Lets talk Supplements! What have you used and what are your thoughts?

[lifeishorsesarelove]

I am bored at work and thought that this would be a good topic to spark some discussion!

What supplements have you tried over the years? What reason/issue did you use them for? Did you feel that they worked for your horse? If you didn’t like them, explain why! If you stopped using them, why?

Anything that you are thinking of trying? What’s holding you back?

I will start!

the good:

MSM - I feed 30g of MSM powder per day to my 7yo grade large pony mare. She has a nasty, dry cough on sometimes when on a round bale and usually in the spring, due to minor allergies. The MSM has completely knocked down the inflammation that was making her cough, so she has stayed on it year round since, because its cheap and its not going to hurt anything but my wallet. My vet is on board with this and is thrilled that we have her cough managed without any heavy hitting medications.

Whole flax - I had my mare and a former pony gelding of mine on whole flax for about a year. The pony had serious skin itchies and dry, flaky skin that seemed to be helped by the additon of flax. I added it for my mare because she always needs more fat in her diet and she shed out extra fast that spring! Both seemed to have slicker, glossier coats while on it. I sold the pony and my mare suddenly refused to eat the flax anymore, so i have stopped using it.

Red Raspberry leaf - my mare has been on this off and on. I do think I notice a positive difference in her heat cycles while feeding it. She can be very “mareish” with lots of inappropriate squealing and peeing while in heat, and this behavior seems to be reduced while on the raspberry. This one may be a placebo effect on my part though! I plan to see how this spring goes without it.

the meh:

Probiotics! I have used Omega Alpha Biotic8 and Mad Barn probiotic. The Biotic 8 was from my vet, after I had a freshly gelded colt on antibiotics for several weeks due to complications. He barely ate it, and he was a pig, so I assume they tasted or smelt awful. The Mad Barn ones were less offensive, but I was adding them for gut support post ulcer treatment as suggested by my vet, and I saw no difference on or off them, so not worth it to me. I question how much of the effective bacteria actually make it to the hind gut.

[Scribbler]

I feed a vitamin mineral etc supplement, salt, and flax in a beet pulp mash to my own horse who is very healthy. When she has had diarrhea related to hay after coming in from pasture I have used Herbs for Horses Probios to clear it up in ten days.

I am also looking after a youngish OTTB that got persistent diarrhea after coming in off pasture. It’s finally cleared up with Probios and something called G’s Formula in a beet pulp mash. I was dubious about the G’s Formula but honestly it is working on this girl. We also took her off alfalfa which seemed to add to the problem for her.

I distinguish in my mind between supplements that are ongoing like vitamin mineral mix or flax, and those that should fix a problem in a set amount of time, like probiotics.

Once the diarrhea is truly resolved I see no reason to keep feeding probiotics. I have also taken probiotics (Florastor) for persistent diarrhea probably stemming from mild food poisoning and they absolutely work on me.

My vitamin mineral supplement has some joint support etc but no idea if that has any effect on a healthy horse.

[CanteringCarrot]

MSM for my horse with allergies/IAD. I’m not sure that it really helps, but it’s cheap enough and he doesn’t experience any negative side effects.

Vit/Min specifically tailored for horses with EMS. My horse does not have EMS, but he is an easy keeper and of the “type” and this supplement is formulated in such a way that it compensates for what he doesn’t receive through hay.

Flax oil or seed for his skin/coat and allergies. I noticed that he gets more shine and less or no random skin funk.

Magnesium Oxide helped lessen his fatty pockets and many feed this to their easy keeper cobs to help with fatty deposits. Along with proper exercise.

If his allergies/IAD flares up I use his nebulizer for treatment and an herbal syrup on his feed that soothes the airway.

[skipollo]

MSM: my horse is arthritic, and this is super cheap and helps keep him comfortable. It’s not a replacement for his maintenance, but it does help him out.

Flex Force: 100mg liquid HA. Again, he’s arthritic. I think it helps him feel more limber overall, but I may be stopping it because per my vet’s recommendation, we now have him on…

Pentosan: okay not really a supplement, but he is on this to extend the life of his joint injections. I think I will be discontinuing the liquid HA at some point since we started him on this instead.

Omega Horseshine: he had one summer where he got an awful skin funk on his forehead. Sprays, washes, I tried it all. Nothing helped and he was going bald. I figured maybe it’s something we need to fix from the inside? So I put him on the Omega. Skin cleared right up. It also has biotin in it which is good for his feet. He gets 1/2 cup per day.

In the past I had him on SmartCalm Ultra because he was such a hot anxious baby. Whether or not it actually worked, I’m not sure. If it didn’t calm him, then it certainly calmed me through the placebo effect, so it was money well spent. I didn’t understand that magnesium supplements only work on horses who are deficient, but I did use it for a while.

SmartShine: I gave this to get over the free shipping for my SmartPaks. It worked fine I guess, nothing remarkable. He has a very nice coat from genetics/diet/regular grooming anyway.

[Amy3996]

My horse has been on SmartCombo Ultra for the last few months, and while I like it, I don’t think it’s doing anything spectacular to really justify the price ($125 for 28 days). I switched him to Exceed 6-Way to replace the SmartCombo, Elevate SE for Selenium and Vitamin E, and MegaCell vitamin/mineral to fill in the gaps since he gets less than the recommended amount of TC Complete. Just started that this week, so too early to really know if it’s going to work for him.

Other things I’ve tried:

AniMed Muscle Up - good muscle supplement. Used it as an alternative to Progressive Topline Extreme, much less expensive and seemed to yield really good results.

Absorbine Flex Max - Excellent joint supplement - only switched away from it because I was looking for a multi-purpose supplement instead of doing a bunch of individual ones.

Platinum Performance CJ - My horse abjectly refused to touch it. Didn’t matter what I tried to mix it with or how gradually I tried to introduce it, he wasn’t having it. Fortunately, Platinum Performance’s customer service is excellent. They issued a full refund, so it was worth the try!

Uckele Poly Copper/Poly Zinc - relatively new supplement, trying as a preventative for scratches since my horse has four white stockings and scratches are an annual battle. Too soon to tell if it’s making a difference, but it’s very inexpensive and he’s eating it well despite the strong smell.

SmartBreathe Ultra - I use this in the spring/summer as a support since that’s when my horse’s heaves symptoms tend to flare. It does seem to help, at least a little bit.

[billiebob]

My gelding is currently on Uckele Tri-Amino and whole flax. I love flax and he’s been on it since I got him nearly 10 years ago, except for one winter when I stopped all supplements on the advice of an equine nutritionist who was completely overhauling the barn’s feeding program. I was unhappy with how he shed out the next spring, so added flax again.

The Tri-Amino is to help him build his topline. He is a middle-aged TB working consistently at 2nd (and parts of 3rd) level dressage, so I like having a bit of muscular support. I’m not sure it helps a ton, but he looks and feels fantastic so I don’t want to change anything. It’s $22 for a 6 week supply so it’s not killing my wallet.

Other things I’ve tried with him over the years:

MSM – this maybe helped with some of his mystery swellings, but it was just kind of meh so I stopped feeding it.
SmartHoof – he ripped a chunk of his hoof off at the coronet band, this helped it grow out a little faster. He actually has great feet so I stopped this once the injury was fully grown out.
SmartCalm – used in the winters before I figured out that he needs extra blanketing and a quarter sheet, I don’t feel like this did much.
SmartFlex – didn’t see any discernible results.
Cool Calories – no discernible results either.
Amplify – this is a good one. I now feed him Ultium, which has this built in, otherwise I’d use it as a top dressing.
Buckeye Ultimate Finish – love this, can’t get it reliably in my area (booooo).
Calf Manna – OMG NEVER AGAIN. I tried this out of desperation while living in basically the middle of nowhere and it turned him into a lunatic within a few days. Stopped feeding it and I immediately my regular horse back.

[Hayburner]

Elevate Vit E supp 2k iu in the winter and 1k in the summer.
Equine omega 1.5 pumps per feeding
Equithrive 1 scoo 2 x a day
Regumate except i. Dec, Jan & Feb

9 year old with no issues just being proactive

thinking about adding Cosequine

[Palm_Beach]

Riding horses - both are easy keepers, so they have pasture/hay 24/7 but usually with restrictions such as a grazing muzzle or a small hole hay net. Both get Triple Crown Lite, MSM and ground flax. My competition horse is 11 and just started this year on adequan once a month. I can feel the difference so he will stay on it.

Race horses - free choice hay/pasture 24/7 and Triple Crown Senior. If they have particularly awful feet, I’ll feed some ground flax. If they don’t have the topline I want, they also get Triple Crown 30% for the month or two before they go back to the track. They are usually older and usually get Legends/adequan, frequency determined by the vet.

I’ve been using TC for years, and previously had my horses on Ultium. I’ve never supplemented much, other than a fat supplement for hard keeping TBs. Now that they are home with me, I can feed all the hay/grass I want, and I don’t have issues with them keeping on the weight, and don’t really need the fat supplement for weight gain.

I’ve always been big on lots of turnout, lots of grass/hay, (plus I hate mowing) and I’ve never had issues with illness or injury. They look great and perform great.

[Obsidian_Fire]

I’ve used liquid HA with enough success on an aged gelding to have kept buying it until he retired.

Now, with just my mare, I am using Turmeric pellets (from Smartpak), flax seed, vitamin e (from UltraCruz), Outlast gastric support, probiotic yeast (Diamond V brand), hoof supp ‘coco sun’ (?) (also a Uckele product).

Aside from that she gets a V/M supp (Uckele Equi-VM), great hay, turnout, some TC Sr (like, 1 1/2 lbs per day, not much).

I’m on the fence about keeping the Turmeric, and I may or may not buy more yeast once it’s gone. Flax, I use seasonally when the grass is gone.

[findthedistance]

I manage a group of school horses, and while I have experimented with a variety of supplements, I keep coming back to hay/grass + ration balancer/appropriate concentrate. There have been a couple exceptions:

> One horse is markedly more comfortable on a half-dose of Platinum Performance CJ. It is more effective than Pentosan for him. (Half dose was an accidental discover because that’s the max he’ll eat – but it does the job.) Downside is this is $$$. Customer service is great, and they’ll send you taste-test samples before you commit.

> We’ve had a couple over the years that needed supplemental magnesium. (Also several we tried it on with no effect.) I’m not picky about brand – Quiessence, SmartCalm, MagRestore, whatever we have around.

[Cbonadeo]

I have a 20 year old Welsh pony with Cushings. Good feet (well, not as great here in the wet-dry-wet-dry San Antonio weather :rolleyes:), no other medicla issues, hates flies with a passion. For feed she gets mostly coastal hay (up to 6 flakes a day, although she doesn’t usually eat it all) with a flake of alfalfa for lunch, and a pound of TC Lite each day (split between 2 feedings). She also has a large salt block in her stall.

For extra supplements up until now I’ve done all smartpaks: smartvite thrive senior, smartflex senior, and the equinox 360 packs (smartbugoff in the summer, smartomega in the winter). I’ve been playing around in FeedXL though, and with that combination of feed and supplements some of her vitamin and mineral levels are pretty ridiculous… I’m also tired of paying sooo much for her supplements! So I’m researching Uckele supplements and thinking of switching to CocoHoof, Equi-VM, and Monosodiun Phosphate.

I won’t bother with feed-through fly pellets any more, since I read that they’re only really effective if everyone in the barn uses them (I didn’t realize they work by reducing population in the manure, thought they just kept flies away form the horse entirely lol. Glad I still used fly spray and fly sheets!).

I also read an article/study showing that feed-through joint supplements don’t actually have a proven effect, so I’m debating whether it’s worth it to keep feeding a smartflex-type supplement. That study was in 2012 iirc though… Anyone have any good, recent studies to share? So much of what I’ve seen about it is anecdotal, no/poor control groups, etc.

We’re moving to Kansas in June and will switch from Coastal with a little Alfalfa to Brome, so once we move I’ll get a hay analysis done (and actually weigh some flakes) and re-tweak supplements/feed amounts as needed.

[Cbonadeo]

@Obsidian Fire

I’ve used liquid HA with enough success on an aged gelding to have kept buying it until he retired.

Now, with just my mare, I am using Turmeric pellets (from Smartpak), flax seed, vitamin e (from UltraCruz), Outlast gastric support, probiotic yeast (Diamond V brand), hoof supp ‘coco sun’ (?) (also a Uckele product).

Aside from that she gets a V/M supp (Uckele Equi-VM), great hay, turnout, some TC Sr (like, 1 1/2 lbs per day, not much).

I’m on the fence about keeping the Turmeric, and I may or may not buy more yeast once it’s gone. Flax, I use seasonally when the grass is gone.

How have you liked the uckele products? I’m getting ready to switch from smartpaks to more tailored (and cheaper!) supplements, and Equi-VM and CocoHoof are 2 of the ones on my list (plus Monosodiun Phosphate, since FeedXL indicates that she’ll be a little short on phosphorous after the switch).

Do you add the flax for the hooves or the coat?

[Victorious]

I have always been suspicious of lots of supplements but, ironically, I’m currently using lots of supplements right now!! My 5 all get excellent RB and hay. They all also get the original Platinum Performance and have been for at least 10 years. At this point, its been in my budget so long that I hardly even think of it as a supplement. That said-it is probably the least necessary one that I feed and would consider dropping it if the budget changed.
I have a mare on Farriers formula and its the best,IMO, for hooves prone to accesses.
All of mine also get Camellnia Oil in their AM feed-I think it helps with shine and scratches
Outlast-easy to feed and not terribly expensive for the few that are ulcer-prone
Ultimate finish-helps keep weight on skinny TB
Succeed-honestly…I was skeptical if this would help the afore-mentioned skinny TB and I can say, hands-down, probably the best money I’ve ever spent for this guy. I love, love ,love how much it has helped my boy and imagine he will stay on it for a long-while!
I’ve ordered Kombat Boots on a rec and the shipping is taking forever, but it will be for the skinny TB (actually not so skinny anymore thanks to Succeed) so I will be trailing that soon.
And I’ve just added legend monthly for him as well and am very happy with that too!

[Obsidian_Fire]

@Cbonadeo

How have you liked the uckele products? I’m getting ready to switch from smartpaks to more tailored (and cheaper!) supplements, and Equi-VM and CocoHoof are 2 of the ones on my list (plus Monosodiun Phosphate, since FeedXL indicates that she’ll be a little short on phosphorous after the switch).

Do you add the flax for the hooves or the coat?

Unless you have some specific dietary restrictions with your horse I doubt very much you have a phosphorus deficiency. What kind of hay are you feeding?

I like the Uckele products very well. It’s too soon with the hoof supp to comment but everything else has been great.

Flax is mostly for hooves but also just because it’s good for a lot of things.

[Scribbler]

@findthedistance

I manage a group of school horses, and while I have experimented with a variety of supplements, I keep coming back to hay/grass + ration balancer/appropriate concentrate. There have been a couple exceptions:

> One horse is markedly more comfortable on a half-dose of Platinum Performance CJ. It is more effective than Pentosan for him. (Half dose was an accidental discover because that’s the max he’ll eat – but it does the job.) Downside is this is $$$. Customer service is great, and they’ll send you taste-test samples before you commit.

> We’ve had a couple over the years that needed supplemental magnesium. (Also several we tried it on with no effect.) I’m not picky about brand – Quiessence, SmartCalm, MagRestore, whatever we have around.

I like this advice because honestly I’m interested in feeding as few supplements as possible, and not duplicating ingredients, because duplicating is easy to do if for instance you fed a hoof Formula and a shine product and a topline product.

We don’t have a really good ration balancer option where I am in Canada hence my mash system.

[Cbonadeo]

@Obsidian Fire

Unless you have some specific dietary restrictions with your horse I doubt very much you have a phosphorus deficiency. What kind of hay are you feeding?

Mostly coastal bermuda (with a flake of alfalfa at lunch). We’ll be moving to Kansas this summer, and she’ll be getting all brome hay at the boarding stables there (I figured I’ll do a hay analysis when we get there too).

[pony_baloney]

My 33 yr. old is mostly retired, just ridden at a walk a few days a week. He has Cushings and very mild ulcers, missing teeth as well.

He’s on soaked Tribute Kalm N EZ and timothy pellets, two Prascends a day and Equioxx.

In the past I had him on just about anything and everything: liquid HA, MSM, OHS, spirulina, SP’s Smart Pituitary, Tri Amino, Source, you name it. The one joint supplement that made the most noticeable difference years ago was Recovery EQ. Up until recently he was getting Uckele’s GUT, but his increasing lack of appetite made me switch to U-Gard pellets.

Now that he’s on Equioxx, I stopped the MSM and other joint sups. He also gets Focus Sr. (Source with enzymes, flax, pre/probiotics and other things for senior horses), Vitamin E capsules and CTB pellets to help with his coat. To save a bit of money I just switched from U-Gard to SP’s Leg Up Stomach and it works just as well so we’ll stick with that.

At his age I just want him to eat his meals, keep weight on and keep his Cushings and potential IR under control. At the moment, his recent mix of sups seem to be working. If his drug$ weren’t so expensive I’d probably add a few more things to the mix but he’s got the essentials covered right now.

[TWH_Girl]

I’ve used too many supplements over the years to list them all, but a few of my favorites are the following. * means currently using on one of mine.

• Exceed 6 Way (MVP)
• Smartflex Senior
• *Senior Flex HA (MVP)
• Absobine Flex Max- agree with above poster on this one
• *Joint Armor
• Elevate
• *Smart Calm regular and ultra
• *Flax
• Dac Bloom and *Dac Foundation Formula
• Farriers Formula
• Smart Hoof

Of course various reasons for using various products over the years. I keep all of mine on a joint supplement and flax and one of them gets the smart calm. I have tried but not been impressed with- Reisport (just too much powder they wouldn’t eat), and Cosequin ASU, as well as a few others I can’t think of. I try to weigh the needs of the horse, their job, quality of supplement and cost when trying to decide what to use. I use SPs and like that I can switch things up without a huge commitment to see if something works.

[Dressage59]

@lifeishorsesarelove Glad you mentioned about the MSM. One of our horses coughs a lot. As instructed by our vet, we tried Zytec. There was no noticeable change after 300 pills, so I’m looking to try something else this spring/summer. Thanks for posting this.

[lifeishorsesarelove]

Really enjoying reading all the replies!

glad to see the comments of magnesium branding not mattering - I have been considering adding this for my mare again, as she has turned into a bit of a hot head… again, and mag helped before. The budget for quiessence isn’t there like it was last time!

intrigued by the comments of hoof supplements making a positive impact. I have been toying with adding one for my mare, perhaps i will revisit.

also surprised by the number of mentions of flax. But I love the stuff so I probably shouldn’t be!