Re: probiotics

["Susan Evans Garlinghouse" <suendavid@worldnet.att.net>]

-----Original Message-----
From: dave & abby bloxsom <cyclone@snet.net>
To: suendavid@worldnet.att.net <suendavid@worldnet.att.net>
Cc: Ridecamp <ridecamp@endurance.net>
Date: Wednesday, February 10, 1999 6:49 PM
Subject: probiotics


>Susan -
>
>Do the requirements for a probiotic differ depending on the stresses
>imposed on a horse, or depending on the discipline he'll be working in?
>
>Are idle/light working horses less in need of a probiotic?
>
>-Abby B
>

Well, first, there is no "requirement" for probiotics---horses, working or
not, all maintain a microbial population in the gut and supplementing with
probios is just an attempt to maintain an optimal population of those bugs.
There are all kinds of things that can affect that population---diet,
feeding interval, roughage to concentrate ratio, antibiotics or other
medications, internal temps, even temperament, etc.  Any kind of stress
(which includes hard work) can affect the population, and stress varies with
each horse.  So one horse that never lets anything fluster him may have
fewer changes than a horse that never gets ridden but spends the day eating
grain and pacing around screaming his head off in a stall.

So judge your horse's need for probiotics based on whether or not he seems
to be an easy keeper no matter what, or whether he seems to be affected
fairly significantly by rides, travel and so on.  IMO, *any* horse is going
to benefit by probios to some extent, but the horses that I try a lot harder
to get them to are the horses that undergoing some sort of stress---whether
that means a hard work schedule, self-inflicted due to temperament or
metabolism, growth, lactation, illness or through some environmental stress
such as travel.

Does this answer your question? :-)

Susan G