My skinny poor horse????

Question

ok she's skinny but not poor..... she's more like spoiled rotten. She is a 15.3 hh 16 year old mare. And she has A LOT of TB in her. Even though she's a paint she's built like a tb. Her sire was a quarter horse appendix and her grandsire was a tb.

And I'm having trouble getting weight on her. She gets in total 4 flakes of hay a day and 2, 1 pound scoops of Safe Choice grain a day. But you can still see her ribs and the top part of her hind quarters stick out. What weight gainer do you recommend? and I want one that will put a sleeky shine to her coat!

Thanks bunches!

Answer 1

Beet Pulp!!! soak it in water during the day and feed at night. Horses slow down at night and beet pulp is high in calories but it is a slow release. I have been using it for 4 days now and can already tell a difference on a thinner horse.

Answer 2

At 16, I think she would be considered a senior or close to it. My Dad has always had great luck with Equine Senior. It has everything they need in it and will help them to put the weight on. It is awesome. You can go to the Purina website and look up the testimonials of horses who have had great luck with it. We swear by it. My Dad's Palomino had a very shiny golden coat using the Equine Senior.

You may want to have her teeth checked too. She may have a tooth bothering her that is making it hard to chew her food well. Good luck. I hope you give the Equine Senior a try. You will be glad you did! :)

These testimonials will shock you. The second testimonial is of a horse that is 36 years old. He looks great. The 4th or 5th one is 38 years old. My old mare was somewhere close to 40 when she died. She was also fed Equine Senior along with her alfalfa. To me 4 flakes per day sounds like the right amount for a horse her size.

Check out the testimonials.

Answer 3

GRASS!  Grass is the best feed for putting on weight and condition.  If you can turn her out on good pasture she'll put on weight and shine like you wouldn't believe.  Be carefull to do it gradually, of course, but it's the best.

If you can't do grass, raise the hay.  Let her have the best hay you can get free choice.  Hay is better than grain for putting on weight, as the grain tends to make them hyper and they fritter the calories away.

I don't like beet pulp.

I second the Equine Senior idea - my old mares get it in the winter when they can't get grass and their poor old teeth can't handle much hay, and it works great.

I'm assuming you've had her teeth checked and had her wormed, of course.

TBs are usually harder to keep the weight on, but don't rush it.   It'll take a few months.

Good Luck!

Answer 4

don't use a supplement. You will just be throwing your money away. Use Omelene feed. It is easy to trainsition to from safechoice and puts weight on my TBs without making them hot. I can also recomend using an oil. Such as corn oil or rice bran oil on her grain. Feed a cup each meal. It will fatten her up. If it were my horse i would give hr unlimited hay. Maybe give her 6 flakes and feed more often (3 times a day 3 flakes each serving) to keep her metabolism going. I know hay is expensive but if you can feed more or feed a higher quality.

I don't like to mess with beet pulp it can be pretty dangerous. Just make sure your not changing her diet drastically and introduce a new grain slowly. (mix it in with the old one increase the ratio every week)

Answer 5

I have a 21 year old 15.3 Polish Arabian gelding who is a hard keeper.  I feed him free choice hay which amounts to 4- 6 flakes a day, and 5 pounds of Purina Senior feed a day.  In winter, he also gets 2 cups of rice bran a day; in summer, when he is also on good pasture 24/7, I cut back on the senior feed to 3 pounds a day.  He is in very light work and this diet keeps him in good flesh.

Answer 6

Feed her rice bran. It has a higher fat content than any other feed, and you can feed it to them in bulk without having to worry about colic. It is about the only thing I've found that can put and keep weight on my 18 year old TB mare. (I feed 6lbs of it a day mixed with 6lbs of Senior.)

A lot of people like to feed beet pulp. It helps too but it's main function is as a source of digestible fiber. So it's almost like giving them more forage, like grass hay, it's just more digestible. But it's not necessarily that high in fat. Beet pulp can actually be used as a source of fiber/roughage when no hay or grass is available.

Rice bran, on the other hand, contains a lot of calories from fat to put the weight on a horse. It has 1/3 more calories than beet pulp, by weight. (i.e. you'd have to feed 1.3 pounds of beet pulp to get the same calories as you'd get from 1 pound of rice bran). This is a big reason why I prefer it...it's more cost effective. However, rice bran can have a mineral imbalance, so if you feed more than about 2 pounds of it, you should make sure a horse's diet is supplemented with a mineral block and/or a complete feed (hence why I feed Senior as well--if you don't think your horse is ready for Senior you could try Strategy.)

Good luck!

Answer 7

all of my horses are tb's.

so i do have similar problems.

i find that boiled barley is the absolute best option.

Its a great fattener and doesnt make them 'fizzy'.

I also feed alot of roughage.

I go through atleast a bag of oaten chaff per horse a week, and a bale of hay every 3 days.

i also use Copra cool fuel, steamed oats, and vitamin supplements.

For my tb's this keeps them healthy and happy!

So hopefully this will give you some ideas and bring your horse back to health!

goodluck :D

Answer 8

I would increase her hay intake to 6 flakes a day. and To get her coat in shape and add extra fat into her diet Add a cup of milled flax into her feed and add a cup of oil ( sunflower oil works good )

Answer 9

First off he should  be getting more hay  like almost 6-8 flakes a day,  Putting Vegetable oil in her grain  start a 1/4 a cup and work up to a  cup of oil a day , you could also try like a weight builder supplement.

Hope This helps : )

Answer 10

I feel your pain!! I have 2 TB's (1 14 yr old mare and 1 10 year old gelding.) Putting weight on them is always a fight! They can loose it SO fast, but it takes forever to put it back on. I know a lot of people have recommended rice bran or beet pulp. I don't use either. Beet pulp can be a problem if you don't let it soak long enough (it expands in their stomachs and can cause colic) and rice bran has nothing much in it but fat. I have had the most luck with the following -

  2 flakes AM/ 3 flakes PM (grass hay)

  1 lb Purina Amplify 1x daily (works like rice bran w/ more nutrients)

  2 lb Purina Strategy 1 x daily (grass hay formula)

  1 scoop Hard Keeper 1x daily

This has made a huge difference in my horses. The hard keeper also helps the coat and hooves. Good luck!

Answer 11

How long has he been on this diet? It might take a few months for him to build this weight up. Try beet pulp, it helps horses digest their food and utilize it more. Also, make sure the horse is wormed monthly. Lastly, make sure his teeth are in good condition. A horse with poor teeth can look very poor as well. Hope that helps!

Answer 12

I have had good luck with soybean meal and with rice bran, as both are highly nutritious and don't make the horse hot.   I would take a close look at teeth and make sure your worming is up to date.

Answer 13

I'm not familiar with safe choice but we used a conditioning mix and added oil and carrots when we had a problem getting weight on the pony. We also added molassed chaff to the hay portion but I don't think you can get that in the States.

This is the feed I used if it's any help.

http://www.youngsanimalfeeds.co.uk/index...

Edit: we also gave him soaked sugar beet in a separate bucket so he could pick and choose what he ate ( we did mix it all up to begin with but he started leaving it)

Answer 14

This works for my poor doers.

I boil my barley in a crock pot (6 hours on high), or you can use crushed barley.

1/3 barley, crushed or boiled

1/3 crushed oats

1/3 kibbled maize

A handful of linseed flakes

1 cup of split peas soaked in boiling water

mineral mix - liquid

If your horse is a picky eater, brewers yeast (one handful) can help increase appetite.

Hay sounds like the right amount. I found meadow mixed with red clover hay to be excellent for weight gain.

Good luck.