RE: [RC] Speaking of beet pulp... - Alan Kay - Susan E. Garlinghouse, DVM
>BTW, I’ve never been given a definition of a “large grain
meal”. I suspect it’s more than a couple
of pounds. Does >anyone have an expert opinion of a “large grain
meal”? I think I feed a pound on ride morning, along the same with >beet pulp and just
enough rice bran to make it more palatable. I always “dose” the
electrolyes separately ‘cause my >horses tend to be excited on ride morning and don’t
eat all their mash.
>Kathy
The general consensus in academia is that for an average 1000-lb
horse, anything over about 3-4 pounds of grain constitutes a large meal.
The small intestine’s enzymatic digestive capacity is exceeded by more
grain than that at one time, and is somewhat variable depending on the starch
content and processing of the grain being fed. Thus, the undigested
starch will ‘overflow’ into the cecum just downstream, continue to
ferment, cause a variable amount of pH havoc amongst the microflora and
potentially contribute to colic, laminitis, etc. That seems to apply as
well to horses that have routinely eaten enormous amounts of grain at one time,
even if they haven’t actually gotten sick (yet). The analogy given
to me was that just because you haven’t gotten creamed yet by playing on
the freeway doesn’t mean you won’t be a grease spot in the fast
lane when the odds finally catch up with you. Pretty graphic example,
eh?<g>
I don’t have the reference in front of me, but there’s
a curve of colic probability based on pounds of grain eaten per meal that predictably,
starts to increase significantly over about 2 pounds per meal, and slopes
sharply upward at over 6 pounds. The same peer-reviewed reference
also shows significant increases in colic and associated bad things when the
daily grain intake goes over about eight pounds total, regardless of how the
grain meals are divided up.
There’s also some good references that illustrate the
large fluid shifts that occur when a horse eats more than about 4-5 pounds of *anything*
more than 2-3 hours after the previous meal. The fluid shifts (due to
saliva and gastric secretions) can contribute to changes equaling up to 24% of
plasma volume---insignificant in a horse standing around in a stall or paddock
not doing anything, but potentially very significant in an endurance horse
exercising in hot weather. A good argument for stopping to let horses eat
at least a few bites at least every hour or so between vet checks.
If you really think your horse needs a lot of grain, then you
can also slow down the intake by mixing it with something to ‘dilute’
the grain, like beet pulp, hay chaff, that sort of thing. For the most
part, if the horse needs that much grain to maintain weight, than IMO, a much safer
strategy is to incorporate beet pulp and some fats. Not everyone agrees
with that opinion, though. J
