anybody do this? Do you feed the same amount of cubes vs grain? Like pound for pound? How’d your horses handle it? Maintain weight? Did you add in a vitamin/mineral supplement?  I would also be feeding free choice hay.

They are not comparable on a lb for lb basis.

Bump

We had a horse that had some issues and were told to feed cubes.  I soaked them a little in water but he would just gobble them up whole.  Not sure  that is great idea either.

This just my opinion.  If I had horse(s) that basically had no issues whatsoever I would feed the Omnis/Omega Complete cube with just a vitamin/mineral supplement.  Of course this is if you can get these cubes.

If I were to only feed alfalfa I would go with alfalfa pellets. 

What vitamin/mineral supplement? 

I feed simple, Sho-Glo or Calf Manna and Quiessence is another good supplement. 

I just got a new barrel horse and he was never on grain.  I attemped graining him with Ultium because I like to feed too much - and it turned him into a raging dragon. way out of character. So, I pulled the grain (as instructed initially..) and started him on a 30 day ulcer treatment.  He mellowed back to his normal, awesome self.

So.

I now feed him alfalfa cubes soaked til it's almost like oatmeal, every night.  In my mind it is a "treat" that replaces his grain.

He does not get any supplements right now - do you all recommend a calf manna / sho glo as a topper to round out this diet?

I've never fed like this before but I feel he is ulcer prone so will not be moving him back to grain at all.

I stopped feeding grain to most of my horses about a year ago and switched them to Danco Forage's Omnis cubes (pasture access too) and ADM's mineral. They have never looked better and that's with maybe feeding them cubes a few times a week. We recently added D&D Nutrition cubes into the mix. These will help my barrel horse maintain his topline that I couldn't keep with just Omnis. He is now doing fantastic on Omnis and D&D plus a mineral and Animal Element supplements. I highly recommend Omnis and D&D to anyone who is interested. They are both fantastic products!!

(Disclaimer - I do sell both products but that's only because I truly believe in them and they work!)

I would really like to try the D&D Nutrition cubes but there are no close dealers to me.  

Grain does not make them a dragon.  Too much grain is hard on the system.  I only feed 2 to 3 lbs per horse per day.   I have mine made at our feed mill.  What do you think that all these per fab feed products are made from. 

I love the Omnis cubes... I still spray them with water when I feed them even though they break apart in your hand... choke scares me cause I have some piggies lol....  but as far as amount, I just have the scoops, and give them almost a full scoop in the evenings, mine are out on pasture 24/7 pretty much

It doesn’t make ALL horses a dragon but it does make a few goofy, silly, a dragon, whatever you want to call it. 

What type of Grain {feed} do you feed? Whats in the mix {feed}?

Another supplement I forgot to add since I'm new to it and started my guys on it a few months back, its Forgo I love love what I'm seeing, my one gelding that does get a bit of a tummy ache at times I'm pretty sure its uclers that flare up sometimes since hes a bit more high strung and a retire barrel horse, but since I started him on Forco I see a big difference with him. So if your horse is ucler prone I would really put him on Forco. I dont think I would really worry about other supplements but Quiessence would be good. 

Quiessance is a good Magnesium supplement

Awesome! I will check into it.   Thanks!

All of our horses are on alfalfa. Not cubes though. Then we do Select Alfalfa as a ration balancer, as well as MSM and once a month sandclear crumbles (Arizona sand and my mare is a forager). Right now none of them are competing, but my mare came from a guy who was roping off of her up to 5 nights a week and he fed only alfalfa. 

I think a lot of what people feed is dependent on the region you live in. Like my horses do not have access to grass pasture here in the desert. But when I lived in Oklahoma we only really had to supplement if hauling hard or in the winter. In Florida, the grass sucked so we supplemented year round. 

The one I run is on alfalfa hay and MVP Exceed 6-Way plus their Natural Vitamin E, he does just fine. I have 2 others that get soaked alfalfa pellets to replace some of their grain meals. I give them 1/2 of a 3qt scoop of pellets to replace 1/4 scoop of the grain. They went from 3/4 scoop to 1/2 scoop of grain. The one I run loses his mind whenever he's on any grain that has molasses or corn, unless you ride him hard 5-6 days a week. He goes from being the bomb proof kid broke kind of gelding to a boogery compressed spring waiting to explode at any second. He ran a lot harder when I had him on the Pro Force Fuel, just 2 handfuls 2x a day. But it was too much work keeping him rode down enough to be normal and even then he would still spook at the dumbest stuff. I feed the others Kalm N Ez now & sometimes a treat if he ran well I'll let him have a small handful of it. Doesn't bother him & he gets ulcers in a snap. But he's on Gastro-Plex daily too to combat that. The other 2 do well with the alfalfa pellets/small grain meal and if I need extra weight I just add more pellets. My 5 year old also doesn't do well with corn/molasses grains, she gets a lot goofier than normal & she's already worked 6 days a week for an hour. We have another at the barn that lost his mind after going from 1/4 scoop regular Safe Choice to the Safe Choice Senior. Switched him back & he was normal again after a few weeks. All 3 of mine are on the Exceed 6-Way and the Vitamin E. They have no access to grazing unless I hand graze them in the yard. I recently did bloodwork to see if any needs weren't being met & they were all fine. 

The OP brings up an interesting question. Reading labels, trading pound for pound alfalfa hay for grain does not add up. In reality though, by eliminating a significant amount of grain from the system, if that is being used, the difference in hind gut efficiency results in the capture of a very real increase in digestible energy from the pre existing roughage plus that of the added alfalfa. In the end, it is quite possible to have a net increase usable energy from a pound for pound trade. The grain limit per feeding that a horse can process without hind gut disruption is under two pounds. If you feed more than that, your horse may well benefit from the replacement of the excess grain, in some cases all grain, with the same amount of alfalfa. 

I have swapped out alfalfa for grain. And this past year had to swap out good local timothy with western kick tush timothy. I have now had to start lowering feed amounts of the hays because my crew is getting very portly. They all look fantastic, and Zan (my avatar) kept dapples all summer long with no fly sheet and full time turn out. My weaner this year is a butterball, seriously. 

Very informative thread. I always learn so much from this forum.

D&D Nutrition is definitely available in your area:

1. Prime Tme Equine

Erin Gallegos

Pauls Valley, OK

970-531-0747

2. Pride Farms

Bryel Mulligan

Coleman, OK

605-695-3901

3. Durant Salebarn

Rebeca Hazaleus

Durant, OK

580-230-1496

LOL  Yes I know but they are like 2/3 hours away.  

I started feeding cubes about 2 years ago. 

Right now my 3 get 12.5# of Hayrite mini cubes in the morning. I have 5 ground feeder buckets I split it between. At night they get 12.5# of cubes spread between the 5 buckets, they each get 1/2# renew gold, a handful of calf manna and I add forco and vitamin E. 

We live on pretty much a dry lot. We are renting this place and they overgrazed it for years. We are trying to get grass to grow but it's a slow process. We keep round bales out for them.

The bay is 13. The sorrel with the black tail bag is 11 and the sorrel with the blue tailbag is 18. I ride 5 days a week and they eat what I posted above. 

They look great! 

When looking at all the crazy labels on feed sacks and the fad supplements people spend big $$$$'s on ... I remind myself to Keep It Simple Stupid (I call this my KISS system) .... 

I prefer baled alfalfa but when I feed cubes .. I fill a 5 gallon bucket 3/4 full with cubes and then fill it with water to soak while I am feeding WHOLE OATS to my tribe. 

In less than 30 minutes the cubes have soaked up the water, softened up and expanded for easy eating.  The reason for soaking is to prevent the compacted dehydrated cubes from landing in a wrinkle in the stomach or all the way to the colon and soaking up the protective slime lining protecting  these digestive tracts and causing choking, sores, ulcers or impaction.  AND being soaked adds water to their system rather than drawing water from their entire body. 

I decided to go back to natural feed rather than feed highly advertised and expensive feeds that have ingredients you can't pronounce and are saturated with waste products from human food processing and ethanol processing.  These are used to increase the profits to the milling companies and not for the betterment of your horses health. 

To keep bones, ligaments and cartilage growing .. the alfalfa and whole oats are the correct balance of calcium and phosphorous ... and the whole oats adds fiber to their gut to help prevent ulcers. Every other day I also throw a handful of GroStrong minerals into their buckets with a 3 lb scoop of whole oats while I return with the soaked cubes and feed a ~6 lb scoop to each horse. If you have never soaked cubes before .. you are going to be amazed how much water they will absorb and more than double their dry weight that has only 5% moisture. (when you bale alfalfa you strive to have 12-15% moisture and it is measured in the field when baling)

SUMMARY:  3 lb scoop of whole oats .. 6 lb scoop of soaked alfalfa cubes (50% is water) .. a handful of GroStrong every other day .. with pasture or hay available 24/7 ...  {{{ if horse needs added weight .. add a pound of cracked or chopped corn daily... on palominos/buckskins if you want a darker shade of gold after shedding in the spring .. add the corn to their feed program right now)}}} 

DE-WORMING PROGRAM:  You can have the best feeding program in the world but if you don't have a good worming program .. you have wasted your money ..  My worming schedule follows holidays which are easy to remember and follows the 60-90 day worming programs suggested by different wormers.   Foals start this program with the holiday closest to being 6 months of age .  

ONE YEAR SCHEDULE each worming is a full tube to each horse   ...  Christmas // New Years week one tube of QUEST 90 days;  IVERMECTIN is used on the following Holidays .. funny how they fall 60 days apart ....EASTER Ivermectin 60 days;   MEMORIAL DAY; LABOR DAY; HALLOWEEN ... then start over with Quest at Christmas or New Years ...   (reason for a full tube is simple .. you want to aggressively kill the worms and not allow any to survive to become immune to the wormer .. this also prevents any spitters or head jerkers to lose any of the wormer failing to get a full dose)  

While I am writing a book ... get to know the difference between PROBIOTICS AND PREBIOTICS .. to enhance your horses digestive system and prevent stomach//colon sores or ulcers use PREBIOTICS after any major sickness or using antibiotics to feed the good gut bacteria the sickness or antibiotics killed.  It astounds me that vets are so oriented to probiotics ... gotta be they are so available and a good profit markup ... 

My college micro-biology classes made me aware that most of the time the best information to apply to horses comes from the articles on the use of meds on humans since our digestive systems are so much alike.   The way a new born foal starts their good gut bacteria is by following Mother Natures instinctive need to eat some of their dams poop within 24 hours.. .. this is another reason I worm my mares 1-2 weeks prior to guesstimated foaling date ... so the foal doesn't get a gut full of worm eggs.  This article for humans contradicts itself as all writers do to cya from any critics ... scroll all the way to the bottom and read the summary chart on probiotics vs prebiotics to get a clear view of what happens ..... https://www.prebiotin.com/prebiotin-academy/what-are-prebiotics/prebiotics-vs-probiotics/  

Since foal season is coming up ... NO enemas on foals !! again Mother Nature has plugged up their behinds until they have sucked enough progesterone to pressure up tummy and colon to remove any wrinkles before blowing the cork out of their rear end.. it will be black as tar and nasty looking and if you look around you will find the plug  ... poop from milk will be as yellow as mustard.   

At mares heat cycle at 7-11 days foals will get diarrhea so why not help them out by greasing their butts also where they wag their tails with vaseline or other type of greasy substance to keep them from scalding their heinies ... ....  If their squirts are very thin liquid you can help them from getting dehydrated by giving 30cc of Pepto Bismol (not the generic kind) twice daily for two days in the mouth ..  .. 

Here is a photo of what mine look like on the above programs ... 

Mom with her 2018 filly by On A Gator and 2019 rd roan filly by AUTOMATIC CAT 

 Mom is in foal to SLYE BY DESIGN for 2020 baby..