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Non-textured senior feed recommendations

My older mare has been eating Triple Crown Senior for many years and has been doing great! Unfortunately, I think her teeth have gotten to the point where she’s having trouble eating the beet pulp shreds. I always soak it, but the beet pulp always seems a little chewy. Are there any senior feeds out there that soak into a good mash but aren’t textured like TC Senior? I believe I have most Triple Crown feeds available, also Nutrena, possibly Tribute, and I’m not sure about others. Any recommendations?

If it’s available to you, Blue Seal Sentinel feeds are extruded so should soak into a totally homogeneous mush. They produce a Senior and an Active Senior that would be more comparable to TC Senior fat-wise.

Triple Crown Senior Gold is not textured. It is more expensive, but your store might be able to order it for you.

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It soaks beautifully too. And is just generally a reall great feed.

It’s definitely textured, with the beep shreds in it. Complete, Sr, Sr Gold, Growth, all textured with pellets and the beep shreds.

Triple Crown Senior Active+ is available only at Tractor Supply (created specifically for them, at their request) and is an extruded pelleted.

Purina Senior and Senior Active are extruded pellets as well.

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I was going to suggest Sentinel as well, but their Senior does not have as much fat in it as the Triple Crown. However, their L/S Performance feed does and is still extruded. I stock all of these at work and have several customers’ seniors that needed extruded feeds doing well on the L/S.

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Purina Senior Active is technically not a strictly pelleted product. It also isn’t a complete feed and is designed to be fed with forage. There are a few other “Senior” labeled feeds from other manufacturers that aren’t complete feeds, but I can’t recall exactly which ones those are off the top of my head.

The Triple Crown Senior Active is an extruded pellet instead of textured!

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It does have beet pulp in it but it’s 100% pellets that break down when soaked which I’m guessing is what the OP is looking for.

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The Nutrena SafeChoice Senior is pelleted and can be fed as a complete feed if hay is a problem. It is designed to break down into a mash easily.

ProForce Senior is pelleted, but may have some shreds but it’s a higher fat, not designed as a complete feed.

Boo, I was trusting their website that says pelleted, just like the Sr Active

TC Sr Active+ is also not a complete feed

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I board retired horses, and have had several ancient ones without many teeth over the years. I have never had trouble feeding them soaked tc senior, so I wonder if you are using enough water/soaking long enough. You may well be; but what works for me is prepping the next meal in a nosebag that is put into a Coleman cooler with water. That way the feed soaks up absolutely all the water it possibly can over 6 -8 hours. It is REALLY mushy!

The coolers work well because they stop the water from freezing in the winter, and stop the feed from fermenting in summer.

None of this might be helpful to you, but I pass it on in case it is.

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Jumping off of this point, OP if you are a little short on time and/or don’t have a cooler at the barn, I wonder if you could use a blender after the initial soaking? Then maybe it would really get the shreds into smaller pieces

It is not 100% pelleted.

More importantly, it isn’t a complete feed and therefore not suitable for the OP’s horse, who I’m assuming can’t chew forage if it can’t even manage soaked beet pulp.

I feed it every day- mine is 100% pellets. Maybe regional formulation?

I have also fed it. And, while I don’t work directly for Purina, I work for a company that is affiliated with them. I have never seen a sample from any mill that is 100% pelleted. But it is pretty darn close, I’ll give you that!

Do you soak in warm water? TC Senior always softened up really nice after soaking with warm water for about 10-15 minutes. It’s been a while since I’ve fed TC Senior Gold, but I don’t remember it having the large beet pulp shreds that the original formula had.

According to their own literature it is not textured. It is pelleted and extruded. The lighter coloured bits are likely the Amplify fat/protein extrusions. The pellets will contain the beet pulp and all the other ingredients.

Here’s an image of a similar product (Evolution Senior - Canuck version) showing the pellets (dark) and the extruded fat/protein supplement (Pur Athlete - similar to Amplify) which are lighter in colour.

image

Count me in as another one who soaks TCS into a total mush. I use a lot of hot water and it almost completely dissolves. My mare sucks it up almost like she drinks water. Definitely no chewing.

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I guess I’m getting a little technical, as we former academics are prone to do. Technically a pelleted feed is a homogenous product. So Senior Active, Ultium, etc. are described as “pelleted & extruded” rather than just “pelleted”. Buckeye Feeds uses the description “multi-textured” for their feeds like that. My company just calls them “textured”. It’s a jargon/industry thing.

So we’re not really in disagreement. I apologize for being pedantic about it.

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