Feeding Your Horse

horse. However, because they are herbivores they need lots of food. The reason behind this is that
plants do not give as much energy and minerals as meats. So feeding your horse lots of plants makes
up for their low nutritional value. They also need lots and lots of water because they sweat a
lot. This page will give you all you need to know about the basics of feeding your horse.
The Rules of Feeding Your Horse:
a) Feed your horse little and often, rather than giving large quantities of feed at one time.
b) Only feed your horse fresh food.
c) Match the amount of feed that you feed to your horse with the quantity of work your horse does.
d) Make sure that you do not exercise your horse straight after he or she has eaten.
e) If you want to introduce new feeds to your horses diet make sure that you do it gradually.
f) Your horse should be fed plenty of bulk food such as hay and grass.
g) Your horse needs to graze in a field for part of the day to be healthy.
h) If your horse is a stabled one, make sure that you feed your horse succulent like carrots,
turnips and apples.
i) Keep your feeding pattern the same each day. You should feed your horse regularly and
consistently every day.
j) Keep your horses manager and hay net clean.
Types of Feed and Hay:
a) Pony nuts this horse feed looks like rabbit or guinea pig pellets. It is very easy to
feed.
b) Coarse mix coarse mix is a mixture of pony nuts and squashed oats. Like pony nuts, it is e
asy to feed.
c) Bran bran is a brownish feed that has a texture similar to that of ProNutro or Maltabella. It is
often used in mashes which are fed to sick horses.
d) Flaked maize this horse feed is made up of flattened and flaked maize. Feed all maize feeds
to your horse sparingly.
e) Dry sugar beet dry sugar beet looks just like a grey bran. You must soak all sugar beet feeds
before feeding them to your horse.
f) Chaff chaff is a mix of chopped up hay and straw. It is generally used as the mass of most horse
feeds while the others are just mixed into it.
g) Micronized flaked barley this feed is given to horses whose owners do not like to feed them
oats. It looks a like Jungle Oats.
h) Soaked sugar beet this is just dry sugar beet that has been soaked.
i) Bruised oats bruised oats are loved by horses, but not so much by their riders and owners as oats
tend to make the horses unmanageable. But if fed in small amounts, oats are fine.
j) Hay hay is pretty much a mixture of edible grasses. It can be fed in bulk.
k) Lucerne this is the dried stalks and sliced up leaves of the Lucerne plant. It does not have the
flowers in it and it pretty much the same as hay.
Types of Treats and Supplements:
a) Mineral licks a mineral lick is just a brownish block of minerals. Horses love these blocks and they
are good for them because they give them any extra minerals they might need. You can place them in the horses
stable or paddock.
b) Cod liver oil a tablespoon of cod liver oil into one of the horses feeds each day in winter can give
them vitamins.
c) Sweet, crunchy treats these are apples, turnips and carrots. However, you must not feed your horse too
many apples as they are known to cause colic. One a day is fine.
d) Sunflower oil horses need a bit of fat in their diets, and by adding a tablespoon of sunflower oil to
each of their feeds.
Feeding Your Horse Feed:
1. First, find out how much feed your horse needs by multiplying his weight by 2.5 and dividing the answer
by 200. Then you need to decide what portion of this should be feed, which should be grass and which should
be hay. You will need your tutor or an expert to help you with this.
2. Once you have determined how much feed you are going to feed your horse, measure out one fifth of it into
his feed bucket. You must feed him this one fifth of his feed allowance early in the morning, mid-morning,
lunchtime, mid-afternoon and suppertime.
P.S. You should also determine what sorts of feeds you are going to feed your horse. You will need to talk to
your tutor or an expert about this because each horse is different.
Feeding Your Horse Hay:
1. First, find out how much hay your horse needs by multiplying his weight by 2.5 and dividing the answer by
200. Then you need to decide what portion of this should be feed, which should be grass and which should be
hay. You will need your tutor or an expert to help you with this.
2. Once you have determined how much hay you are going to feed your horse, measure out one third of it into his
hay net. You must feed him this one third of his hay allowance early in the morning, lunchtime and suppertime.
3. Take the full hay net to your horses stable. Inside his stable there should be a tying ring. Put the string
of the hay net through the ring. Then, pull it up to about the height of your horses muzzle.
4. Loop the string through the rope mesh around the bottom of the hay net and take it back up to the tying
ring. Then, put the end of the string through the ring again and secure the hay net in its place with a
firm quick-release knot.
P.S. If your horse has a dust or breathing problem, then you must soak the hay net (full of the portion of hay,
of course) in a clean bin full of water for a bit before you give it to him.
Letting Your Horse Graze:
1. First, find out how much grass your horse needs by multiplying his weight by 2.5 and dividing the answer by
200. Then you need to decide what portion of this should be feed, which should be grass and which should be
hay. You will need your tutor or an expert to help you with this, as well as determining how much time it
will take your horse to get the amount of grass he needs.
2. Unlike hay and feed, grass does not need to be fed to your horse a little at a time. If your horse needs to
graze for three hours each day, you can put him in the paddock for three hours straight.
3. When you let your horse go into his paddock, you must never leave his halter or head collar on. It is very
dangerous because your horse could get his halter hooked on something. If he panics, he could badly injure
himself.
P.S. Some horses suffer from a condition called laminitis. Laminitis is a sickness that makes a horses
hooves get inflamed so badly that they cannot walk. The only way to prevent this disease is by putting
your horse in a nearly bare paddock, where there is not enough grass to make him sick. The only other
way to deal with this is to stable your horse for most of the day and put him out in a lush paddock
for short periods of time.
do not understand it enough to completely care for a horses feeding) but as long as you have an expert
working with you, and books to study, you should be fine.
One last thing: You may be wondering how to know whether your horse is fat, thin or in shape. It is not
difficult to tell if your horse is fat, you should not be able to feel its ribs or spine. He will also
have thick pads over his shoulders and a round belly. If your horse too thin, you will be able to see his
ribs and his hip bones. His head will also look too big for his neck. If you horse is on shape, he will
look sleek, his outline will be smooth and you should be able to feel his bones with a prod from your
finger.
But this is very important your horses weight depends heavy on his breed. For instance, Beetle, the
horse I have been riding for five-years, looks a bit podgy because he is a Welsh Cob x Boerperd x
Thoroughbred. Welsh Cobs and Boerperds are a bit heavier than most horses, so Beetle is actually pretty
close to his proper weight. However, Dreamtime, the gelding I have only recently started riding, looks
almost thin. Again, this is down to his breed. He is half Arabian and half
Appaloosa. While Appys are
average in horse weights, Arabian’s are some of the lightest of all breeds of horses. So, just like
Beetle, Dreamer is pretty close to his proper weight.