As the temperature drops, horses burn more vitality to remain heat, due to this fact their power necessities will improve. We can provide our horses additional vitality within the form of concentrates and forage. Forages are digested by the microbes in your horses giant intestine and produce more heat than concentrates. A fantastic analogy is to compare concentrate and forage to your wood stove. Concentrates are your kindling and Forage are the logs. Ideally a horse would obtain free choice hay throughout the winter. How a lot additional forage does your horse need to stay warm? Then they can regulate in the event that they need more or less through the day and night. Some of us have easy keepers who would not do well on free alternative hay! For these horses, we need to regulate their intake. Weigh out their hay and supply it in small gap hay nets to prolong their quantity of chew time. The first thing you want to do is find out how much your horse weighs. Using body size plus heart girth tends to be extra correct. I recommend utilizing the following technique versus a weight tape that solely wraps around the heart girth. Using a mushy measuring tape (the sort typically present in sewing kits) measure your horses heart girth and write the number of inches down. Subsequent, measure the body length from level of shoulder to point of hip, and write it down. Write down the HG and BL additionally, this may assist make sure you that you're measuring at the identical location every time. Be sure to write all of it right down to discuss with throughout the winter. If you are a couple of inches off, most certainly you are measuring from a slightly different location (except you may inform by trying that your horse has obviously gained or lost weight). Try to find landmarks. Paint horses have great landmarks! Now that you know the way much your horse weighs, you may figure out how much hay he must eat. Your average horse in very best weight ought to eat 2% of his physique weight. Some arduous keepers require upwards of 2.5% of body weight. You probably have an overweight horse, you'll be able to drop all the way down to 1.5% of his physique weight, however no less than that or you can be creating a complete different set of issues! 23lb of hay per day. Max weighs 1,159lb and needs to eat 2% of his physique weight. When the temperature drops under forty five degrees F (including wind chill) horses begin to burn additional power to remain warm. This 45 degree mark is known as "Essential Temperature". For every 1 diploma F under the crucial temperature, your horse would require a 1% increase in digestible power (DE). As with every thing horse related, there are a whole lot of variables to this rule, resembling wind chill, rain/sleet, your horses coat thickness or when you blanket. Consider digestible energy like your horses calorie requirement. Since horse nutrition is 90% math, lets get back to that! If I proceed with the math we'd calculate your horse's DE necessities, subsequent calculate how much extra DE is needed for your present temperature, subsequent test your hay to see precisely how much DE it supplies per pound, lastly calculate how a lot further hay will present the extra DE required for the current temperature. If it's 20 degrees F where our buddy Max lives he would need an extra 2 1/2-5lb of hay. This guideline is for horses at maintenance or mild work. Additional hay shall be needed in case your horse is wooden horse statue a hard keeper, in heavy work, or on poor quality hay.
