Horse owners often have to consider controlling their horse’s weight. Most of the time, the horse will weigh too much, but there are situations when horses need to gain a little bit of weight. For very active horses, keeping a steady, high weight total is extremely important. Here are some tips on how to make help a horse gain a little bit of weight if it needs to.
High quality hay will help your horse gain more weight than the cheap stuff. Nice hays, such as alfalfa, have a higher calorie intake. If you add five or six extra pounds of alfalfa hay to your horse’s pile, then it will add somewhere around 300 calories to the horse’s daily intake. In addition, you might consider adding a high fat feed to your horse’s bucker in order to add some calories. Rice bran is also high in fat, so consider it for weight gain.
If you have an older horse that is rounding the corner, you might want to switch over to senior feed. This can also be used for younger horses that have dental problems. When horses aren’t able to easily chew their food, they will not eat as much. By switching to this easy to eat food, you can help the horse take in everything that it needs with minimal effort.
Some weight problems can be due to stress in your horse. Stressed or nervous horses lose the balance in their intestines and they need something to help them get it back. In order to help with this, provide your horse with probiotics. After a few days, this will help your horse gain the enzymes that it needs to get the digestive system back on track.
You may want to let your low weight horses have a meal by themselves every once in a while. As a general rule, smaller horses have trouble getting food within their herd. The bigger, stronger, and more aggressive horses will always find a way to take the smaller horse’s share of food, even if you increase the amount of food you provide. If you let the horse eat by himself, confining either the more aggressive or lesser aggressive horse, then you can help fix this problem.
High fat foods can help your horse in a couple of different ways. Not only will it add calories and make the horse gain weight, but you can do so while feeding the horse less. When you feed the horse a little bit less, it reduces the chance that he might colic from eating too much.
In order to know whether or not your weight gain plan is working, you are going to have to be able to measure the horse’s weight. You can’t simply rely on your eyesight to let you know if the horse has gained weight. Weigh him each month on a scale in order to see what sort of progress you are making. If you take the time to make these changes, you should see some results within a couple of months.
Patricia Reszetylo
http://EquineTeleseminar.net
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