I recall being 15 years old in the early 80’s. Boarded my horses on a 35 acre pasture with about 40 horses on it. In south Florida. I swear if one blade of grass grew taller than an inch the entire herd pounced on it. It was covered with green and not dirt but not at all feeding anyone. There were a couple of boarders as well as the owners/managers who would only come out 3 times per week. Tuesday Friday and Sunday and feed their horses 2 two 3 quart scoops of sweet feed. Once that day. Their horses were MORBIDLY obese. Like 7 + on the scale. No hay. Just that feeding. And the stressed AF pasture. All self care. So yes, I think there have been metabolic horses forever. We just didn’t have the Internet back then and didn’t know about it.
Declining quality in pasture is definitely an interesting point to consider. Dovetailing with that… the horses who lived on those pastures had ample space and time to roam. Now that there’s been a shift toward hyper structured training programs and more restrictive turnout spaces and schedules…I wonder what impact the loss of grazing land and freedom to move on their own time has on long-term soundness. My guess is probably not a good one.
Dovetailing even more, Katy Watts used to be active on here talking about how grass species have changed. Native grasses have been pushed out by invasive cultivars developed for lawns.
Great questions and discussion here.
I’ve asked myself this many times.
Old horse keeper from the '70’s here.
One big difference in commercial feed then and now-. Beet Pulp.
No such thing back then.
So did the horse feed companies find a use for a product that was considered a hog or cow feed.?
How much sugar is in beet pulp from sugar beets?
Why so many IR And EMS cases now?
My grandfather’s work horses
only worked in springtime yet
they were fed a couple ears of hard corn per meal all year.
Beet pulp may be the modern
culprit.
I can say with my own horses, they received far more beet pulp in the 90s than they have in the past 20 years.
The only commercial product I use with BP is senior feed for the older hard keepers. The younger horses are on ration balancers or vit/min supplements. And it’s usually the younger ones struggling with EMS-like symptoms in my world.
I wonder more about all the wheat mids and processed soy. Yet at the same time, eliminating those ingredients has never been a magic bullet for my horses.
I think our modern issues are likely multifaceted from an extensive combination of husbandry changes. Everything everyone has mentioned probably plays a small role, with no one thing being the sole culprit. What’s the saying? Every solution comes with new problems?
Back in 70’s, old time horsemen
rebelled at newfound pelleted
feed. They believed you should only feed horses natural whole
grains that were recognizable
in the feed. Pellets were junk floor sweepings/ junk food.
Maybe they were right.
We only fed sweet feed w/ variable protein percentages.
That and imported northern T&A
hay.
Beet pulp was used in the barn I boarded at (and grew up riding in) the late 80s. I don’t know enough about feed formulas then to know how common it was as an ingredient.
I don’t know who started using beep as livestock feed, but certainly horse feed companies found a good, healthy use for it
Beet pulp is what’s LEFT after the majority of sugar has been removed from the sugar beets. It’s low sugar.
it’s not like they didn’t exist back then, they absolutely did. But it wasn’t really understood what was going on, other than symptoms like laminitis, much less how to treat it. I remember a few cases in the barn above where looking back, the horse was clearly IR, and the treatment was the lowest quality, crappiest hay you could find, and strict stall rest. None of those horses survived, because that was poor treatment but it was the best most vets knew at the time.
But also, BREEDING has selected for IR horses. Lots and lots of high quality show ponies were “high quality” because they had the round look from the start, without a lot of work going into it, not understanding that roundness including the crest, was due to IR. When you breed for a phenotype without understanding what causes it, you bring along its causes, and they’re not all good. IR/EMS and HYPP are 2 good examples.
A couple of ears of corn is nothing in the grand scheme of the daily intake
Hardly. Picking on one ingredient of your choice as a cause of a myriad of issues, while ignoring 100s of other changes, isn’t how science works
wheat midds are the best parts of the kernel - higher protein, lower starch. I wouldn’t feed 2lb of it to a metabolic horse, but as part of a feed that’s low NSC, it helps with the protein
Soy must be processed to be safe to eat. The reason eliminating those 2 things doesn’t help most horses with issues, is because they’re not the cause of most issues 
No, they were not right. Are there some crappy mills with crappy practices who sweep floors into pellets? No doubt. Those are NOT quality companies producing quality feeds. Don’t blame them for the bigger picture
Way back when, we fed COB or sweet feed mostly. We mostly had healthy, trained horses. Bc the unhealthy ones, the ones with hard training issues got sent down the road or into the ground. This was my experience and YMMV.
When I think back about 30 years I grew up with a pretty rough around the edges but locally beloved riding club. There were a lot of good ole days practices that absolutely were not to the benefit of the horses. However, they did have the string of 10-12 out in a massive field with a lively creek and lots of turnout. The pastures were green but fairly sparse and likely the native grass with minimal improvements done so there was lots of natural movement. I think about that compared with individual or small group turnout on 1/2-1 acre of beautifully lush grass with heavy weed management. Gorgeous to look at and mowed to stay below 5” but from a horse health perspective that’s a lot of density and a high risk of the grass becoming strained during summer months or drought and kicking out a ton of sugar.
I have a toothless oldie and I use COB with loads of molasses to flavour his soaked hay cubes - I think the strong smell of molasses makes a big difference in his appetite, pretty certain the actual cob goes right thru him as he has no teeth to grind them.
my horses have access to pasture pretty much year round, it’s unimproved pasture, mostly native grass with some volunteers from whatever crops my neighbours planted the year before - usually some canola and sunflowers. I fenced a second rough pasture for winter grazing when we had a hay shortage instead of keeping them in sacrifice paddocks with round bales, so they got breakfast hay but had to go paw for lunch until they came in for the night - huge difference in their fitness, weight and mental health.
I don’t think beet pulp is the root of all the issues, but, for some reason that I can’t put my finger on, I just really dislike it. Maybe it’s how it kind of looks like bits of shredded tree bark. I just don’t love feeding it. I’d rather feed hay pellets.
Another thing to consider is that most pasture grasses have been developed over the last few decades to be as high in calories and sugars as possible to make cattle that will be packaged at a processor before they turn five years old as fat as possible before heading to the feedlot. It’s not as helpful for an animal that is intended to live as long as possible grazing on said grass.
Regarding beet pulp, I’ve read old (seriously old) horsekeeping manuals taking about feeding hardworking horses root vegetables like turnips, carrots, and beets. Beet pulp just takes the fiber remaining after removing as much sugar as humanly possible, dehydrates it to keep it stable, and sells it as a form of fiber-based feed that is higher in calories than most hays.
Remember that beets you see in the stores, and which most people who grow beets, grow, aren’t the same as sugar beets (which aren’t sold in grocery stores). Red beets (which actually come in a variety of colors) vs sugar beets.
One of the more frustrating things with aging horses. You find something they eat consistently, and you think, ‘Problem solved.’ Then, they stop eating it. Usually after you’ve just bought a new 50 lb bag of it. 
Nailed it. And when the other 2 are easy keepers such that you can only dole out the “icky” food 1/2-1c at a time, well… 
I was at a huge BB at that time and nobody fed pounds of feed. Owners supplied and fed their own grain ( if they wanted ) and most didn’t feed any since this was CA and the hay was alfalfa and the horses got plenty. Horses were stalled. No grass.
A treat was the most any horse needed , even if they were in training. I rode my horses hard 6 days a week and they didn’t need grain to hold weight.
I really think that hay is shorted for so many horses now that feeding 4-8+ pounds of a specialty feed has become commonplace. I always wonder if that contributes to the huge ulcer issues we see today.
That is the best one! None of my current 3 could handle even a handful as they are all easy keepers.
Beet pulp is the 2nd or 3rd ingredient listed on my RB tag.
Interesting. It’s never been an ingredient in any of the half dozen or so different brands I’ve used. Mostly nationally available stuff: Buckeye, Tribute, McCauley Bros, Triple Crown, Hallway… don’t remember it in Purina, but it’s been so long and they don’t list ingredients online.
I have been feeding the Purina Enrich Plus Senior and never looked at the tag before ( or of the Enrich Plus I fed previously). My gelding is bothered by something which is why I looked --just today actually!
Horses love it though.
