|
|
Veteran
Posts: 276
 
| I know our grass has started to come on here in the last couple weeks too, which is more nutrients for them. Just a suggestion, but I would cut the grain out completely or at least by a lot. Full feed grass hay, plus some pasture grass, plus a flake of alfalfa and a little grain, should be plenty to maintain even the most used performance horses. Our horses get full feed prairie hay and two flakes dairy quality alfalfa morning and night and they are fit and have plenty of weight and energy. They are ridden 6-7 days a week and hauled/competed on at least once if not 2-3 times per week. You could try it and see how it goes. My guess is that is a LOT of energy going in with not much means to burn it, which gives you the change in attitude.
|
|
| |
|
 Warrior Mom
Posts: 4400
| SpaceCowboy - 2017-03-01 2:26 PM
I know our grass has started to come on here in the last couple weeks too, which is more nutrients for them. Just a suggestion, but I would cut the grain out completely or at least by a lot. Full feed grass hay, plus some pasture grass, plus a flake of alfalfa and a little grain, should be plenty to maintain even the most used performance horses. Our horses get full feed prairie hay and two flakes dairy quality alfalfa morning and night and they are fit and have plenty of weight and energy. They are ridden 6-7 days a week and hauled/competed on at least once if not 2-3 times per week. You could try it and see how it goes. My guess is that is a LOT of energy going in with not much means to burn it, which gives you the change in attitude.
I didn't even factor in the pasture grass coming in. Didn't think about it! But it's making sense... seems like overnight we went from dormant to bright green out there.
Thanks for the replies |
|
| |
|
 Expert
Posts: 2258
| I couldn't see the label on it but it is fairly low in sugar and starch it listed at 5% sugar and 10% starch I think . Does it have any soy? I have one who is a total nut if she gets any soy. She is never super quiet but if soy is in her feed she turns into the devil. |
|
| |
|
 A Somebody to Everybody
Posts: 41354
 
Location: Under The Big Sky Of Texas | cutnrunqhmt - 2017-03-01 4:01 PM I couldn't see the label on it but it is fairly low in sugar and starch it listed at 5% sugar and 10% starch I think . Does it have any soy? I have one who is a total nut if she gets any soy. She is never super quiet but if soy is in her feed she turns into the devil.
The label on the Omega Force? |
|
| |
|
A Somebody to Everybody
Posts: 41354
Location: Under The Big Sky Of Texas | Omega Force is very concentrated and was designed to be fed in smaller amounts then the traditional feeds. I didnt see any Soy in it. |
|
| |
|
Warrior Mom
Posts: 4400
| I just looked at the label, there is soybean meal and soybean oil in it. I know my horse doesn't have a problem with soy though... I've fed him soy before. I rode this evening and other than a plastic bag stuck to the barb wire flapping in the wind he was pretty well behaved and focused on our workout. No shooting today, it's been a few days since I've heard it. I only gave him 1lb tonight and I'm keeping them stalled tonight with a net full of hay. Riding thru the pasture I hadn't realized how thick the grass was coming in. |
|
| |
|
A Somebody to Everybody
Posts: 41354
Location: Under The Big Sky Of Texas | want2chase3 - 2017-03-01 6:16 PM I just looked at the label, there is soybean meal and soybean oil in it. I know my horse doesn't have a problem with soy though... I've fed him soy before. I rode this evening and other than a plastic bag stuck to the barb wire flapping in the wind he was pretty well behaved and focused on our workout. No shooting today, it's been a few days since I've heard it. I only gave him 1lb tonight and I'm keeping them stalled tonight with a net full of hay. Riding thru the pasture I hadn't realized how thick the grass was coming in.
Glad to hear he rode better tonight, I just bet between the guns going off and the good grass coming in had to do with him being silly.. I guess I over looked the soy, but the soy I have no problem with either.  |
|
| |
|
Expert
Posts: 2258
| Southtxponygirl - 2017-03-01 4:04 PM
cutnrunqhmt - 2017-03-01 4:01 PM I couldn't see the label on it but it is fairly low in sugar and starch it listed at 5% sugar and 10% starch I think . Does it have any soy? I have one who is a total nut if she gets any soy. She is never super quiet but if soy is in her feed she turns into the devil.
The label on the Omega Force?
For what ever reason I was having trouble getting to the labels so I never saw it. It is a feed we don't have in our area. |
|
| |
|
Expert
Posts: 2258
| want2chase3 - 2017-03-01 6:16 PM
I just looked at the label, there is soybean meal and soybean oil in it. I know my horse doesn't have a problem with soy though... I've fed him soy before. I rode this evening and other than a plastic bag stuck to the barb wire flapping in the wind he was pretty well behaved and focused on our workout. No shooting today, it's been a few days since I've heard it. I only gave him 1lb tonight and I'm keeping them stalled tonight with a net full of hay. Riding thru the pasture I hadn't realized how thick the grass was coming in.
I only have one who we have issues with soy. I fought her goofy attitude for a year finally made a feed change and she is better. Glad your horse was doing better . |
|
| |
|
Warrior Mom
Posts: 4400
| Southtxponygirl - 2017-03-01 6:25 PM
want2chase3 - 2017-03-01 6:16 PM I just looked at the label, there is soybean meal and soybean oil in it. I know my horse doesn't have a problem with soy though... I've fed him soy before. I rode this evening and other than a plastic bag stuck to the barb wire flapping in the wind he was pretty well behaved and focused on our workout. No shooting today, it's been a few days since I've heard it. I only gave him 1lb tonight and I'm keeping them stalled tonight with a net full of hay. Riding thru the pasture I hadn't realized how thick the grass was coming in.
Glad to hear he rode better tonight, I just bet between the guns going off and the good grass coming in had to do with him being silly.. I guess I over looked the soy, but the soy I have no problem with either.
He was a good boy! I made him stand by flapping plastic bag for a good while till he understood it wasn't going to kill him and that I wouldn't let it kill him lol! Then we did some figure 8s in the "danger zone" he was a little nervous but least I had him focused on me instead of what was behind those trees |
|
| |
|
Warrior Mom
Posts: 4400
| I just found out this evening that our other neighbors had a 3 day old calf killed by a pack of coyotes last week... we share a fence line as well.. could be another reason why he's been a little on edge. |
|
| |
|
Warrior Mom
Posts: 4400
| Well, he was back to his ol normal lazy self today when I rode him. He didn't even give the plastic bag a 2nd look lol! I lowered his feed last night and kept them stalled till after breakfast this morning. Granted I haven't heard any shooting going on this whole week, maybe they ran out.  |
|
| |
|
| want2chase3 - 2017-02-28 3:22 PM I recently put my normally laid back, almost lazy gelding back on Bluebonnet Omega Force. He was on the nature's blend performance formula for a while and I just wasn't impressed with it and how much I needed to feed. Well, he's always been a little spooky, nothing out of control but he'd spook at stupid things every now n then, but he's gotten so much worse and only thing I've changed was the grain. He only gets 4lbs a day of it. He was like a total hot head the last time I rode him, prancing and spooking at every little thing... now, it doesn't help my next door neighbors have started shooting their guns every afternoon behind my pasture where I ride... I'm chalking some of that up to his change as well... but I was wondering if that feed could also be contributing to his extra spook and nervous energy... I was watching him the other day and he was watching something in the bushes and then he spooked so hard and tried to turn and run and he tripped or slipped and fell down all the way, rolled over and jumped up and took off bucking like a fool. I'm about to go buy more feed and I'm thinking maybe this isn't the right feed for him.. I don't really want to go back to the nature's blend again, it's really high in starch IMO but that never seemed to affect him. He looks fantastic on the omega force but I can't deal with this extra garbage from him..
IMO - the issues your experiencing sound like a textbook case of magnesium deficiency. Iron competes with mag for absorption so I would be mindful of this when selecting any feed/supplement that has added iron. The Omega Force has 300ppm of iron, plus uses Mag Oxide which is said to be the least absorbed form of mag (only a 4% rate for humans)-citrate and malate forms are much better choices for absorption. Horses use their magnesium stores for any "stress" so you may be seeing the symptoms show up now because for every shot fired, your guy is using magnesium and he has run dry. |
|
| |
|
 Money Eating Baggage Owner
Posts: 9586
Location: Phoenix | It IS springtime; he's probably feeling good.
Although if that feed has a lot of sugar....we'll there you go. |
|
| |
|
 My Heart Be Happy
Posts: 9159
Location: Arkansas | Chandler has pond guns going during the cold months to help with the blue herons and water turkeys. And of course one of them is in our pasture. It took our herd several weeks to get used to the gun (it's set to go off every few minutes for three consecutive shots, from about 7:30 am to 7:30 pm), but now they will graze right up to it and eat. I feel for you, because I can't imagine trying to ride when all that is going on. Hope you get it all worked out soon. |
|
| |
Folks on-line