I rarely if ever getting into the “feed diatribe”. Everybody has different opinions on it.
Thought the following article was worth a read.
http://www.paulickreport.com/horse-care-category/nutrition/age-not-a-reason-to-change-equine-diet/
A study involving 17 stock horses over five weeks does not really have any base for me… Foals are one equine class that HAS to be fed according to age-feeding corn or oats before nine months of age can cause many issues. Seniors have different requirements than a ten year old in high work-this has been studied many times by universities and feed companies. Stress factors have been shown to effect digestibility in horses over six so unless you have pasture pets-feeding according to age and workload is very reasonable.
I would not base any of my equine research on a three week outdoor study and a two week indoor study- No body scores changed so “digestibility appears to be similar between healthy adult and aged horses”. Do this study over a reasonable period of time of a few months and wait for results. Sorry I am adding this to online misinformation without some real backing.
though owners should stay mindful of an older horse’s body condition and muscle mass.
so, no need to change diets except for when there is.
" it is not necessary to change his core diet, though owners should stay mindful of an older horse’s body condition and muscle mass. Additionally, horses with dental issues or disease may require different nutrients in their diets."
In other words if he’s thin and leaving quids all over his stall, change his diet.
That was a column about nothing.
I don’t really agree with any of the three diets used or the sample breed or the time frame:
“They completed a study on digestibility using 17 stock-type mares; they were fed three different diets for a five-week study: hay only, hay plus a starch- and sugar-rich concentrate, or hay plus a fat- and fiber-rich concentrate.”
Stock-type horses are usually very thrifty, and if not in hard work they don’t need much other than good quality hay and pasture to hold their weight. I would have used a breed that may have a little harder time holding body condition, such as TB. 5 weeks is not long enough to have a significant change in body condition. And why did they leave out protein??? It’s the most limiting resource wrt body condition.
Never could figure out why anyone would feed a “senior” feed to older horses who were doing great on a feed for horses in work. Senior feeds never worked well on any horse that the warmbloods have been around.
How does a study on “digestability” address the NEEDS of a horse of any age ?
^^^^^YES!
I only feed senior feed or a ration balancer to everything. Triple Crown Senior is a great feed for horses is basically any stage of life and is nearly identical to TC Growth in percentages of what it includes. I asked the company if there was any real advantage to feeding growth when I had babies, and they couldn’t say there was. It is particularly good for TBs as it is low sugar and high fat, so keeps weight on without sending them through the roof.
I have not been impressed with some Senior feeds like Purina but all Senior feed is not alike.
Funnily enough, most of my Seniors are not on TC Senior, they get the ration balancer. The young horses get the Senior. It just depends on body condition, not age, but the feed is a very good one.
[QUOTE=merrygoround;8180547]
" it is not necessary to change his core diet, though owners should stay mindful of an older horse’s body condition and muscle mass. Additionally, horses with dental issues or disease may require different nutrients in their diets."
In other words if he’s thin and leaving quids all over his stall, change his diet.
That was a column about nothing.[/QUOTE]
No it was about not changing the diet just because a horse hits a certain age. I read that the diet needs to be changed only if the body condition warrants it. Which is what I have always done.
The only horses I ever fed differently were my youngsters & pregnant mares and that was only for a time. My older horses ( 20’s) ate just like everyone else.
Just going by how horses are fed by their owners on COTH, this would be a real revelation to many.
[QUOTE=IPEsq;8180541]
so, no need to change diets except for when there is.[/QUOTE]
:lol:
The point the article was making was that age alone doesn’t cause a change in how horses digest food. Therefore, just because a horse is old doesn’t necessarily mean you have to change the diet. The study was specifically analyzing digestion and comparing how nutrients were extracted from what was eaten.
Obviously, older horses can have other problems that are associated with old age that might necessitate a change in diet, but those problems probably aren’t related to how the horse is digesting it’s food.
It’s an important point to make, because it’s pretty common to hear people say that their old horse “doesn’t digest his food well” and discuss all the feed changes they have made when really the problem is that the horse needs dental care, needs a better deworming program, needs softer/easier to chew feed, needs more feed, needs herd mates that don’t drive it away from the hay pile, or needs care for a veterinary issue (or has a veterinary issue that may not be treatable).
Personally, I feed normal retirees a pretty normal diet and pay strict attention to the other variables that could affect their weight and condition.
That may be what the point of the study was, but I do not believe that was the point of the article, and which was a ridiculous read.
I’ve fed Triple Crown Senior and Seminole Senior to horses as young as 5–because they’re great feeds that work well for many horses (even many that aren’t seniors!). Honestly, I think we just need to look at each individual horse and build a diet around his/her needs.
[QUOTE=Frizzle;8181458]
I’ve fed Triple Crown Senior and Seminole Senior to horses as young as 5–because they’re great feeds that work well for many horses (even many that aren’t seniors!). Honestly, I think we just need to look at each individual horse and build a diet around his/her needs.[/QUOTE]
Agree, I feed everything TC Senior or TC30.
[QUOTE=Frizzle;8181458]
I think we just need to look at each individual horse and build a diet around his/her needs.[/QUOTE]
^^ That.
Yes, feeds are designed for different stages of life because in general the young/growing, the longer span of “in the middle” and the oldster do have different needs. The young/growing horse has more requirements in terms of many nutrients than the same horse doing the same thing. A young horse not doing any work may have the same nutrient needs (and not just relative to his weight, but absolute numbers) as that of an adult in hard work.
An old horse may have trouble digesting things as well as he did, but a middle-aged horse could too.
Old horses are more likely to have dentition issues, which is why many of the Sr feeds are high in fiber. That high fiber might or might not work for a younger horse.
The key is to know what a given feed is - why it’s formulated like it is, HOW it’s formulated - and compare that to the needs of a given horse. That’s pretty much it.
My older horse (21yo TB mare) has been on Legends Performance feed for years. She looks great and many people are surprised to learn her age. I have just recently changed over to Seminole Senior as my younger mare(8yo OTTB) wasn’t gaining weight on the Legends. She was ok, but could use 50ish lbs. She wasn’t interested in eating large amounts of food either. With switching to the Seminole, she has gained the last bit of weight she needed, is very shiny and her whole musculature looks better. Older mare looks the same, so will just monitor her in case she needs to go back on Legends.
Once again, a case of “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” I’ve got a whole bunch of Seniors doing better right now on a 14/6 “performance” pellet than they did on “Senior” food–all have their teeth and can eat hay and grass, so there’s no need to fill them up on beet pulp out of a bag, which can actually discourage grazing.
OTOH, once their mouth is smooth, they’re no longer capable of supplying their caloric needs through forage, so the Senior feeds are then a godsend. Ditto when you’re molly-coddling horses who come in emaciated with their systems all messed up.
AGE ALONE means nothing, because equine ages tend to be far more “physical” than “chronological.” But poor dentition, bellyful of ulcers, too many field rivals kicking him away from the hay, heat, cold, flies–can make a HUGE difference in how and what you feed. Still, this study is interesting and confirms a lot of stuff that’s really common sense.
I think that the study has come to an incorrect conclusion. I only read the link, but they don’t say what age the horses are, and this is kind of an important detail. I have absolutely seen in older horses (small sample size, long sample time) that over time that supplementation makes a difference, that just as in people, certain nutrients are not as well absorbed.
You could say it was just random that that happened to my animals, that it was unrelated to advancing age, and I can’t say that that’s wrong. But one would wonder why this has been shown in humans and dogs but it would not be true in horses. My guess is that their horses weren’t old enough, or more accurately, that they weren’t near enough to the end of their particular lifespan.
One thing that totally follows, for example, is that a horse that is decreased in appetite still has at least the same need for nutrients on an IU/gram basis than he did when he was eating more food. Thus, the need for additional supplementation could likely occur.
