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 Regular
Posts: 66
Location: Burns, WY | Your cooperatives as a great place to start to try to find someone to test your hay and you can also talk to folks around you that do grow hay and see where they go for testing, plus, even ask the people that you are purchasing the hay from to see if they may have tested their hay.
The hardest thing about recommending any one particular hay to someone for their PSSM horse is that there is so many variables. The time of day that the hay was cut, at what stage of growth it was cut and even soil conditions can affect the NSCs of hay.
Like a vet in MT that has a PSSM horse will recommend alfalfa and my vet in WY will recommend grass hay to his clients. I think testing or asking for test results is the best way to go and then if you see good consistencies year after year from your hay suppliers, then you'll know what you should and shouldn't buy.
Also, when it comes to grains for horses, people really need to be careful. Some feeds will claim they are low starch but yet their NSCs might be in the 18% mark, which come PSSM horses just can't handle it. Just like the University of MN recommends Ultium, but some horses can't handle the NSCs of that feed and need even lower NSCs. Then, some feeds add chromium and that is a big no, no as well for PSSM horses. It is fine for horses with RER, but not PSSM. | |
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 "Drank the Kool Aid"
Posts: 5496
 
Location: Iowa, LA | Just bumping for awareness! | |
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 Undercover Amish Mafia Member
Posts: 9991
 
Location: Kansas | A vet suggested my mare had PSSM due to being diagnosed with Fibrotic Myopathy, so I put her on a high fat/low starch diet. Even before then I didn't notice any symptoms, other than her being lazy occasionally. Her maternal grandsire was recently diagnosed with PSSM, I'm looking at getting my mare tested to see....but can PSSM be passed along from the grandsire? What other symptoms would I need to look for? | |
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  Champ
Posts: 19623
Location: Peg-Leg Julia Grimm | hoofs_in_motion - 2013-07-11 10:30 AM A vet suggested my mare had PSSM due to being diagnosed with Fibrotic Myopathy, so I put her on a high fat/low starch diet. Even before then I didn't notice any symptoms, other than her being lazy occasionally. Her maternal grandsire was recently diagnosed with PSSM, I'm looking at getting my mare tested to see....but can PSSM be passed along from the grandsire? What other symptoms would I need to look for? I'm just begining to learn about PSSM. But I can answer your question about the heritability. It is a dominant gene. In a horse who has one positive gene it is expressed in varying degrees. It is passed on to any foals 50% of the time. So it could have been passed from the maternal grsire of your mare through her dam.
Edited to be more clear.
Edited by OregonBR 2013-07-11 12:36 PM
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 Expert
Posts: 2674
Location: Silver Lake, MN | appycowgirl - 2013-07-09 4:02 PM Your cooperatives as a great place to start to try to find someone to test your hay and you can also talk to folks around you that do grow hay and see where they go for testing, plus, even ask the people that you are purchasing the hay from to see if they may have tested their hay. The hardest thing about recommending any one particular hay to someone for their PSSM horse is that there is so many variables. The time of day that the hay was cut, at what stage of growth it was cut and even soil conditions can affect the NSCs of hay. Like a vet in MT that has a PSSM horse will recommend alfalfa and my vet in WY will recommend grass hay to his clients. I think testing or asking for test results is the best way to go and then if you see good consistencies year after year from your hay suppliers, then you'll know what you should and shouldn't buy. Also, when it comes to grains for horses, people really need to be careful. Some feeds will claim they are low starch but yet their NSCs might be in the 18% mark, which come PSSM horses just can't handle it. Just like the University of MN recommends Ultium, but some horses can't handle the NSCs of that feed and need even lower NSCs. Then, some feeds add chromium and that is a big no, no as well for PSSM horses. It is fine for horses with RER, but not PSSM.
Do you know why chromium should not be in the diet? | |
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 Expert
Posts: 3782
Location: Gainesville, TX | This is all very interesting!!  | |
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Meanest Teacher!!!
Posts: 8552
Location: sunny california | CarrieH77 - 2013-07-11 12:07 PM appycowgirl - 2013-07-09 4:02 PM Your cooperatives as a great place to start to try to find someone to test your hay and you can also talk to folks around you that do grow hay and see where they go for testing, plus, even ask the people that you are purchasing the hay from to see if they may have tested their hay. The hardest thing about recommending any one particular hay to someone for their PSSM horse is that there is so many variables. The time of day that the hay was cut, at what stage of growth it was cut and even soil conditions can affect the NSCs of hay. Like a vet in MT that has a PSSM horse will recommend alfalfa and my vet in WY will recommend grass hay to his clients. I think testing or asking for test results is the best way to go and then if you see good consistencies year after year from your hay suppliers, then you'll know what you should and shouldn't buy. Also, when it comes to grains for horses, people really need to be careful. Some feeds will claim they are low starch but yet their NSCs might be in the 18% mark, which come PSSM horses just can't handle it. Just like the University of MN recommends Ultium, but some horses can't handle the NSCs of that feed and need even lower NSCs. Then, some feeds add chromium and that is a big no, no as well for PSSM horses. It is fine for horses with RER, but not PSSM. Do you know why chromium should not be in the diet?
cromium helps with sugar metabolism. | |
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"Drank the Kool Aid"
Posts: 5496
Location: Iowa, LA | hoofs_in_motion - 2013-07-11 12:30 PM
A vet suggested my mare had PSSM due to being diagnosed with Fibrotic Myopathy, so I put her on a high fat/low starch diet. Even before then I didn't notice any symptoms, other than her being lazy occasionally. Her maternal grandsire was recently diagnosed with PSSM, I'm looking at getting my mare tested to see....but can PSSM be passed along from the grandsire? What other symptoms would I need to look for?
Appycowgirl can probably explain it better but I believe you have AT LEAST a 50% chance of passing it on if you breed a horse with only one copy...but if you breed one with two copies, then it would be a 100% chance! Do you know how the grandsire tested? P1/P1 or P1/N?
These horses can show sensitivity to grooming or shots, buck, hind end "lameness"/stiffness/off, body soreness, sore backs, tie up, dislike loping, lazy, or hot & crazy(my mare's case), etc. My mare was thought to have hock/stifle issues, but did not improve with traditional therapies. My gelding is more on the "lazy" side when hurting... | |
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Elite Veteran
Posts: 702
| annemarea - 2013-07-06 10:30 AM
brlracerchick - 2013-07-06 10:22 AM When they do eat grass, when do you start to notice symptoms?Â
 With my mare, within 24 hours or the next day when I go to saddle up and ride. And it usually takes days/weeks to get her back where she was. My mare seems to improve faster than the gelding. He has a slow but steady improvement and it kinda made me second guess myself. But now I know I was right. He just was so similar acting to my mare in so many ways. He's really turning into a love bug now that he realizes being touched wont hurt like it used to.
 Any of your mares act marish when touched like they had an ovary cyst or tumor? I have a mare that I am suspecting now. Her ultrasounds are clean, no cysts or tumors. She squells when touched and is super sensitive. I have had training issues with her and had two vets shoot xrays and still no answers. It is more work to get her to work than it is worth. When I started her she was nice and had a good work ethic, never bucked and was dry lotted with a round bale and strategy. Now she is on pasture 24/7. She is double bred Moon Deck and I will be sending off hair. Thank you for your insights and journey! | |
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"Drank the Kool Aid"
Posts: 5496
Location: Iowa, LA | txaggiegal - 2013-07-11 11:49 PM annemarea - 2013-07-06 10:30 AM brlracerchick - 2013-07-06 10:22 AM When they do eat grass, when do you start to notice symptoms?  With my mare, within 24 hours or the next day when I go to saddle up and ride. And it usually takes days/weeks to get her back where she was. My mare seems to improve faster than the gelding. He has a slow but steady improvement and it kinda made me second guess myself. But now I know I was right. He just was so similar acting to my mare in so many ways. He's really turning into a love bug now that he realizes being touched wont hurt like it used to. Any of your mares act marish when touched like they had an ovary cyst or tumor? I have a mare that I am suspecting now. Her ultrasounds are clean, no cysts or tumors. She squells when touched and is super sensitive. I have had training issues with her and had two vets shoot xrays and still no answers. It is more work to get her to work than it is worth. When I started her she was nice and had a good work ethic, never bucked and was dry lotted with a round bale and strategy. Now she is on pasture 24/7. She is double bred Moon Deck and I will be sending off hair. Thank you for your insights and journey!
 My mare was just sensitive over her lower back and when you brushed her there, she would drop from the pressure. We tried hormone therapy but it didn't go away. That was before I knew what was causing all of these crazy symptoms. But my gelding will nicker at me when I go to get off of him! LOL Never saw that before! Almost like he's thanking me for getting off his back! It's a sweet light nicker.
Edited by annemarea 2013-07-12 12:48 AM
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Sock Snob
Posts: 3021
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Regular
Posts: 66
Location: Burns, WY | As far as chromium goes, I'm not sure why it is not recommended, but on any of the research papers that you read and even on the unoversity of MN's website, they say to not feed chromium.
Also, there has been some folks on the PSSM Forum who were feeding chromium to their horses and were having problems and once they quit feeding chromium, there horses improved remarkeably.
Now as far as inheritance, yes it could've come from the grandsire, but unless you test the parents you really don't know which side. I'll give a classic example of what I'm talking about.
Back some months ago we had a lady who had reported that her mare was PSSM n/P1. We had proven that the maternal grandsire, Noble TKO was positive even though the owner of the stud was refusing to test. Several of Noble TKO's foals were positive and the dams tested negative. Now, this mare's dam, a daughter of Noble TKO, was tested and she ended up testing out negative, so it ended up proving that the sire of this mare, Potassium, was indeed positive.
So, just because a grandsire is positive, it doesn't always mean that the parent from that particular stud is positive and only by testing the parents or at least getting a negative test on one parent, do we prove who the positive parent is.
This has been done numerous times lately as there are stallion owners out there who know they have positive studs and they are either refusing to test or they have tested and are refusing to disclose their stud's results. So, because of their refusal to disclose or test, many folks have gone out and proven, that based upon evidence of the one parent testing negative and the foal testing positive, that a particular stallion is positive.
Also, another way to prove that a parent is positive is by testing out the foal and the foal tests out as P1/P1 which means that both parents contributed their P1 gene to the foal. See, all horses carry two copies of each gene and when they are bred forward, the foal will inherit one of those two genes from each parent, hence the reason that we say if you breed an n/P1 to an n/n, you have a 50% chance of creating and n/P1 foal or a 50% chance of creating an n/n foal. Of course some folks love to gamble, but at times that gamble doesn't pay off.
I have a friend that recently found out her stud was positive, PSSM n/P1. Last year's foal crop and the previous year's foal crop all turned up negative, but this year, all of his foals turned up positive. So, there isn't anything set in stone saying that you'll get 50/50 exactly. | |
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| Has it ever occurred to you that PSSM is another vet // drug company fad to make a lot of money on a long term basis.
If you look at so many of these fad diseases that are diagnosed ... they have all shown up after Genetically Engineered grains like the ethanol corn wastes were added to feed and beet pulp which is also trash left over from sugar beet processing. Look at your feed tags and find one named grain you find there ... don't you thing all this trash you never heard of or can't pronounce might be the root cause and shutting down enzymes or gut bacteria in your horses.
All of these extruded grains with no names have heavy metal and weird chemicals applied to them in order to get the main product out of them. When various heavy metals, over dosed supplements of vitamins and minerals and other crap build up in a horses system he starts falling apart muscle wise and nerve command center shuts down. Keep in mind a horses skeleton is only held together and supported by muscles and a few ligaments ...
It is like the money making ruse that AQHA is doing trying to scare everyone into getting the 5 panel tests done at a good profit for them and their favorite labs.
Try to find the actual ingredients in any sack of Purina or the other over priced feeds ... no can do ... it is amazing what kind of trash feeds we buy and the number of vaccines we shoot our horses with year after year .... don't you think after a while all this crap is going to accumulate in a horses organs and start shutting him and down and the best thing a vet can come up with is plain grass hay along with some deep muscle//organ antibiotics .... which tells you a whole lot right there ..
It is the same thing with fast food or food served in restaurants ... you have no idea if the hamburger is real or pink slime or actual country of origin ... how much mercury or other contaminants in fish/seafood or what. Look at your neighbors kids ... since yours are perfect ... and ask yourself ... Dang, what happened to them... lol
Just a dumb theory of mine ... but I think doing sonograms on human unborn babies is one of the most unhealthy things you can do ... the low radio shock waves can screw up a kids brain and DNA just so they can make more money running worthless tests and charging it to insurance companies which ups the premium costs. If you disagree ... go back to early 1980's until now and see how frequently and how much fun it is to check on baby with pictures and what sex it is and the increase in all the ADDHYXZ'z when diagnosed old kid is given more drugs and the rise in autism is huge ... along with the crap that is in kid vaccines ...
It is funny that those of us that were raised on chickens with dirty feathers, crippled calves that would not bring a good price at sale barn, bacon grease in everything, more gravy, heavily buttered anything, hogs that were too fat, raw milk and beans and taters with only home baked pies, cakes and cookies that would grow mold on them if not eaten in a few days instead of being labeled .. Best eaten before 12.31.2014 .... and of course we had to work and play outside all day long ...
IMO horses and kids are fed too much crap, not worked enough and given too
many drugs, supplements and unknown trash foods .... and who did it to them .... WE DID!!
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Sock Snob
Posts: 3021
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 Swiffer PIcker Upper
Posts: 4015
Location: Four Corners Colorado | BARRELHORSE USA - 2013-07-14 3:40 AM Has it ever occurred to you that PSSM is another vet // drug company fad to make a lot of money on a long term basis. If you look at so many of these fad diseases that are diagnosed ... they have all shown up after Genetically Engineered grains like the ethanol corn wastes were added to feed and beet pulp which is also trash left over from sugar beet processing. Look at your feed tags and find one named grain you find there ... don't you thing all this trash you never heard of or can't pronounce might be the root cause and shutting down enzymes or gut bacteria in your horses. All of these extruded grains with no names have heavy metal and weird chemicals applied to them in order to get the main product out of them. When various heavy metals, over dosed supplements of vitamins and minerals and other crap build up in a horses system he starts falling apart muscle wise and nerve command center shuts down. Keep in mind a horses skeleton is only held together and supported by muscles and a few ligaments ... It is like the money making ruse that AQHA is doing trying to scare everyone into getting the 5 panel tests done at a good profit for them and their favorite labs. Try to find the actual ingredients in any sack of Purina or the other over priced feeds ... no can do ... it is amazing what kind of trash feeds we buy and the number of vaccines we shoot our horses with year after year .... don't you think after a while all this crap is going to accumulate in a horses organs and start shutting him and down and the best thing a vet can come up with is plain grass hay along with some deep muscle//organ antibiotics .... which tells you a whole lot right there .. It is the same thing with fast food or food served in restaurants ... you have no idea if the hamburger is real or pink slime or actual country of origin ... how much mercury or other contaminants in fish/seafood or what. Look at your neighbors kids ... since yours are perfect ... and ask yourself ... Dang, what happened to them... lol Just a dumb theory of mine ... but I think doing sonograms on human unborn babies is one of the most unhealthy things you can do ... the low radio shock waves can screw up a kids brain and DNA just so they can make more money running worthless tests and charging it to insurance companies which ups the premium costs. If you disagree ... go back to early 1980's until now and see how frequently and how much fun it is to check on baby with pictures and what sex it is and the increase in all the ADDHYXZ'z when diagnosed old kid is given more drugs and the rise in autism is huge ... along with the crap that is in kid vaccines ... It is funny that those of us that were raised on chickens with dirty feathers, crippled calves that would not bring a good price at sale barn, bacon grease in everything, more gravy, heavily buttered anything, hogs that were too fat, raw milk and beans and taters with only home baked pies, cakes and cookies that would grow mold on them if not eaten in a few days instead of being labeled .. Best eaten before 12.31.2014 .... and of course we had to work and play outside all day long ... IMO horses and kids are fed too much crap, not worked enough and given too many drugs, supplements and unknown trash foods .... and who did it to them .... WE DID!!
I agree with a lot of what you are saying here. Me and my horses are healthier on a real food diet. I have raw milk and butter on everything, raise my own meat and buy veggies seasonally and freeze them for winter. Even though I eat tons of fat I still managed to lose 30lbs.
My horses are barefoot, and live on a paddock paradise and for the most part they only get grass hay and limited grazing plus a good mineral supplement and salt. I do occasionally feed grain to the broodmares in late term and when weaning foals. but only for a short time, Organic alfalfa and oats or barley would probably be a better choice but they aren't readily available here.
Paddock track system with slow feed hay bags would be ideal for these horses. | |
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 Thick and Wavy
Posts: 6102
Location: Nebraska | anything in this pedigree suggest PSSM?
http://www.allbreedpedigree.com/missy+pistol | |
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"Drank the Kool Aid"
Posts: 5496
Location: Iowa, LA | BARRELHORSE USA - 2013-07-14 4:40 AM Has it ever occurred to you that PSSM is another vet // drug company fad to make a lot of money on a long term basis. No, it hasn't occurred to me, and I'll tell you why. While I believe in what you are saying following this statement, believing this particular statement would be like me saying that I don't believe in science, but I do believe in the Easter Bunny. 
Have you ever heard of Monday Morning Sickness?? It was around way before genetically modified grains. Also, how is it that taking my horses off of grass made all the difference? Kinda doesn't make sense to me. And why are only some horses affected, while others you can load up with grain and never skip a beat?? Nope, sorry....have to disagree. But if that's what you want to believe, then be my guest. Ignorance is bliss.
Edited by annemarea 2013-07-14 11:05 AM
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 I Don't Brag
Posts: 6960
| annemarea - 2013-07-14 11:04 AM
BARRELHORSE USA - 2013-07-14 4:40 AM Has it ever occurred to you that PSSM is another vet // drug company fad to make a lot of money on a long term basis.  No, it hasn't occurred to me, and I'll tell you why. While I believe in what you are saying following this statement, believing this particular statement would be like me saying that I don't believe in science, but I do believe in the Easter Bunny. Have you ever heard of Monday Morning Sickness?? It was around way before genetically modified grains. Also, how is it that taking my horses off of grass made all the difference? Kinda doesn't make sense to me. And why are only some horses affected, while others you can load up with grain and never skip a beat?? Nope, sorry....have to disagree. But if that's what you want to believe, then be my guest. Ignorance is bliss.
I might have agreed with BHUSA....UNTIL I found myself with a horse with PSSM.
These horses cannot have anything resembling a grain, not oats, not corn, not barley. Well they can have it but they and their owners will pay a price. When you see the difference in them by simply changing their diets, it makes a believer out of you.
What I will say is this IS mostly a man made problem. By breeding for characteritics we desire, we have reinforced genetics that are less than desirable. Think HYPP. Many HYPP horses "blow up" physically, making them appear more muscled, something the AQHA halter world rewarded, so we bred to this stallion for that characteristic....long before we were aware of anything called HYPP. Same with HERDA, and now PSSM. I am wondering just how many exceptional performance horses have had this disease at one level or another and how it is connected genetically, to performance abilities.
I am constantly finding my education and beliefs challenged, when it comes to horses. Last year I had a yearling filly get Epiphisytis in her knees. I had always been told that the best thing to do was get them on grass and off momma or grain......hers was caused by......grass. Stressed grass than grew like crazy after we finally got some rain in last summers drought. I had her on a JR feed and was told that she was not getting ENOUGH of the Jr feed to get the minerals she needed. Common sense told me that since she needed more minerals, give her that rather than up the feed on a baby who was already growing too fast for her joints. You gotta let good old commom sense factor in sometimes. At the same time, especially with horses, you need to keep an open mind and KEEP learning. | |
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| I wish BHUSA was correct, but I too have had way too much experience with the frustration caused by what I believe to be genetic disorders in some very talented horses. The best thing is to do the science and get to the truth of how we got to this point, why we got to this point, and how to correct this in the future. If that means we stop breeding certain blood lines, then that is what needs to be done. Here is a short synopsis on several of the genetic disorders we KNOW OF in AQHA blood lines. As for the AQHA, I heard if you breed to more than 15 horses a year, you must now have your stallions tested. ALL stallions should be tested if they are breeding, as far as I'm concerned. And not just these "hair sample tests". From what I've read that only tells you if your horse has Type 1 PSSM. Type II requires a muscle biopsy. Here is a link to AQHA diseases we KNOW exist:
http://manc.umd.edu/Abstracts2010/LenzHYPP%20abstract.pdf | |
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"Drank the Kool Aid"
Posts: 5496
Location: Iowa, LA | bingo - 2013-07-14 1:29 PM I wish BHUSA was correct, but I too have had way too much experience with the frustration caused by what I believe to be genetic disorders in some very talented horses. The best thing is to do the science and get to the truth of how we got to this point, why we got to this point, and how to correct this in the future. If that means we stop breeding certain blood lines, then that is what needs to be done. Here is a short synopsis on several of the genetic disorders we KNOW OF in AQHA blood lines. As for the AQHA, I heard if you breed to more than 15 horses a year, you must now have your stallions tested. ALL stallions should be tested if they are breeding, as far as I'm concerned. And not just these "hair sample tests". From what I've read that only tells you if your horse has Type 1 PSSM. Type II requires a muscle biopsy. Here is a link to AQHA diseases we KNOW exist: http://manc.umd.edu/Abstracts2010/LenzHYPP%20abstract.pdf
You are right Bingo. Both of my horses tested negative for Type 1 via the hair test, but tested positive for Type 2 via muscle biopsy. | |
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