Feeding Plan for Winter
For horses winter can often mean the change from being out at grass all day to being stabled at night and even for the majority of the day. Even for field-kept horses, the low nutritive value of grazing during the winter will mean that additional forage is essential. In the winter your horse will use up to 80% of his feed energy to keep warm. Making sure that he is well-rugged you will avoid wasting energy on heat loss, and allow it to be used for weight gain and work. Fibre is the most ‘warming’ food for your horse as more heat is produced during its digestion than with any other nutrient. The heat produced by a horse from eating 1kg of hay would be twice that produced from eating 1kg of barley.
Monitoring your horse’s condition with a weightape or tape measure will allow you to pick up changes quickly, and allow you to adjust the diet in good time. Generally, you should be able to run your hand lightly across your horse’s ribcage and just feel his ribs, but not see them. Don’t forget that winter rugs and hairy coats will make it impossible to see even quite prominent ribs, and can easily disguise the first signs of a loss of condition.
Concentrate feed is needed when forage is not maintaining your horse’s condition or giving him enough energy for the work he is doing. If you feed concentrates all year round then you will probably need to increase the quantities you feed during the winter unless your horse is doing less work. Each feed should contain no more than 2Kg (4.5lbs) of mix or cubes, as the horse’s stomach is small and cannot physically cope with larger quantities than this. If you need to feed more than this to prevent weight loss then split it into two or more feeds or change to a conditioning feed . This will allow you to give your horse more energy or put weight on him without having to increase the total amount of feed he is getting.
Older horses are often difficult to keep weight on in winter. Although these horses often maintain their condition fairly well, or even very well, during the summer when they are out at grass, in the colder weather they seem to just ‘drop off’, especially over the withers and hips. As horses get older they tend to reach a stage when they start to look their age and lose weight more easily than they used to.
Specific feeds for older horses take their differing nutritional requirements into consideration. High quality protein is particularly important for older horses, as their metabolism is sometimes less effective at absorbing it. Higher levels of digestible energy are also essential for maintaining body condition, and vitamins and minerals are carefully balanced to suit older horses. Older horse’s apparently reduced ability to digest feed, often combined with diarrhoea or weight loss, should not be attributed to age alone. It is perhaps more likely to reflect chronic parasite damage over the years. Parasite control via a strategic worming programme and good dental care have a significant role to play throughout the horse’s life if problems are to be avoided in later life.
Sometimes there doesn’t seem to be any obvious explanation for the drop in weight, the horse is being offered as much hay as it will eat, and is getting a concentrate feed, and yet is stilling losing weight. But how much hay is he actually eating? This is often the key to the problem – in the spring and summer when grass is highly nutritious and also soft and succulent, the older horse finds it easy to eat and puts weight on well. As the grass deteriorates in quality we supplement it with hay. In theory this should help keep condition on and is an essential source of fibre, but if the hay is hard or stemmy many older horses will find it difficult or even impossible to chew. If you have an older horse and give him as much hay as he will eat, take note of how much that actually is – it may be that you also need to boost his fibre intake from other sources to avoid weight loss. Haylage is one alternative and if even haylage is difficult then either oat straw chaff or hay chaff can be fed as hay replacers, or to ‘top-up’ low intakes. Alfalfa chaff is particularly useful for horses that are losing weight. In addition, high fibre pellets , soaked to form a soft mash can be fed, the amounts fed will depend on the quantity of long fibre that the horse is managing to consume. Soaked sugar beet is another useful source of digestible fibre.
Of course it goes without saying that it is essential to get your horse’s teeth checked at least every 6 months – your vet or dentist will then be able to pick up any problems.
Digestion
Gastric Ulcers
Health
Intolerance & Allergies
Laminitis
Winter Feeding
