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Topic: weight lose (Read 2096 times)
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ljwbeach-2
Novice
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Posts: 1
I love Trakehners!
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Every winter our Trakehner has a great weight lose. We have tired everything. Our vet has even drawn blood for testing but everthing has come back good. Is this a command problem with Trakehner's? Does anyone have any ideas? HELP!!!! Laura
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Eileen
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Old Hand
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Posts: 523
I LOVE Trakehners!
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I wouldn't say it is necessarily common. How old is you Tk? Have you tried a high fat diet, maybe a lower starch.
There are people out there a lot more knowledgeable than I who may have more advice.
If you've met all the protein and calcium requirements, I like soaked and rinsed beet pulp shreds ( I like to get rid of the molasses as much as possible). I also use a balanced rice bran (Empower by Nutrena works well for me). To make certain I have enough protein and calcium, I also feed soaked alfalfa cubes. I add oats and chelated minerals and vitamins with digestive aids. This works great for an older tb gelding I have who is always tough to keep weight on and winter is even harder-- He just glows and is in the best weight he has had for years. Hope this helps.
Good luck,
Eileen
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BLB
Guest
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Laura:
I have an older mare that is a hard keeper during the winter and I do pretty much what Eileen does. However, I feed her natural glow rice bran with 2 lbs of Equine Senior mixed with H20 plus every other day I give her 2 lbs of beet pulp soaked in LOTS of water. I am a big believer of beet pulp in the winter because it not only helps to put and keep weight on the horse but it also helps a horse that has a tendency to colic due to changes in the weather.
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Joy
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Old Hand
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Posts: 1,270
I love Trakehners!
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I personally don't like rice bran or beet pulp because those crops are among the most sprayed and have those chemical residues. Instead, I use H.E.S. (High Energy Supplement), which is a Dynamite product made from unsprayed soybeans. I have a 19 y.o. TB mare that does great on this. i also board a 26 y.o. Appaloosa gelding that is (at his owner's request) on beet pulp, but until I added HES to his diet, didn't maintain his weight well.
I've also found that if feeding grains (oats, COB, etc.), soaked is definitely more digestible, and, like Eileen, I make sure there's good digestive aids (probiotics) and chelated minerals. The chelation is important; otherwise most of it just passes through.
Most important, I find, is ALWAYS having hay available. Older horses often eat more slowly, and if they're sharing with other horses, may not get their share otherwise.
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fuzzy
Guest
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My Trak is a hard keeper, in the winter especially, but I have found that there are three things that work with him. Corn oil, and two supplements - Red Cell and Equi-Pride. Any one of these works. But also, he's a young fellow who is always either growning or running around, so now that he's turning five I'm hoping he'll buff up a bit.
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Tannenwald Trakehner
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Old Hand
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Posts: 935
TANZBRISE by Windfall out of Tariana
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Weight loss during the winter usually signifies that the horse is not getting enough energy (calories) and possibly/probably enough protein to maintain it's condition under the added stress of colder weather and so forth.
Depending on what your present diet is, you can increase the energy level by increasing the amount of concentrate or grain you are feeding (within reason--too much is bad), adding a fat source such as vegetable (corn, soybean, peanut, sunflower) oil, adding beet pulp (which is a low carbohydrate source of fermentable fiber that provides almost as much energy as grains), or a commercial energy supplement.
One of the big tip-offs to an insufficient protein level is decreased hoof growth and quality. You can increase protein levels by feeding a hay with a higher protein content, changing your usual grain/concentrate mix for one that is higher in protein, or supplementing the diet with any number of sources of high quality protein. Soybean meal is a good source of quality protein, meaning it has an appropriate amino acid profile (the kinds of proteins that are in it) and is a good source of the first limiting amino acid, lysine. Soybean meal is what remains when soybeans are processed for oil, so it does not contain very much fat. There are also many commercial protein supplements available.
Joy, I would be interested in seeing documentation of higher pesticide content in beet pulp as opposed to other equine feedstuffs. I have searched online and can find no technical data to support that statement. Sugar beets can be a difficult crop to manage due to susceptibility to insect attack, but even under fairly aggressive pesticide applications to the growing crop the actual pesticide residues in the final beet pulp are quite low and within established tolerance levels.
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Lara, Gryphon Farm
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Gold Medallist
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Posts: 291
Trakehner Cowgirl
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I use the Natural Glo Rice bran and corn oil, but what makes the biggest difference is Strategy, by Purina. I have a winter hard keeper, five years ago UC Davis vets recommended this combination - I havn't had a problem since. Hay meals three, preferaby four times daily (keeps the finicky eater more interested than having it sit in front of them constantly). Ask the vet to take a closer look at the horse's teeth to make sure he can chew hay properly before swallowing (to maximize nutritional content). Whatever combination of product you use, talk to your vet about how much to start with, how many times per day, etc. Some are safer than others and can be given in larger quantities twice daily, etc.
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pnorton
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Preliminary
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Posts: 94
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I live on the edge of some rice producing farmers and from what I can tell there is little need for chemicals as they flood the fields to keep weeds out and bugs too for that matter.
As for the horse loosing weight. My horses both TB and TK gain in the winter because the heat is gone. Of course this is probably because most are fed free choice high quality grass hay when the grass is not so pretty. Maybe the horse in the original posting on this thread is loosing weight due to not enough roughage once the grass is all dead. Eating hay also helps the horse to stay warm.
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