horses special diet.

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I need a good diet/recepit, to feed a very thin horse, the horse belongs now to a mission in Peru, and he was just rescued by a missionary. Thanks

-- Rafael (rroces1@yahoo.com), April 02, 2002

Answers

Hi Rafael - First of all, you may want to do the following first. Have the horse dewormed using an ivermectin type paste, and have his teeth floated. Do you know how old the horse is? His age will have an affect on what type of feed he should receive. If the horse is located in Peru, I'm not sure of the availability of rice bran, beet pulp or corn oil. Those three items work well on horses that need to put on weight without adding high protein. You need to take it slow and not overfeeding or you will be dealing with colic and other health issues.

Best of luck to you and the horse. I'm sure he will appreciate the care that he lacked before his rescue.

-- Joy in Eastern WA (jparkes@spfarm.com), April 02, 2002.


Yes, it needs to be wormed but gradually so as to not over tax its system.

For feeding it should have the best quality available of grass hay free choice. If alfalfa is available it should be also given 1% of its normal body weight per day over 2 feedings on top of the grass hay. After 2 weeks up the alfalfa slowly over a week to 2% of its body weight. As a rule of thumb most horses are around 900 pounds.

-- Stacia in OK (OneClassyCowgirl@aol.com), April 02, 2002.


The advice about not changing the diet too quickly (either in quantity or nature) is VERY important. It's tempting to throw food at a horse like this, but it could cause some terrible problems. Remember--he didn't become thin overnight, and he won't get to his healthy weight overnight, either.

If possible, find out what he's been eating and you can use that as a base. We rescued a horse that was dangerously undernourished . . . in fact, he was so pitiful that he didn't have much of an appetite. We fed him a bran mash with a bit of molasses (a wonderful way to tempt an appetite) on top of grass hay and alfalfa hay.

Worming is vitally important--it's amazing how much damage worms can do. My guess is that if he's been rescued, he probably hasn't been wormed or had his teeth floated. As Joy mentioned, have his teeth checked. A horse's teeth will wear unevenly, and if teeth aren't floated, it can seriously affect a horse's ability to eat properly. (The horse we rescued was 18 and the vet guessed that he'd never had his teeth floated. )

Our rescued horse is now healthy and happy. It's wonderful what some care and attention can do.

-- Julie Woessner (jwoessner@rtmx.net), April 02, 2002.


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