Hi, I am pretty new to the board but have been lurking for a really long time. I did some searches and think I know the answer to my question but am not quite sure if I know specifically and would love to get your take. I bought a Hanoverian foal and she is 4 months old. She is about 13.2 behind and 13.1 in front so I feel like she will probably be big. Her mom is about 16.2 and it seems like she may be larger than mom. She will be weaned soon and come to my trainer’s place. I am interested to hear what you have to say on what to feed her. My trainer and BO have raised babies for many years but they have always been ponies or fairly small horses (15.2-15.3) The horses are all TB, Quarter or warmblood crosses so they don’t have much experience with true warmblood babies. They do feed small amounts of grain to their babies once they are weaned but in my discussions with other breeders that I have worked with that produce very large warmbloods I have been told to just give a ration balancer such as Gro 'n Win and a salt block as the baby will have lots of grass and hay. It seems that this makes a lot of sense but how long do you feed a balancer and I am assuming the bag will suggest how much? Nutrition is of course a big deal in any horse but there does seem to be a direct correlation with OCD and nutrition at least from what I have read and heard from breeders. I do trust the breeders I have talked to but I would like more opinions on what works. Thanks!
Nutrition for the mare during pregnancy is really important in preventing OCD, so hopefully your mare was properly fed. Another thing to consider is turnout. They should be turned out as much as possible, preferably 24/7. The idea is that the young horse should walk a lot, and get regular amounts of light exercise on their own, instead of having long periods of stagnancy (in a stall), then short amounts of intense exercise, IMO.
I feed my weanlings Gro 'n Win and free choice hay (they always have access to salt and minerals). I go by the recommended amounts for their age and weight on the back of the bag.
Ration balancer. High nutrition, lower calories than the same nutrition in a “real” feed (ie a growth or mare and foal feed).
You can feed the RB all their lives if they are easier keepers 
At 4-6-ish months, she’ll probably need 3-3.5lb of the RB, as that’s typical of them. If that’s too many calories, then you can drop that in half and feed a vit/min supplement.
If it’s not enough calories, then you can add a couple of pounds of beet pulp and/or alfalfa pellets, though it will probably be easier to feed the recommended amounts (usually 5-6lb) of a growth feed, ie Triple Crown Growth, Purina Ultium Growth, etc. Just keep it all as low sugar as you can, and both of these are pretty low (TC lower than Purina)
