Imaginative Horse Care

[Roger]

Rice bran contains23 mg/kg of Thiamin "B1". So for every lb you get almost 12 mgs. Rice bran needs supplimenting with a digestable source of calcium. Its feed tab indicates 12-15% of fat, 12-15% protein, and 12-15% of mostly digestable fiber. We can get it locally for around $13 per hundred. I thought that I had found the best feed around at the cheapest price. It is a good feed, but I did notice that the horses were much more calm. I just found out about the B1 content when I got my new NRC Nutrient Requirements of Horses.
I really think that rice bran is a calming agent. Horses at work need 5 mgs/kg of dry matter or 50mgs for every 10lbs. Mine were getting 130 per day.

I think you could buy B1 and calcium pills and ground them in a coffee grinder and top dress it on your feed and it should calm down any excitable horses

we get ours at Capps in Fairfield, but the mills have stopped processing rice now. They seem to feel that they will have more latter this spring. There are a couple of places one in Eagle Lake and one in La Grange that also sells it, but I'm not sure what they charge. I'm stretching mine out as far as I can. I am now feeding 3# rice bran, 3# chop corn, and 4# Crimped Oats as long as the rice bran last as my base feed.

Roger

We feed our young horses and broodmares a cup of ground agricultural limestone top dressed on their feed every evening. They must crave the calcium as they lick the chalk dust off the bottom of the pans. I don't know if this calms the horses but according to my vet it prevents/treats OCD's, promotes increased bone density, and promotes growth. He cites a K-State study saying yearlings fed supplemental calcium showed better growth than a control group without the supplementation. I'll try and find the reference.

Where can I buy the rice bran at that price?

Chuck
Argyle, TX

[Shammy Davis]

The last posts concerning Aloe Vera, Bran, and ground flax seed have been great.

I just wanted to make a few comments. The Aloe Vera makes sense. I had not really thought about it much, but there is a company in Canada that markets natural supplements. One of the supplements is a citric solution that is recommended to calm the gut. It's pretty pricey stuff and I wouldn't be surprised to find out that it was Aloe Vera. I'm sure Sam's Aloe Vera is in my price range.

The bran is a no brainer and I'm glad it keeps coming up in our discussions. I've also added a twice weekly regimen of a 1/2 cup vegetable oil to supplement my wet ration. I buy the 5 gal containers at Sam's also.

The ground flax makes more sense than the whole seeds from a cost point of view. I'd never really thought about it until that subject was posted earlier.

Thanks to all of you. Keep the ideas coming.

[Shammy Davis]

To repel ticks, add several garlic cloves to feed on a daily basis.

[Shammy Davis]

To repel flies, add several garlic cloves to feed on a daily basis. Sorry about being redundant but I wanted to keep this thread alive in hopes that someone else can offer something imaginative.

[Roger]

To repel flies, add several garlic cloves to feed on a daily basis. Sorry about being redundant but I wanted to keep this thread alive in hopes that someone else can offer something imaginative.

I hesitate adding this one because most of you think of me as crazy roger as it is.

When horses are stressed and are loosing weight, an old cowboy remedy was to find a horse in the herd that was doing well under the same conditions and collect manure from that horse, soak the manure over night and tube the liquid into the poor doer. Its surpose to add good bacteria. It seems to work when nothing else does. The excess fluid makes a nice fertilizer.

[Shammy Davis]

Roger: Excellent. Keep the manure remedies flowing.

[Shammy Davis]

Roger: Some years back a KD contender was very ill and had lost a great deal weight. The connections tried everything to get weight on him but nothing worked until as I remember a VET suggested yogurt. I think the attending Vet advised them to allow the yogurt to sour and give it to the horse. I think it is based on your "good bacteria" theory. Do you, or does anyone, recall how long the yogurt was allowed to sour and how it was administered? That KD contender, as I remember, had a good recovery though it raced poorly on Derby Day.

As I recall there was a great deal of media attention on this horse at that the time. As VP Dan Quayle once said, "A mind is a terrible thing to lose." That may apply to me at least in terms of my memory.

[griff]

I seem to remember that there is a ground limestone that can be use with a horses feed and one that should not.. Does anyone know the differience??

griff

[Laurierace]

Roger: Some years back a KD contender was very ill and had lost a great deal weight. The connections tried everything to get weight on him but nothing worked until as I remember a VET suggested yogurt. I think the attending Vet advised them to allow the yogurt to sour and give it to the horse. I think it is based on your "good bacteria" theory. Do you, or does anyone, recall how long the yogurt was allowed to sour and how it was administered? That KD contender, as I remember, had a good recovery though it raced poorly on Derby Day.

As I recall there was a great deal of media attention on this horse at that the time. As VP Dan Quayle once said, "A mind is a terrible thing to lose." That may apply to me at least in terms of my memory.

That was Invisible Ink and it was unpasteurized buttermilk that was allowed to sour, not yogurt. Edited to add that he was second in the Derby. I'll take that kind of poorly any day!

[Shammy Davis]

Laurierace posted:

. . . I'll take that kind of poorly any day!

I guess what is working so poorly is my memory, but thanks for information. One of my mares has been on regimen of antibiotics and I thought I start her on a regimen that would insure good gut bacteria.

Invisible Ink did well after having to stomach sour buttermilk. I know I couldn't do it.

[Laurierace]

A commercial probiotic would be a much better place to start. They only went to the rotten buttermilk when everything else failed and he was at death's door.

[Shammy Davis]

http://www.ker.com/library/Proceedings/ ... te_p99.pdf

[LKR]

I have a couple of broodmares that are thin that I would like to put some weight on. If I gave them rice bran oil, how much would I give them a day? 1 cup twice a day??

[madelyn]

My exeperience with vegetable oils, which are pure fat, is that too much too soon can cause VERY loose manure (runny). Try adding a couple of tbsp for the first few days, gradually getting up to about 1/2 cup twice a day.

Soaked beet pulp is also an excellent feed additive to put weight on - 1 scoop soaked in water to cover will expand to enough for two or three horses. Add a scoop, soaked, to regular grain ration twice a day. I wouldn't feed it dry, since it just EXPLODES.

[LKR]

Thanks.