Posts Tagged ‘horse’s health’

You may know what is best to feed your horse but that does not mean you are feeding your horse right. Sometimes we become very busy with our daily schedule and let that influence the diet we choose for our horses. The consequences of less than perfect feeding regimens are rather minor at first, maybe costing extra money but not really harming our horses. Sometimes bad choices when making feeding decisions can have serious consequences. Sometimes excesses or insufficiencies can cause health threats to our beloved animals. Some less than optimal feeding decisions may cost the horse his energy. This can result in sluggish performance when you are counting on an excellent performance from your horse.

This article will include some mistakes to avoid when feeding your horse. These are mistakes most often noted by equine nutritionists so that we can avoid them. 

Too much grain can be harmful to your horses’ health. This mistake can lead to obesity and contribute to colic and laminitis. When feeding your horse right, less grain is usually better unless your horse is working extremely hard such as a competing hunter/jumper or race horse.

If your horse does need concentrated feeds it is best if the portions are broke up into small meals. Four or more small meals per day will be better than feeding the ration once or twice per day. If you want to feed your horse right, avoid feeding a meal of more than 0.5 percent of your horse’s weight per meal. Horses’ have a very small stomach in comparison to their size. Frequent small meals are much better for them.

Feeding a horse by volume rather than weight is a common mistake. If you are feeding your horse right you must feed by weight not volume. It is easier to just scoop out the usual feed ration and feed it to the horse. When it comes to nutrition weight is what matters not volume. If you happen to change feeds the same volume in one brand may not be the same amount of nutrition in another brand. Be sure to read the feed label to understand the nutritional content per pound of ration. A kitchen scale is convenient tool for measuring the ration.

Another common mistake that is made when we feed our horses is giving the wrong feed to the wrong horse.  There are a wide variety of feeds available for many specific equine needs. There are feeds specially designed for broodmares, foals, adults, seniors and the list goes on. All are formulated for very specific nutritional needs. Giving the wrong feed to the wrong horse can cause harmful imbalances in horses. So does feeding a horse a formulated feed when none is needed. The nutritional needs of a yearling still developing are very different from the needs of an adult horse. Improper feeding in a yearling can cause abnormal growth. You must make sure you feed your horse the ration designed for his specific time in life if you are going to feed him correctly. 

Sometimes we kill our horses with kindness. We must find the balance between the horse’s natural eating needs and the demands domesticated life places on them. Feeding your horse right will help him stay healthy for many years to come.

For additional information about practical horse management please go to http://wcf-ltd.com/horse/ to learn more about how to care for your horse.

Author: Fran Mullens
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
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This Spring, owners of laminitis horses are starting to chew their fingernails because spring is just around the corner. Despite record cold weather in parts of the country, green grass and other signs of spring are popping up regardless. This, of course, makes people who have laminitis horses quite nervous!

If you are one of those people, don’t panic. Luckily for you, there are a lot of horse health care steps you can take to prevent your equine buddy from experiencing laminitis symptoms… or at least keep them to a minimum. The same is true for horses who are insulin-resistant, or otherwise on the edge of falling into laminitis.

In this article I cover some basic steps you can take to keep your laminitis or laminitis-prone horse healthy this spring. If you want to learn more about this chronic condition in general, check out the ebook, Understanding and Mangaging Cushing’s Disease, Insulin Resistance and Laminitis. Horse Health Care: Preparing Laminitis Horses for Spring Before spring really hits, horse owners can take steps to ensure that their laminitis horses are healthy and ready for warmer weather and greener pastures. Assuming that your horse is currently not experiencing any symptoms of laminitis, here are three steps you can take to ensure that he’s ready for the coming season.

Check Weight and Insulin Levels Overweight horses and insulin-resistant horses are both prone to laminitis. Before you turn your laminitis horse out on pasture, make sure that he is at a healthy weight. Overweight horses tend to develop mechanical laminitis, meaning their hooves can’t stand the weight of their bodies. If your horse is overweight, you probably need to help him lose weight before spring. If he still has his winter coat, you may have to run your fingers through his coat to see if he’s fat or just furry. If he is fat, you can help him lose weight either by feeding him a more appropriate diet (see the section on diet below) or exercising him more, or both.

This is also a good time to have some blood work done on your horse to check on insulin levels. Insulin-resistant horses may or may not be overweight, but are prone to grass founder or laminitis. Signs of insulin resistance include a cresty neck and unevenly distributed fat over the withers and base of the tail. A preventative blood test now to check insulin levels can save you grief this coming spring.

Double Check Overall Health Because laminitis horses tend to experience symptoms when they are generally unhealthy, check for signs of overall health. Signs that your horse isn’t healthy include poor hair coat, eye discharge, change in temperament, stiffness, sensitivity to hot or cold weather or weather changes. If your horse shows any of these signs of poor health, now is the time to increase his nutritional program, and restore his overall health. The combination of one ounce of XanGoMangosteen juice plus Simplexity Essentials seems to work well for most horses.

Avoid Over-Vaccination and Drugs Vaccination is a normal part of most barn routines, and yet over-vaccination can be one of the main causes of laminitis. In addition, laminitis horses are extremely sensitive to drugs or vaccinations in their bodies, and even one round of “normal” vaccination can trigger a laminitic episode.

Managing Laminitis Horses During the Spring Once spring has well and truly arrived, there are more horse health care steps you can take to protect your equine friend from a laminitis episode. Laminitis horses have to be carefully managed in terms of diet and nutritional supplements, hoof care, and pasture turnout.

Diet for Laminitis Horses The best diet is simple, low in carbohydrates, and high in fiber. Small amounts of equine senior feed is acceptable for some laminitis horses, while others do well on a small amount (8 ounces) of oats or barley. At the same time, some laminitis horses can not tolerate any grains.

A probiotic/enzyme supplement like FasTrack or Simplexity Spectrabiotic supports the digestive function and limits the production of endotoxins. Simplexity blue-green algae provides a source of food-based vitamins, minerals and antioxidants. Small doses of antioxidants such as coenzyme Q10 may be indicated. You should not need to give more than 60-120 mg a day of a good quality Q10 product like those produced by Simplexity Nutramax Comal, or Thorne brands. Generic brands of Q10 may not be active.

Hoof Care for Laminitis Horses Spring is also the time many people pull their horses up and put shoes on. However, if possible it is best to keep laminitis horses barefoot for as long as possible. They must be trimmed regularly. If their toes are allowed to grow long or their heels are allowed to get too high, then the normal mechanism of the hoof is impaired. Overly correcting angles on overdue hooves creates unnecessary discomfort for the horse and sets back his effort to establish new laminar attachments.

If your horse must have shoes, you might try a heart bar shoe or a shoe with a Theraflex pad for at least one shoeing period. If contracted tendons are the main problem then wedge pads are used to raise the heels. A reverse shoe may suffice if the tendon tightening is mild. I always shorten the toe to ease breakover. I rarely if ever lower heels. Shoeing must be done by a competent farrier that has worked before with foundered horses. These horses have special needs which may require beveling the inside shoe rim to protect the sole and clips to take pressure off the nails and hoof wall. The shoeing interval must be regular and tailored to the horses needs. Amazingly, owners will spend thousands of dollars to save a foundered horse but neglect hoof care after the crisis is past.

Pasture Management for Laminitis Horses Turn-out on lush grass should be approached cautiously. Many horse laminitis cases have hormone imbalances that affect their sugar metabolism. Fast-growing, lush grass is high in sugar. In the spring, laminitis horses should closely-monitored for an increase in digital pulse if turned out on pasture.

The safest time to turn out laminitis-prone horses on pasture is late at night or early in the mornings, when the grass is not in a flowering stage of growth or stressed by drought or frost. It’s best to turn these horses out in pastures that have not been sprayed with artificial fertilizers, herbicides, or insecticides.

While I prefer horses to be grazed on unfertilized, native grass pastures, grasses in nutrient-poor soil are often under stress and produce high levels of sugars. Since steadily growing grasses tend to deplete their sugar levels (which is a good thing), regular mowing to encourage this kind of growth can help control sugar levels. Regular mowing also helps control weeds.

Keeping Laminitis Horses Health I hope these tips help you keep your laminitis horse healthy this coming spring. It’s been a trying winter for most of the country, so having a healthy happy spring would be a wonderful blessing for horses and humans alike. If you need more help with your laminitis horse, check out the resources in the next section.

Madalyn Ward, DVM, is a recognized author and veterinarian in the field of holistic horsekeeping. For free tips on horse health, horse personality types, and horse nutrition, plus one-stop shopping on holistic horse products, visit http://www.BuyHolisticHorse.com.

Author: Dr. Madalyn Ward, DVM
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
Provided by: Humorous photo captions

Hoof maintenance is a crucial part of looking after your horses health. You should look at your horses hooves every day, and minimum twice per week.  You should become familiar with what is usual and what is not, and be able to to spot any issues that might be starting. 

Reading this simple guide will hopefully help you in your daily grooming practices.

1. Approaching your horse ensure the symmetry is close, however they don’t have to be exactly equal, but very close to the same size and shape. 

2. Look carefully for defects in the wall and coronary band.  Lift up the hoof, run your hand over the exterior of the wall to feel for impairments.  You can use the exact technique for the coronary band and then press it softly. Applying these two procedures will also highlight tender areas and moisture holding areas.

3. Examine the sole. Examine the colouring in each hoof. If correct they should be identical in colouration.  A well defined dark spot indicates bruising or damage.

4. Examine and compare the frogs.  The front hooves should be the sae size and shape, the same applies to the rear hooves. Try and lightly press each frog using your hoof pick, mostly, excluding the desert areas, they should be slightly spongy.

5. If already shod, hold the horseshoe and see if it wiggles. Look for missing clinches, if the shoe is loose you may choose to remove the shoe before your horse loses it on its own and perhaps removes a chunk of hoof as well.

If you keep a good close eye on each hoof, you can avoid a great deal of problems by noticing the problem before it gets severe.

We recomend you work into your daily hoof cleaning some simple steps. Use a pick from heel to toe.  If packed solid you may need to loosen it up a touch before it can be taken off. Once the material has been taken out, check all the parts of the hoof and be positive that there is not a bad odour as this is usually a obvious sign of thrush.  Be certain there are no pebbles or gravel lodged anywhere, even under the shoe.

Your horses hooves should exhibit a natural sheen on the hoof wall. 

If you see a smooth uniform surface with no cracks, circles, dishes, flares and a concave sole that touches the shoe, then you can be pretty sure that your horses hooves are in good health.

For more horse information, horses for sale and more, please visit the Horse and Pony Directory.

As there are different techniques for dog grooming or health care for the dog breeds, the same is true about horses… Have you heard about acupuncture for horses? Acupuncture is something that most of us our familiar with. However many people are perhaps ignorant of the fact that acupuncture is also used on animals for example on different dog breeds (canine acupuncture). Equine acupuncture is a method where this particular treatment is used to cure horses.

There seems to be some confusion over the origins of this unique method. Some claim that it was found in China while others believe that equine acupuncture was found in Tibet. The thing that must be kept in mind is that this treatment was one that came about 3000 – 4000 years before organized western medicine came into use.

Equine acupuncture gained global popularity during this time since the horse was a significant animal and was used for war and for transportation. However there are still those who think negatively of acupuncture considering it to be unproductive and somewhat primitive. This is indeed a misunderstanding. Good results gained through use of equine acupuncture on horses suffering from varying health problems and acupuncture being effective on people suffering from arthritis has lead to its widespread acceptance.

Some people might be amazed to know that equine acupuncture is extensively used in the case of performance horses and veterinary acupuncturists have accompanied several Olympic teams during games. In this case the motive is not just to treat any clinical conditions but also to ensure that the horse in question is in the best possible level physically before the games. The fact that it’s unnecessary to use drugs in equine acupuncture makes it all the more attractive since horses that are given drugs face the risk of being disqualified from competitions.

Some people have are of the notion that acupuncture is painful. This is not so in a majority of cases. People might get a numb or a ‘warm’ kind of feeling at most Even in the case of horses in equine acupuncture since the needles used are very thin, being only about 0.18 – 0.25 millimeters in width it’s unlikely that there is going to be any pain.

If you do intend to have equine acupuncture done on a horse that you might own make sure that the veterinarian you hire is qualified for the job. Certification on this regard is issued by 2 bodies and you might be able to find online the veterinarian working closest to your house who is qualified at equine acupuncture.

It must be kept in mind however that equine acupuncture is a treatment that tends to be somewhat costly. Though this unique treatment is unconventional it is effective.