I would like to know if I can find a vitamin supplement that is complete - meaning it has all the B’s and enough E. I’d like to streamline my feeding a bit.
In searching for this, it occured to me I don’t actually know how much of what a horse really needs per day, on average.
There has to be a breakdown somewhere?
According to FeedXL, my diets are well balanced but my feed room looks like the local feed store…LOL.
But I do highly recommend anyone spend the money on the actual book - it’s totally invaluable and well worth it.
But to answer your direction question: “I would like to know if I can find a vitamin supplement that is complete - meaning it has all the B’s and enough E.”
No, you can’t Why? Because the majority of the nutrients come from the forage. So while a good v/m will have everything a horse can’t make on his own, and some have even some things they can (like biotin, or Vit C), they will only have enough that will possibly make up for what is deficient in the average forage. There are v/m supps that are more suited to all/mostly grass-based diets, and some more suited to all/mostly alfalfa-based diets.
There’s only so much you can cram into a v/m supplement, which is typically fed at a rate of 1-2oz. There are some “mega” v/ms out there, like HighPoint Grass (HorseTech), and Uckele’s Sporthorse Grass, and U-Balance Foundation, which are bigger servings, and therefore higher amounts of nutrients.
But Vit E is rarely in a supplement at more than about 500IU, mayyyybe 1000 for a few, and is something that so cheap to feed, either with something like Walmart’s human gelcaps, or Santa Cruz’s UltraCruz Natural E.
HorseTech does have a B Complex (not sure of its exact name, not hard to find though), and Rod there is always willing and happy to make custom mixes, and I’m sure he’s already been asked to make a mix of something like HighPoint Grass and the b-complex product.
I signed up for a monthly account on feedxl.com. I entered my feed information, supplements, and guessed at the hay type. You also include information about your horse (activity level, weight, etc…) and it really gave me a clear idea of what my horse could potentially be lacking and included the ratios as well. It gave suggestions on what may need to be increased.
I highly recommend it and will do this for all new horses.
The difference between horses and humans is that horses almost always get almost all their calories from what they are actually meant to be eating: hay, or preferably grass. That means they get most of the nutrients they are meant to have.
Humans are perfectly capable of keeping themselves going on empty-calorie processed foods, muffins and donuts and french fries, and get almost zero of a number of nutrients. That’s why human supplements will have the RDI of many nutrients. Also humans can’t manufacture vitamin C like a horse does.
If humans were eating a healthy whole foods diet that would be the equivalent of hay for a horse (whatever that might be for humans brown rice and lots of veggies probably) they wouldn’t need 100 % RDI vitamin pills either.
Well, we’d get most of our nutrition if we ate what we’re meant to be eating - whole, real foods
Humans are perfectly capable of keeping themselves going on empty-calorie processed foods, muffins and donuts and french fries, and get almost zero of a number of nutrients.
Until they can’t keep going. Horses are the same - people think a horse who is “fat and shiny” is healthy, when they can be riddled with health issues.
That’s why human supplements will have the RDI of many nutrients. Also humans can’t manufacture vitamin C like a horse does.
Good marketing Horses can’t make many nutrients either
If humans were eating a healthy whole foods diet that would be the equivalent of hay for a horse (whatever that might be for humans brown rice and lots of veggies probably) they wouldn’t need 100 % RDI vitamin pills either.
brown rice and lots of veggies? LOL More than that, but definitely not a regular diet of highly processed, boxed and bagged foods
We don’t NEED supplements with 100% RDA of 12 different things either, but it makes people feel better about it, and sort of justifies the rest of their dietary choices
You should be able to download a free copy of the NRC 2007. We’re due for a new version but its a good resource. It will list all nutrient requirements by BW and activity level/production state. I would really recommend taking a look if you are interested in learning more-I think its a really easy read and explains some of the basic research behind why the requirements are set the way they are.
Horses are able to synthesize most of the water soluble vitamins so aside from riboflavin and thiamin there aren’t really requirements listed in the NRC. They do require the fat soluble in the diet.
I ran the numbers and found that if I added up all the things I was feeding that I could stop feeding if I went the AZ Cu Complete route, I was still paying an additional 10 bucks a month per horse for the convenience of feeding one thing instead of a whole lot of things–and that was if I bought the ginormo 60 kg option. Four horses, and that 40 bucks convenience tax was just a little more than I really wanted to deal with, just to make life in the feed room slightly easier.
But Horsetech did send me a very generous free sample and the horses found it palatable while I was deciding if I wanted to pay for “easier”!
It’s a crapshoot. Unless your horses are stalled 24/7 and you weigh the hay daily, you really have no idea how much forage they are consuming. If they are on pasture, you don’t know how much they are eating, and you don’t know exactly what they are eating, and the composition of the pasture will change seasonally. But you should be aware of any soil deficiencies.
Good article, here are some quotes,
“[I]Generally speaking, a diet that is high in pasture and good quality hay and lower in concentrates will provide the average horse with essential vitamins and minerals in the quantities required, without the need for supplementation.”
“[/I]The main precursor for vitamin A, beta-carotene, is present in fresh pasture and good quality hay in levels that are more than sufficient to satisfy the horse’s requirement. Vitamin A will be stored in the liver for up to six months, to be released as needed by the horse’s body.”
“Because they are abundantly present in most types of green forage, B vitamins in adequate quantities should be provided by a normal diet…No signs of deficiency have been reported in horses for any of the B vitamins with the exception of B1 (thiamine) deficiency, which can occur when horses eat bracken ferns.”
"Vitamin C is synthesized from glucose in the horse’s liver and is not a dietary requirement for this species as it is for humans. "
Vitamin D - "A horse that receives sufficient amounts of sunlight (at least six to eight hours per day) should not require dietary supplementation. "
“Fresh pasture is the best source of vitamin E, although vitamin E is also present in good quality hay, particularly alfalfa.”
“All minerals can be dangerous when present in high enough levels, yet toxicity in horses is rare. For that matter, so is deficiency. Far more problematic, because it is far more common, is imbalance of levels of minerals whose specific ratio to each other is required to optimize the horse’s health and wellbeing. Calcium and phosphorus are one such pair, sodium and chloride another.”
So you can spreadsheet away, but if your horses are turned out on pasture, your spreadsheet is at best a guestimate.
@Palm Beach well sure. I know that. It was just an odd-ball question that came to me; as much as I do know about nutrition, my question was a missing piece - just something I’d never come across.
Anyway, my diets are pretty darn decent, my horses are happy and healthy. I have 2 TB’s - one who’s 22 and one who is 6.
Pasture is hit or miss depending on the season and availability but they do get turned out daily FWIW. I feed free choice mixed grass hay from the Klamath Basin & alfalfa from same. I don’t weigh it as no need to. I do weigh my supplements & my pelleted feed - TC Sr. I run my diets thru FeedXL.
I suppose in my area the biggest issue is the high iron table - it’s in the water, it’s in everything. One barn I know of actually softens their pasture water!
Vit E deteriorates very rapidly once grass is cut whether it’s a grass or legume. Vit A deteriorates more slowly, and is more linked to the green color, so even the best quality hay that is not nice and green will be lower in A. Alfalfa does by default have more A than grass hay does.
I would always make sure to supplement Vit E for horses getting little to no fresh grass. Yes, E is stored, but a given horse can end up depleting his stores before he’s able to get back on grass, and if there’s never enough grass, it should be added daily.
Why? Because the majority of the nutrients come from the forage. So while a good v/m will have everything a horse can’t make on his own, and some have even some things they can (like biotin, or Vit C), they will only have enough that will possibly make up for what is deficient in the average forage. There are v/m supps that are more suited to all/mostly grass-based diets, and some more suited to all/mostly alfalfa-based diets.
Horses can’t make many nutrients either
