Re: Feeding Babies

["Kim Pelletier" <kim@redhorsetech.com>]

Hi Celeste,

Quick growth spurts can be scary!  It would be hard for anyone to say
whether your filly needs more feed or not without knowing a whole lot more
information on her and the available feed (and its composition).  I can try
to give some guidelines, though :-).

If your filly is showing a "hint of ribs" as mentioned in your post
(thinking that she is a condition score of 4.5 or so on the American scale
without knowing more about her), than she should be in pretty good
condition, as far as fatness goes.  To help prevent any of the developmental
orthopedic diseases (DOD) that I believe are your concern right now, you'll
want to feed this filly to her level of growth, age, weight, and exercise.
You don't want to plump her up, nor starve her.

The key point here is to provide all of the nutrients this filly needs for
her stage of growth *without* going overboard or starving her body of
everything that it needs.  You'll want to maintain her recommended levels
and ratios, for which the NRC publication can be a great guide.  However,
the NRC can only be thought of as the bare minimum requirements for about
95% of a population of horses; some horses will need further fine
adjustments if the recommendations are not working so well with them.

So... what are the consequences of over/under feeding?  If you go overboard
on energy, protein, mineral supplementation, etc., you can increase the risk
for faster growth rates, which in turn, can increase your filly's chances of
developing DOD.  On the other hand, if you try to prevent DOD by cutting
back on the filly's nutrition too much (including energy), you can also
increase the chances of developing any of these conditions simply because
you are not providing the body with enough nutrition to support this filly's
normal growth pattern, proper skeletal formation, and so on.  It's a fine
line.

If your filly does not show any signs of DOD or other negative
growth-related conditions right now, then she should be provided with plenty
of opportunities to exercise freely, which will strengthen the bone matrix
and associated support structures.  Forced exercise beyond her comfort is
not recommended, and can actually make things worse.  In that light,
constant stress (physical, mental, emotional) should also be avoided.

If you notice any lameness, shortness in stride, unusual change in
conformation (especially in the "knee" and below regions), then this should
raise a flag in your head to call the vet for his or her diagnosis.
Sometimes, DOD simply cannot be avoided due to genetic influences from the
sire's or dam's line, etc.  But, keeping a close eye on the filly's growth
rate, "fatness", exercise, and nutrition can help reduce the risk.

Hope it helps,

Kim (and 'Lee, the QH mutt)

Lubbock, TX





----- Original Message -----

> In a message dated 10/23/00 12:51:43 AM Pacific Daylight Time,
> celestem@badgermining.co.za writes:
>
> << My question is,
>  should I worry about this and increase her food or should I not worry as
she
>  is growing so fast... <snip>