missyclare
Posted : 5/23/2012 2:12:17 PM
First of all, you'll have to forgive her for being old, cause gravity rules with us. The Wellness is high fat. What they call cool calories. Horses don't require fat at all. When the hue and cry went up about sugar and starch in the diet, they started this high fat thing, which is not the answer. They still don't get it. After 3 months of high fat feeding, it will have depressed the enzyme complex that allows the burning of glycogen for energy, where the energy should be coming from. 95% of fat fed gets stored, like fatty pads on the body or crested necks.
It also harbors inflammatory cytokines that sit ready at any glucose rise that goes straight to her feet, predisposing her to laminitis. Fat has no nutritional value whatsoever, its just fat. Being 25 years old automatically pushes her into Cushings/IR risk and the pasture with clover and all she can eat is risky. I would get her off the Wellness and the fat and let her system straighten out. I would temper the pasture access to nightime when the sugar is lower and feed hay during the day.
I would treat her like an IR horse, even though she isn't, so that she won't become one. You don't want to go there. What grass she gets will be adequate in nutrients. If you see her standing around looking depressed and drooling, you'll know its slaframine poisoning from the clover and should get her off it right away anyway. I don't think she needs a supplement. Its protein that builds muscle and it sounds like she's getting plenty of that. The pasture itself is excess and the Wellness not needed while on grass.
Strengthening exercises like lifting her legs over logs or poles or hillwork will help. A good balanced trim will also help to lift the back because she will be able to support herself more correctly. Other than that, a sway back at this age is a given, along with the hollows over her eyes and the need for saddle pads with inserts.
As for the Wellness, I wouldn't go back to it later, either. The fat is unnecessary, the 12% starch is dangerous and they don't tell you how much sugar is in it, but starch is converted 100% to glucose and worse than sugar. With both of them added together, it should be under 10%. The stabilized flax seed has been processed and lost its omega values and the mineral amounts are a joke. Biotin amount is really a joke.
This winter, I would buy a bag of flax seed and grind it up in a $10 coffee grinder just before feeding. That's the fat she requires...essential fatty acids. (4oz./day). 1tbn. of salt/day to drive thirst and add some iodine, yeast for a healthy gut, California Trace Minerals, which will deliver proper amounts and 2000IU of Vit. E/day (human natural E gelcaps from Walmart.) You can get E+Se from Uckele, that will include Selenium in the mix. E and Selenium do better when delivered together. I would deliver it all in one cup of oats, no more. Oats are so high in starch that they use it as a benchmark to measure corn against. So shy away from grains and go to beetpulp shreds for added fiber, nutrition and safe weight gain, if needed.
So, forgive the back, do what you can. As long as she stays happy and healthy and safe with her diet, a sunken back is merely a badge of her lifetime of hard work. If you avoid the store bought feed, you avoid high fat, inadequate nutrients, high starch and sugar and especially high iron, which is another real baddie. Hope this helps....