Horse's diet - supplements

When you have to decide about your horses diet you should consider some points:

• how old is your horse? Is he a young foal or a senior horse?
• is your horse underweight or overweight?
• does your horse have any allergy?
• does your horse have any respiratory disease?
• does your horse work a lot? Is he a sport horse?
• is your mare pregnant?
• is your mare nursing?
• do you have a stallion or a gelding?
• is your horse recovering from any illness?

First of all understand what your horse needs. Depending on his age, activity and phisical conditions you can choose the diet that is more suitable for him. Do not overevaluete the power of supplements: they can be useful but they are not enough in many circustamces. In fact you can find every kind of supplements but keep in mind that using them too much can also create problems ( do not exceed with some vitamins and minerals). They can be good in case your horse is eating poorly because in this way you can provide vitamins that otherwise he doesn't get, or when your mare is nursing (due to the fact that she passes many nutritional elements to the foal) or during hard training. Supplements available are those related to hooves (with biotin), those to mantein joints, vitamins, supplements especially created for horses with allergies, supplements for nervous horses, electrolytes to reintroduce the electrolytes lost during hard work by sweating, supplements studied to keep flies away, to make the coat shining or to help your horse to gain weight. If you are not sure about what kind of supplement you have to use or if you don't know if it is right to use it or not, ask your vet for an advise! 

Coming back to the horse diet try to give him good hay at least 2 times every day (it would be better if you can do it 4 times); be carefull to feed the animals always at the same time (it wouldn't be good to change their schedule every day and it can create a big stress on them), horses love routine behaviour and they seem to have a clock that indicates when it's time to eat (my horses usually neigh 5 minutes before the usual lunch time to remember me it!). Especially if your horse is stabled, try to feed him many times because in this way he has something to do during the day and he doesn't eat too much in too little time. Be careful you you change feed, decrease it (because your horse is overweight for example) or increase it (their digestive system is not made to afford sudden changes in their diet). So switch gradually in anyone of the cases listed above and also when you put your horse outside having free access to grass. In this last case remember that lush green grass can cause colics or laminitis so put him outside for a limited time (for example one hour or half an hour) increasing that time gradually and decreasing the amount of hay that you give him (because grass integrates it).