So my horse was recently diagnosed with laminitis 
and he is also prone to bladder stones…so in order to increase his water intake I was doing the whole gatorade thing and he was drinking a lot more, to the point where he never touched his plain water. Now I am in a dilemma as I was told to discontinue that and his water intake has not been the same. Looking for suggestions on other ways to flavor his water outside of the sugary stuff or regular salt. I also cannot add anything like alfalfa or any product that contains calcium. He does get salt added to his grain and access to a salt lick.
Do you have some access to warm water? In winter my horse likes a mint tea…lol. I take a mint tea bag or two and break open into a bucket of warm water. He does prefer warm water in winter but wouldn’t necessarily turn it down in other weather. I’m not sure you’d get enough flavor without at least starting with warm water.
Peppermint extract (only a tiny drop required) might work.
Depends upon the horse and if they like the minty flavor.
Hi OP,
I use Triple Crown’s Timothy Balance cubes as part of my IR guy’s food ration. They hold a good amount of water, expand and soften really quickly, and are not higher than 10% NSC per the TC website. https://www.triplecrownfeed.com/products/timothy-balance-cubes/
Also, you might ask your horse’s vet about their opinion of Uckele’s sugar free flavorings. I haven’t used them before because my guy is a good drinker/eater but they are not supposed to impact sugar or insulin levels and there are multiple flavors to choose from. Here’s the link to check those out: https://uckele.com/horse/product-categories/flavorings-treats.html
Best of luck, OP!
What was the cause of laminitis and how was it determined?
Laminitis is a symptom of something - metabolic or mechanical - but depending on the cause can be managed in different ways.
Interesting idea! My horse likes mint, so that could be a good thing for him in the winter. It even dried mint leaves infused …I have a bag of those.
Aren’t there a lot of sugar free drink flavor packets and whatnot in the states still? Mio, Crystal Light etc. I don’t know the ingredients though.
We used apple cidar vinegar for our race horses flavoring, so they would drink well on the road, no matter what water we had on hand in the different tracks.
Not sure if that would be acceptable with your bladder stones, but if it is, that could be one more choice.
Hard to believe that the little bit used for flavoring in a horse’s water would make much of a difference on his stones or laminitis?
Is he on thyro L? That will sometimes cause them to drink a bit more.
This sounds a bit crazy, but I clean my horses water buckets with Listerine daily so I only need to bleach out occasionally.
My guys really like the taste of Listerine (or the bargain equivalent). Maybe a dollop of that in his water would work. It has a relatively strong minty smell even diluted.
Thanks for all the fun ideas! I’ve tried the tea thing (mint and chai) to no avail, I also have those uckele products didn’t realize they were sugar free but he didn’t like them when I tried before, have done the horse quencher and acv too with no success. Haven’t tried warm water or listerine so will experiment there.
I will be starting him on the thyro-l tmrw so interesting to hear it might make him drink more (fingers crossed)
am awaiting results on his cushings/metabolic tests but was told regardless to treat him as such from here on out. The vet was not too fond of using the sugar free alternatives as I had inquired about those…she said it can still have a similar affect on their insulin…so unsure if I want to play that game or not
