[RC] pregnant mare nutrition, part 1 - Susan E. Garlinghouse, DVM
Had to break this up into two posts, sorry. Blame it on the
type A personality and being stuck at home with a cold.
From: Susan E.
Garlinghouse, DVM [mailto:suendavid@xxxxxxx] Sent: Friday, September 14, 2007 5:56 PM To: 'Cindy Stafford'; 'ridecamp@xxxxxxxxxxxxx' Subject: RE: [RC] nutrition q about pregnant mares
It sounds to me as though the recommendations you read (ie,
tons of grain and warm bran mashes) were from a pretty old text,
which isn’t always a bad thing, but weren’t all that great in this case.
I don’t like feeding a lot of grain to any horse---never more than 2-3 pounds
of grain per meal, and never more than 6 pounds per day total for a 1000 lb
horse. The overwhelming clinical data is that feeding more than that
sends your chances of starch-related GI problems through the roof, and there are
plenty of other (better) alternatives to just dumping tons of grain in front of
your broodmare (or any other horse).
So, a couple of bits of trivia for feeding pregnant
girls---first, about two-thirds of the growth of the foal will occur in the
third trimester, and up until then, she doesn’t need a special diet. Good
quality hay (I prefer really great mixed grass hay), whatever supplements are
appropriate for your region, clean water, some salt. Don’t get fancy,
because “fancy” usually equates later to “damn, wish I hadn’t done that”.
If you really want to add a supplement, then I really like Platinum Performance
myself. There are other good ones out there, but that’s what I feed
mine. No, I don’t sell it or get a kickback or freebies from them.
During her pregnancy, you want her in good condition (we’re
talking body fat here, not aerobic capacity), and by the time she actually
foals, maybe just a tiny tad on the chubby side. While she’s at peak
lactation, she can’t eat enough to replace all the calories she’s putting out
in milk, and a little body fat will come in handy. *If she loses
weight, it doesn’t mean she’ll stop producing milk, or that the milk will be
lower in quality or quantity.* What’s most likely to happen is that
a) she’ll be a little thinner at weaning than you might want, and b) she’ll
have a little more trouble settling in foal if you want to breed her back
again. Big deal, unless you’re a serious breeder. For myself, I
just don’t like seeing a broodmare that looks like a dairy cow, all bag and
bones. So I like them with some good cover over their ribs going into the
last month, but not pig fat, either. Moderation in all things.
Don’t drastically increase her rations during peak lactation, this would be an
especially bad time for a bout of colic. Better to ease her into
lactation with a good reserve, and don’t panic if she’s loses some
weight. It won’t be life-threatening to Mom or Baby.
