Feeding the Poor Doer

Meal sizes are also an important factor to think about when feeding for weight gain. The horse’s stomach is relatively small for the size of their body and, with its structure being fairly rigid, it cannot stretch to accommodate a large meal. This means that feeding very large, higher starch meals in one go can lead to the feeds being pushed through the digestive system much more quickly, with the result that they are not able to absorb the full benefits of the feed. Therefore feeding smaller, more frequent meals can help the horse to get the most out of their feed and support weight and condition. The only exception here is in the case of highly fibrous feeds like chopped fibres which are digested in the hind gut. This means we can think of them like hay, so there’s no need to limit the meal size of these feed types, in contrast to cereal-based feeds. To keep meal sizes manageable, it can be useful to leave separate buckets of higher energy fibre feeds like sugar beet, alfalfa or dried grass products in the stable or paddock for the poor doer to trickle feed on through the day as another method of increasing their calorie intake.

When feeding the fizzy or excitable horse, many owners may struggle to find the balance between supplying enough calories/energy in the diet to maintain their horse’s weight and condition whilst managing their temperament. In these situations, it’s important to remember that feed cannot change a horse’s natural personality, but the choice of energy sources in the ration can influence behaviour. A study funded by Dengie in 2015 showed that horses fed diets high in fibre and oil were less reactive to novel stimuli and had lower resting heart rates than horses fed cereal-based feeds with the same energy/calorie value (Bulmer et al, 2015). This suggests that using higher energy fibre feeds is preferable to traditional high starch conditioning feeds when it comes to weight gain, especially for horses who are naturally sharp and excitable.

The link between diet, the microbiome in the horse’s hind gut and overall health is increasingly being researched and understood. The horse’s colon is lined with mucus, and this offers protection to the colonocytes (gut cells). Fibre provides the specific type of energy that the colonocytes use and so feeding sufficient fibre can help to maintain a healthy gut lining. Studies have shown that when there isn’t enough fibre, bacteria will utilise the mucus to a greater extent as a source of nutrients and this can start to erode the mucus layer (Desai et al., 2016). This leaves the gut more vulnerable to acidity which compromises the joins between cells; a phenomenon known as leaky gut syndrome. If the gut is leakier or more permeable, it means pathogens and substances that wouldn’t normally escape from the gut into the body can now do so, which can lead to poor health or disease. Since infection or disease can result in weight loss, this further demonstrates the importance of fibre not only for providing calories but also for the support of gut health when it comes to improving weight and condition.

If gut health is compromised and harmful bacteria attack the gut, an inflammatory reaction occurs. The symptoms can include loose droppings, diarrhoea and possibly free faecal water. A high fibre diet is the starting point in trying to maintain a healthy gut and avoiding these issues but for horses prone to digestive upsets, the use of a digestive aid supplement containing ingredients like scFOS prebiotics, yeast or postbiotics can be of benefit. These have been shown to aid the health of the digestive system as well as improving fibre digestion by helping to establish a healthy population of microbes in the gut.

To develop topline in horses, they require the building blocks of muscle (amino acids) to be supplied in the diet, combined with working correctly for the muscles to build strength and increase in size. Horses will obtain protein from a variety of sources including grass, forage and the bucket feed. However, it is not only the amount of protein that is important, with the protein ‘quality’ being just as relevant. Protein is made up of amino acids, some of which the horse cannot synthesise themselves and so need to come from the diet. These are called essential amino acids. Of these, lysine is particularly important as it is a limiting amino acid – if the horse has insufficient lysine in the ration, then protein synthesis and therefore muscle development will be limited. Protein sources that contain a higher proportion of essential amino acids are generally considered to be of better quality.

Horse owners are often frightened of protein which is because it has historically been thought to cause a range of issues, which research has now shown not to be the case. Grazing and forage can go a long way to meeting a horse’s protein requirements, but to help ensure they are getting what they need, make sure you are using a feed appropriate for your horse’s workload at the recommended quantity. Good quality pelleted feed balancers are an excellent way provide the horse with vitamins, minerals and essential amino acids including lysine, especially for good doers on restricted forage rations. For poor doers, consuming the recommended amount of a fortified feed that is suitable for the horse’s level of work should supply what they need, alongside sufficient forage. Alfalfa is another great source of quality protein which means that relative to other fibre types, it contains good levels of the essential amino acids that are most valuable to the horse. This means that chopped or pelleted alfalfa can be a useful addition to top up a horse’s intake of quality protein without having to turn to costly protein supplements. More information on protein for horses can be found here.