pelleted feeds are offered soaked. This restores their natural hydration, increases bulk and slows eating rate. It aids digestion and can help reduce the chance of choke. Horses choke because they did not chew the food sufficiently. If a horse chokes, we need to look at what went wrong for the horse. Hungry and greedy horses may bolt their food and fail to chew it sufficiently. Young horses who are teething may fail to chew properly and horses with dental issues just cannot chew well. Even with good dental care, the teeth will start to let the horse down at some point from the late teens on and by the time they are 30 it is inevitable that the molars are worn out and will start to fall out if this hasn’t already happened.

We are accustomed to soaking beet pulp and rightly so. It is not difficult to soak feeds and enables very valuable and nutritious forage feeds to be offered safely to all horses, good chewers or not.

Soaked feeds are very palatable but need to be fresh. Feed within 12 hours of adding the water. Use an amount of water that suits your horse. Some love a soup, others prefer more of a crumble texture. You can use warm water to speed the process along and offering a warm feed is appreciated by many horses in the winter. Don’t let the requirement for soaking put you off feeding the very best forages to your horses.

20/10/2022

Another happy horse... 4 weeks on Platinum Feeds Equilibrium Plus meal 🥰🖤🤎🖤🤎

25/09/2022

07/09/2022

If only your horse could smell this....

20/08/2022

Wow! 23 days on 3kg of Platinum Feeds Equilibrium Plus meal! Happy horse❤❤

13/07/2022

03/07/2022

At Platinum Feeds our formula is locked and consistant quality strived for...

“Feed” for thought…

Why would a feed label encourage consumers to transition horses when changing feeds, but readily swap out ingredients based on the price of commodities, essentially making it a new feed? 🤔

From an economical standpoint, it keeps bag prices lower by allowing them to swap for cheaper ingredients, but from a nutritional standpoint, it creates inconsistency in the diet. This can be one reason why it looks, smells, tastes different from time to time.

Will changes in ingredients cause the horse to colic? Not likely (in most cases). However, it can cause mild disruptions in the gut. It takes the microbes in the hind-gut a minimum of 3 weeks to adjust to changes. Including changes in forage! Think of a time when you ate something that didn’t quite sit right with you, maybe caused a mild stomach ache. Were you visibly sick to other people? Probably not. Were you still able to get up and go to work or handle your responsibilities for the day? Probably yes.

But were you working at 100% that day?

So the way I think about it is, if we think about a performance horse, we may not notice that he's feeling a touch off, but these "micro-changes" could have negative impacts on performance (energy, desire to work, etc). If they aren't feeling their best, how can we expect them to perform at their best?

ALL Bluebonnet Equine Feeds have a guaranteed locked formula to create the most consistency for your horse. If having a locked formula (not the same as a consistent formula) is important to you and you’re interested in knowing if your feed is, call the company and ask. But be specific. Some companies will only lock one or two products, so if you call and ask if they have locked formulas, they might say yes, even though the feed you’re interested in may not be one of them.

30/05/2022

SO SPECIAL WHEN ONE OF OUR VERY OWN BABIES DOES SO WELL ON THE ENDURANCE TRACK! Premier Endurance Festival, Sondela. 28 May 2022. Lightweight division. Huge congratulations to Stephanie Burnard and BK Dr Zhivago who won the lightweight division (120km) in a time of 6:01. This little gelding has come a long way in the very capable hands of Steph and her team. We share in your joy! Well done.....

19/05/2022

The green and gold of the horse world.... lucern and maize💚💛💚💛

19/05/2022

The making of Equilibrium pellets...

12/04/2022

08/03/2022

08/03/2022

08/03/2022

Siloah Jahmed also finished his 1st Novice 80km ride. Happy owner Liezel Belsten and happy riser Jan-Louis Bezuidenhout.

Sien uit na wat hy gaan maak in die toekoms 🌾

Onwards and upwards!

11/01/2022

Hallelujah...supplier managed to bale DRY lucern!!!

09/01/2022

https://www.facebook.com/56880838282/posts/10159219098648283/

All horses need deep sleep overnight that requires lying down completely. Stall size, bedding, and stress can cause horses to get insufficient rest.

17/11/2021

Platinum Feeds Excel

In a one-on-one with Joe Pagan, Ph.D., he explains pertinent research in energetics, alternative energy sources, and feeding horses with muscle disorders.

13/10/2021