Horse feed

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GUNSMOKE
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Horse feed

Post by GUNSMOKE » Sun Mar 14, 2010 4:02 pm

What type and brand of feed is everyone using these days for field trial horses? I'm not looking for any long drawn out discussions or looking to start any problems,just wondering with the season in full swing what everyone is using to keep their horses up to speed. Thank you in advance.

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Karen
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Re: Horse feed

Post by Karen » Sun Mar 14, 2010 8:39 pm

Both of our are on Purina Strategy.
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RayGubernat
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Re: Horse feed

Post by RayGubernat » Sun Mar 14, 2010 8:49 pm

Gunsmoke -

My horse do not get as much work as some out there, mostly weekends. During most of the year, they are on pasture and I feed them a small portion of a 10% pelleted stock feed, mostly to assure that they get enough of the micronutrients. The also have a mineral block available next to their water.

One thing I have been doing over the past couple of years is to substitute their normal grain supplement with a pelleted feed that has no corn or molasses or other simple sugars starting the night before a trial. One such brand is Nutrena Safe Choice...there are several others. It seems to help a bit first thing in the morning. Prior to my using this type of feed, both of my guys would be a little antsy first thing and it would usually take a brace or so to get them settled down. They are not wild in any way... just a little antsy, but if I can eliminate some of that, it is worth it to me because I am not a good rider and do not enjoy a horse dancing around.

When they have been fed these corn and sugar free rations the horses are a bit less fired up when first saddled up and less likely to be silly for that first half hour or so.. These rations typically have more protein, so they actually have more nutritive value that the molasses and corn containing feed.

Anyway, that is what I usually do. I mention Safe Choice because I think my guys like the taste the best of the several brands I have tried. The prices are all about the same.

This year, for the first time, I have been feeding Purina Strategy in the teeth of what has been a fairly nasty winter here. The horses seemed to do very well on it and when I grab one to road some dogs, they are pretty calm and mellow. It is about one third more expensive per bag than the stock feed I was using, and about the same as the corn and molasses free feeds, but I am feeding less of the Strategy and maintaining weight, coat condition and general appearance, so it is only slighly more expensive. It may be that, for my guys, I don't need the corn and molasses free feeds but can get the same results with Purina Strategy. Time wil tell.

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Re: Horse feed

Post by Neil » Mon Mar 15, 2010 11:54 am

I was going to have to sell a horse if not put him down until I switched to Safe Choice, he was that bad. It is pricey by any standard, but it gives them bottom and keeps their weight up without the hyperness. It saved me a horse and perhaps an injury.

When I am ridding them, it is all I feed.

Neil

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daniel77
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Re: Horse feed

Post by daniel77 » Mon Mar 15, 2010 8:24 pm

In my experience, for most horses out there, the regular ole 12-14% "all stock" pellet that ever feed store carries will do fine for most horses out there. Some people really don't like feeding pellets. Each to his own, but I've fed tons upon tons of various pelleted feeds with no problems thus far. For a horse that is really working, I REALLY like Nutrena Compete. I've fed a bunch of Strategy also, but it has more carbs and less fat, also lacks a few additions that Compete has. To my mind, Strategy is a real good feed, but it tends to make a horse hyper. At least more so than Compete. Compete also used to be cheaper, but where I live now, it is a bit more/bag. No, I don't work for Nutrena. :mrgreen: Also keep in mind that a fair bit of what you pay for in the "premium" feeds is the additives like Biotin and certain amino acids and such, that the common trail/trial pony may not really benefit from. I say this as a person who has never ridden a horse in a trial. I'm assuming that ya'll go some miles in a day, but not 25 miles in that day.

Again, unless your horse really is undergoing regular and fairly hard exercise, I think most any generic feed of 12% protein or so will do. If you have a hard keeper, try and make up those calories in fat, not carbs. A bit of corn oil over the top will help a bunch also, again without adding that hyper BS. I'd also add that GOOD hay is the cornerstone of any good nutritional program. Even among top equine athletes, they should get most of their food in the form of good quality hay.
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Neil
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Re: Horse feed

Post by Neil » Tue Mar 16, 2010 7:30 am

Daniel,

I will make a bold proclamation, no horse works harder than a field trial horse in the South in the spring, NONE! 4 hours at 8 mph in hock deep sucking mud, up and over hills, creeks, etc. takes some groceries to keep them going for 10 - 12 days at a time. It is tough.

For the weekend trialer, they would most likely be better off not feeding anything but good hay.

Neil

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daniel77
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Re: Horse feed

Post by daniel77 » Tue Mar 16, 2010 8:12 am

No arguments here. As I said, I've never done the horseback field trial thing. It is my experience that MOST horses get too much feed and not enough riding, but that isn't true for all, certainly.

I do know that for a ranch horse, working and making 25 miles a day, there is no amount of feed that will keep up their conditioning indefinitely. If you try and feed them enough to do it, you're asking for colic/founder. That is why most are on a rotation. No horse can take that every day and survive, much less thrive.
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Re: Horse feed

Post by RayGubernat » Tue Mar 16, 2010 8:57 am

Daniel -

I am in total agreement with you on the pelleted feeds. According toe the discussions i have had with feed company reps, the pelleted feeds are easier for a horse to digest and therefore deliver a much higher percentage of the available nutrition to the horse.

To follow up on Neil's comments, I want to share this with you.... i have watched a very successful area pro, Mike Tracy, feed his horses at trials. He starts out with several flakes of second cutting alfalfa, some of the nicest, greenest stuff you could ever find. If I fed my guys that stuff, I would be peeling the horses off the ceiling of the barn(or me). Then he gives each of his horses a heaping tub of sweet feed with electrolytes and other additives. The feed tubs he uses are the black rubber ones that are about 8" high on the sides. They get this ration twice a day. His horses are on generally on the lean side, but you can bounce quarters off just about any part of their bodies. They are HARD. You can probably guess what amount of work those horses are asked to do.

Oh yeah, he typically carries four to six horses for himself, his scout and any of his clients that show up. He and his scout typically use four horses a day(two each). Most of his horses are somewhere between five and twelve years old. As they approach the upper age limit, they get replaced.

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Re: Horse feed

Post by Blue Dawn Kennel » Wed Mar 17, 2010 8:01 pm

We feed a custom sweet feed that we have mixed @ our local elevator. It has all the vitamins, selinium, and stuff that through the years has kept our horses from colicing/or tieing up. When @ home their on native prairie grass (high in protien) and during the winter they either have a big round bale of brome (high in protein) or native prairie grass. During trial season when we're on the road they mostly get brome or prairie grass hay. If we're working them extremely hard we'll give them some grain but they don't get grain before or after traveling and not until after they've worked a day at a trial. You can ask anyone whose seen our horses that not getting grain our horses look good and healthy and well fed. Just what we do, know some don't have a elevator that can mix but it's sure worked for us over the 15+ years we've been feeding our custom.... then don't have to worry about not being able to find a certain feed when your off away on the road trialing or trail riding.

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Razor
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Re: Horse feed

Post by Razor » Wed Mar 17, 2010 9:51 pm

Nutrena steam rolled oats, 2 pounds of Empower and all the hay she will eat.

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dan v
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Re: Horse feed

Post by dan v » Thu Mar 18, 2010 3:16 pm

Razor wrote:Nutrena steam rolled oats, 2 pounds of Empower and all the hay she will eat.
That Empower will put some weight on a horse.....without makin'em crazy.
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Re: Horse feed

Post by Razor » Thu Mar 18, 2010 3:48 pm

Pretty good stuff. I have been very impressed with Empower so far. It is not cheap but you do not feed to much.

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