Exercise causing runny poop?

[Hilarycarey]

What causes a horse to have cow paddy poops after exercise?

No other stress signs u/s

Used to grind teeth, swish tail etc (but had no poop problems when showing stress signs go figure )

2 years later after lots of physio work, in hand work, full turnout on track system with friends. Very settled in life. Moving really well, ears forward and works well.

This started in November. When no longer on pasture, switched to 24/7 Timothy hay.
just lots of pooping u/s and very watery afterwards.
I know not normal but don’t know where to start.
Manure in stall normal / tiny bit soft at times.

[Weezer]

My gelding recently started developing runny poop after switching from grass to hay in the fall. I tried all sorts of things to fix it last winter but the problem persisted until he was back on grass in the spring. When he started with runny poop again this fall I added probiotics to his ration and everything is good now. I’ll keep him on the probiotics until he’s back on grass. So I think it could just be a change in his intestinal health. I’m using Mad Barn probiotics.

[Hilarycarey]

Thanks for your reply!
It his poop were always runny I would think more hay related but it’s always worse after a work out. The exercise makes it worse for some reason…

Love madbarn, he’s on omneity and added the digestive supplement 4 weeks ago… no change.

[RedHorses]

Any horse pooping many times in a short period will have progressively softer poops with more fecal water. If you’re getting there in one ride there is something stressing your horse about being ridden.

[FjordBCRF]

Do a search here for Fecal Water Syndrome or FWS or FFWS, there are a couple threads on the topic if you aren’t familiar.

The majority of horses that seem to have this issue find that it’s related to the hay. I have a gelding that only gets in during the warmer months so I look at it as being heat stress induced so were a bit of an outlier.

Did he switch from grass to hay around the same time it started? Based on my experience with it so far, I would consider maybe the rides low level stress him out and possibly the change from grass to hay is exacerbating it? It sounds like stress is what kicks it off to me.

[PNWjumper]

In my experience, almost all of my horses’ runny poop issues have been related to the hay.

“Timothy” doesn’t mean anything. I mean, it’s a type of hay, but I’ve had timothy that’s set all of my horses into diarrhea and other loads that everyone is fine on. Others where only the mares got runny poops, and most recently a load where only my new import (young gelding) has runny poop and everyone else is fine.

When it’s the hay, you can throw all of the supplements you like at the horse and it is unlikely to make a difference.

And exercise inducement wouldn’t tell me anything except that you’re stressing a body that’s already a little stressed and likely just setting it off more.