Oats - The good, the bad and the ugly

My new horse came to me on a diet of 4 lbs of oats and a VMS that’s 13.5-16% Ca & 3% P at 0.5 lbs per day. She’s on free choice grass hay, but I don’t have a weight on that.

She was in full training, so I imagine I’ll have to lower her oat ration to keep her weight (950 lb) in check. I plan to ride ~5 days a week, but I doubt I push her as hard. By my math, at 4 lbs it’s 2.61:1 or 2 lbs is 3.39:1, so the Ca:P is fine.

Currently, she looks GREAT, so I’m hesitant to change anything, but I’m wondering if there’s any merit in moving to something like Unbeetable/Alfalfa/BP/etc as the carrier? Obviously they’re lower NSC and there’s not much of a price difference…

Thoughts?

ETA, that would put me closer to 5.44-5.79:1 ratio if I used Unbeetable forage, for example. At the high end of acceptable? I’d prefer to keep the VMS, considering I’m happy with her condition currently. The grass hay would bring that ratio back down too.

This article has some really great information on micronization (and includes citations)!

https://www.capstonehorsefeed.com/micronization/

Any links are well disguised in that link from what I can see?

I’m asking for a scientific (peer reviewed) reference to back up the claims made on that marketing link. I see a couple of semi-citations made, but none of them provide enough information to identify the actual paper they are referencing.

1 Like

Unfortunately this article was not created by Keyflow, so I’m unable to provide the exact studies this article cites. However, here are a couple of research articles I was able to source on Google. The Dr. Cuddeford they reference, appears to be Dr. Derek Cuddeford.

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/225070776_Starch_digestion_in_horses_The_impact_of_feed_processing

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/5347364_Effects_of_processing_barley_on_its_digestion_by_horses

https://ker.com/equinews/variations-grain-processing-influence-digestibility-horses/ (realize this is not a peer-reviewed, scientific research article, but thought it was worth including as well)

1 Like

Thanks! Those studies seem to indicated that micronizing increases starch digestibility over whole grains but not necessarily consistently over other processing methods. Still, it’s more science than some companies provide!

3 Likes

According to several sources that I read, Oats have 90% digestibility so they don’t benefit from micronizing quite like barley or corn do (with around 40% digestibility).

Just a note :slight_smile: I will find the sources tomorrow.

The studies have all been pretty hard to read, so here’s Equus. It’s got a slightly smaller # but I think that’s ok. https://equusmagazine.com/horse-care/nutrition011903

3 Likes

My horses are fed pretty clean for the most part. However, I have a mare with allergies and asthma. I never knew that allergy testing existed and now I will never have a horse without doing the test.

Both of my mares tested allergic to oats, so that’s a pretty quick and easy decision to eliminate from their diet. One (my 4 year old) has been a little bit of a hard keeper (thin when I bought her and she got very thin when I had her at the trainer for 60 days) but she has put weight on great when in my hands.

I feed 1-2 cups of Purina Outlast per day, along with Hygain Zero and alfalfa pellets. Pretty simple and straightforward. And my horses are out 24/7 so they can either graze as they choose or have free choice hay.

So I guess my long winded suggestion is --> ALLERGY TESTING. If you’ve got a hard keeper, make sure you aren’t trying to fatten them up with something they are allergic to.

2 Likes

That’s a really good point! And even more reason to know exactly what’s in your feed.

Interesting! I use Omneity as well, and have 2 horses in my barn with very poor feet and slow hoof growth. They were on Farriers Formula when they came to me, and since omneity is much higher in biotin than FF we took them off the Farriers. Both horses have increased foot growth and one in now into his 4th showing cycle and has not pulled a shoe off his formerly shelly snow growth foot.

2 Likes