I have 2 mini donks and I have a hard time assessing body condition. I’ve read that once they get fat pads, they are really hard to get rid of.
I’ve had one for 9 months and the other for about 5 months. They may be preggers as well
. One has a pointy spine that drops off to the side but I cant feel individual vertebra. She has a long thick fat pad on her upper ribs but I can easily feel her lower ribs. No fat pads on her butt. Her crest is thickened. She is very round. Parts of her scream.thin and other parts scream obese
. The other is uniformly fleshy with a flat back. No fat on butt and a thick crest. I can feel her lower ribs less easily. She doesn’t confuse me. She is what I would expect for fat.
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Crest on necks is your fat marker. Donkey is not a horse, puts fat on differently. They should have thinner necks, usually with a pointy mane, not a wide neck under the mane.
Donkey was developed to live on almost nothing, desert lands, sparse food plants far apart. He had to work to find food, as well as working for owner. No chance to ever get fat! No fat people either, harsh living for all.
I presume your donkey’s do not work for a living, not burning calories performing tasks like driving. So they have no muscle tone. I am again presuming the pads you are finding are undeveloped muscle, not really fat. Fat seems to always go to their necks first, which is why you watch neck to track overfeeding. Without muscle tone from work or planned exercise, the will have sharper spine areas, appear ribby, when they are in fact well fed to overfed.
Putting them on an exercise program to build muscle, burn calories, will improve their health. Hope it also burns off neck fat before the get a broken crest. No fixing that. The should be on a dry lot, no grass and minimal food a good part of the day. Probably muzzled when allowed to graze to reduce intake further. Working animals were not fed all day long, so they had reduced rations in countries of origin, they survived in healthy condition.
I sound quite harsh, but you need to think this way so your donkeys stay healthy. Can’t feed them like horses without hurting them. Giving them jobs like driving add purpose to their lives and health. Fat, broken crested donkey with founder, is a very sad sight.
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Neck fat is where it’s at!
Will the crest go completely away? I’ve read that once they have fat pads that they will always have then to sine extent
Donkeys will get fat pads along the upper ribs in addition to the neck and rump. And, a donkey can be quite overweight while you can still feel her ribs. They truly are air ferns and need to be kept on a restricted diet to keep them from becoming obese.
Check out the Donkey Sanctuary- they have lots of great info on donkey health and care.
https://www.thedonkeysanctuary.org.uk/what-we-do/knowledge-and-advice/for-owners/donkey-health-and-welfare
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My experience with my mini molly mule, who has been fat her whole life and who I acquired at age 12, is that even when you get their weight back under control and maintain it the fat pads may get smaller or softer but they won’t go away. Neither will the fat neck or a fallen crest. She sure is cute though.
My donkey is getting fat pads in the strangest places. Bulbous lumps on her hips, back, and shoulder even though her crest isn’t that big and her “belly” is fine by horse standards. Time to break out her muzzle again…
The Donkey Sanctuary has a body condition score sheet, but I can’t seem to find it on their website. I did find some other folks’ versions of it:
Here’s a little more description:
http://www.vet.ed.ac.uk/ctvm/Research/DAPR/Training%20Publications/Donkeys%20-%20Condition/DonkeyBCS3poster.pdf
True - the neck is a good indicator. Mine is IR and has foundered at least once. The only grass she gets anymore is what grows in the gravel of the sacrifice paddocks and what she can reach through / under the fence. No pasture time. She gets only low carb hay plus a vit/min, MSM, and Remission.
We also put her on Prascend last spring (1/4 tab each day). That is the thing that made the biggest difference in shrinking her fat pads and softening her neck. She’s still lumpy, but significantly less than she was.
There’s a picture of her in this set with her winter coat on (doesn’t look that lumpy but she is).
https://www.instagram.com/p/BfWRf3qhP4h/
Here she is in her fall and summer coat - you can see her lumps. They get slightly smaller in the winter but mostly get hidden by hair.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BY9wIMnnaLp/
https://www.instagram.com/p/BVviev8g6aY/ (last in the series)
Because they don’t shed terrifically well, and play really hard, so they all sweaty and gross under there and I used to do hunters and can’t stand unkempt animals :lol:
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@TheJenners Do you have problems with sunburn and/or flies when you clip? I used to clip my girl, using just a standard 10 blade on my Oster A5 clippers. Her clipped hair was almost translucent and offered no protection against the sun until it grew more. The first year I clipped her she got sunburn on her back so badly that it blistered and peeled! Plus, the flies would bloody her more easily. She had to live in a fly sheet for weeks after being clipped. Your guys don’t seem to have that problem?
Not at all. I clip with my big Osters to power through the dense, slightly curly (so matty/tangled in places) hair, then my Andis for legs, face, and small spaces like sheath and chest. No sunburn or fly issues, but they take dust baths about sixteen times a day, so that might help? They are seriously dusty, you can walk out and pat them and get clouds of dust. And I don’t generally clip the ears at all. I did clip a donkey in Alabama who burned in the sun, but I solved that by clipping with the hair for the next year. Has never been an issue here. I wonder if grass (isn’t it clover?) might be contributing to it? Isn’t there something they can eat that makes them more photosensitive?
Clover can exacerbate photosensitivity in some equines, but I think the problem was lack of sun protection. Maybe she just has a weird coat; she’s extra shaggy and it’s possible that long, wispy hair just doesn’t do it’s job when clipped.
My two guys play like crazy. We love watching them- so comical!
