I bought a tb mare four mos ago. She is 10 and was used as a broodmare for the last 6 yrs. She had difficulty carrying pregnancies due to uterine infections. She is a mild cribber. She had ulcers, has had an episode of choke when I fed solid grain. Ulcers are gone, she is now fed a mash of oat bran and maintenance pellets twice a day. She gets about 20 lbs of straight alfalfa hay and 10 lbs of first Timothy/orchard/alfalfa per day. Turned out all day on ample big pasture. She has no stress, is trail ridden on weekends at the moment and has very friendly herd mates, never left alone. I can’t get her to gain weight. First tb I’ve ever had that I cannot keep fat. I’ve always been an oats and alfalfa hay person and never had problems until this mare. Her stool used to be loose, is now normal but has kind of a scoury smell. I’ve had fecal/CBC/liver and kidney panels done, all good. The only thing I can think of is it’s the cribbing. She wore a cribbing collar 24/7 while at the breeding farm. I used the collar only while she was stalled for half the day. She had an episode of choke with aspiration pneumonia, so I lined her stall with heavy plastic which deterred the cribbing as she had a lot of thickening wear the collar was worn, and took the collar off. The collar never deterred the cribbing anyways. The plastic has as it’s crinkly…so won’t touch it. I’m looking for affordable supplement ideas to mix in with her mash that will be good for her guts and add fat. From what I’ve been researching, would flax and Manna pro senior be good to add? The oat bran was super expensive to buy by the 50 lb bag, only used to make a good mash to carry ulcer meds. I’d like to stop using the oat bran.
What’s a “maintenance pellet”?
Have you dewormed her?
What did you use to treat her ulcers?
Oat bran is not recommended for much of anything anymore, so definitely pull that. Putting her on a good senior feed, like Triple Crown Senior, would be a good choice. Deworming for encysted strongyles and tapes is always a good idea for a horse without extensive history.
The sour manure is common with ulcers, but you can’t determine gastric or hind gut from that. I’d get her scoped, because if you see a clean stomach, then it’s her hind gut
Oat bran is valuable for hind gut health IF you’re actually getting good quality oat bran and not just ground oats, as the latter brings all of the nutritional profile of whole oats, which is more starch than some horses can deal with. But also, we don’t know how many pounds you’re feeding
What “maintenance pellets” and how many pounds?
It’s also worth testing for PPID (Cushing’s) as weight issues is easily a first symptom. She’s on the younger side for it, but definitely not too young at all.
I think you need more diagnostics before tossing supplements at her, as diagnostics will guide you to the most potentially useful supplement
The maintenance pellet is just a hay stretcher pellet. The oat bran is all bran, not just ground oats. She has been on 2 cups of oat bran, 10 lbs of maintenance pellet made into a mash, per day. She’s been dewormed for all and a fecal was clear. She was treated for ulcers 3 mos ago, stool is improved with a normal consistency but smells slightly off. Acts fine, no pain or discomfort.
She has no other symptoms of Cushing’s other than the weight issue. Doesn’t drink excessively, coat is sleek and shiny, not a big sweater, feet a great.
If this horse is truly eating 30 pounds of quality hay a day plus 10 pounds of a hay pellet, and still thin, there’s something wrong with her, like perhaps cancer. It’s not always apparent on basic bloodwork. Is she grey by chance?
Working her up at a referral clinic could be a good next step.
Is it possible she’s not actually consuming all of that? Wasting it, or another horse is “helping”?
Do you have pictures showing her condition? Where would you rank her on the henneke scale?
I’d rank her a 7 or 8. Blood work came back normal. Cancer would show as elevated wbc’s right? She’s a bay. What I have wondered about, is with her having difficult pregnancies, losing the last foal early on a bigger stud farm, could she have been on all kinds of meds/treatments to keep her in foal? Could the difficulty in keeping weight on her be residual effects of drugs, treatments etc?? I’m not familiar with what is used on difficult broodmares. With her history in mind, I’ve tried to blandest of feeds and treatments required, with a very consistent schedule. Fresh water always. One thing, is she won’t lick a mineral block, like doesn’t know what it is. So I’m going to just start adding some to her mash. Doesn’t tc senior have quite a bit of soy in it?
She is stalled half the day, fed alfalfa and grain inside. The pasture has a lot of grass, pasture mix seeding.
An 8 is straight up fat, so if she’s a 7 or 8, it sounds like she doesn’t need any more weight?
7 or 8 on the henneke scale is obese.
No, not all cancer shows up as high white cells.
the coat issue, the sweating issue, laminitis/hoof issues, tend to be signs of more advanced PPID. Weight loss/topline loss is among the first symptoms
IBS/IBD are other possibilities, and it would take ultrasound to take a look at the thickness of intestinal walls.
Unfortunately, a lot of cancer issues don’t show on blood work until it’s pretty severe
If you’re using the 1-9 scale, then 7 is fat, 8 is pushing obese. High 4 to low 6 is ideal
Then I’m not familiar with the hennekke scale lol, sorry. She isn’t so skinny that it’s concerning, she just isn’t gaining weight despite everything she’s eating. Her top line does suck. She had a muscled neck from cribbing which I didn’t realize at first. Now with that being reduced, topline has changed. IBS has crossed my mind. Cushing’s never did as it never struck me as something tbs could get unless fed a lot of soy, which maybe she has. I’ll put her on tc senior and maybe extra probiotics and see if it makes difference. If not, I’ll do more testing. Thank you for the advice and possible culprits, I appreciate it!
Cushing’s (more correctly called PPID now) isn’t caused by soy, or diet in general, thought PPID horses are generally also predisposed to becoming IR/EMS, so it’s a good idea to feed them as if they’re IR, or going to be. It doesn’t have to be AS strict, but closer to that than to a normal horse
I researched ppid and now I do consider it a possibility. I’ve reduced the pure alfalfa hay by half, feeding more first and have her on tc senior as a mash because of her prior choke episode. She isn’t displaying any symptoms of ulcers other than stinky manure which is changing with the feed change. She did display ulcer symptoms a couple mos ago so I treated her for them, now resolved symptom-wise. Haven’t had her scoped and no idea if she has hind gut ulcers. I’m going to see how she does with the diet change and go from there. Thinking I may buy tc senior gold next time for the added gut support and also from reading about others success with it for ppid horses.
If she’s on hay, hay stretcher pellets, and bran, I’d consider adding a vitamin/mineral option like California trace or Vermont blend. It sounds like you may have something trickier going on but also she likely isn’t getting all of her key nutrients at the moment so it doesn’t seem like it could hurt supporting her system holistically.
Did you scope before and after? My normal weight glossy coat good footed never pinned her ears pony had bleeding ulcers. Even three months in her stomach was still very angry despite her looking “healed” by any external markers.
I’ve changed her feed. I was giving her enough to put weight on two tbs and she was going backwards. Things I’m quite positive of: no worms, no stomach ulcers, no teeth issues, no lingering infections, no anemia, no heart murmurs, no kidney/liver raised enzymes, no pregnancy, no stress. Things I’m not sure of: metabolic, IBS, hind gut, lyme issues. Former broodmare, four or five pregnancies, lost last foal and difficult pregnancies with priors because of recurrent placentitis. No idea how or with what, she was treated with. Beautiful mare, not a huge loss of tone, and one I hope to turn into an all-rounder for myself to maybe foxhunt, hunter derbies, hunterpaces etc… I really did want to buy a mare with the option to be able to breed later but that is highly unlikely with this mare. Great body conformation, but lousy reproductive conformation.
I think with the third alfalfa, tc senior and a grassy pasture, her vitamin and mineral needs should be met. She gets lots of first cutting too, a Timothy, orchard, clover mix. She does have a mineral block as well but doesn’t touch it. Do you think she should still have added vitamins and minerals? Her pasture is on ground that wasn’t heavily farmed and we’re in the fertile belt of NYS. My water well is nearby and I have a mineral problem lol, so I’m pretty sure my dirt isn’t deficient.
If you go with TC Senior you don’t need a vitamin/mineral supplement as long as you are feeding the required minimum amount for her weight in pounds.
We’ve just worked out way up to the required lbs. I gradually switched from what I was feeding prior.
