Feeding the Performance Horse
By Winter
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20th Jun 2010 •
2,500 views
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1 comments
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The general care of feeding a performance horse is based on the horses workload such as the training, and event preparations. The important question to ask yourself is, How do the dietary needs of the working horse differ from the maintenance horse?
Well the first thing that you need to know is that water is the most important thing in a horses diet. The requirements for water vary from environmental temperature, to the horses exercise activity, then to the type of feed the horse consumed (pasture, hay, grain, nutrient content).
The next thing you need to know is what type of work does your horse do, as in light, moderate, or heavy work.
Light Work means that the horse has around 1.25x Energy of maintenance. The performance that these type of horses do would be pleasure riding, trails, and equitation. The energy is based on the low intensity or relative length of duration of work.
Moderate Work means the horse has around a 1.5x energy of maintenance. The performances these horses do would be categorized in Reining, cutting, jumping, timed events, ranch work, etc. This has increasing levels of intensity and/or duration.
Heavy Work means the horse as around 1.75-2x energy of maintenance. The events would be placed in Racing, Polo, Endurance, etc. High intensity and/ or long duration.
Another note you also need to be aware of is your horses metabolism. whether or not your horse is Aerobic or Anaerobic.
Aerobic Metabolism is relatively low intensity exercise such as walking, trotting and cantering. The heart rate would be below 150bpm. Fuel= Glucose and fat. All horses utilize aerobic metabolism because it's part of all training programs.
Anaerobic Metabolism however is more of a high intensity or long duration exercise. The heart rate of the horse would be above 150bpm.By-product of anaerobic work would equal to lactic acid, which causes muscular soreness and fatigue.Fuel = Glycogen, ATP (Adenosine Triphosphate) and CP (Creatine Phosphate).
Also a must is to know there are Dietary Challenges for your horse.
1.You need to monitor the water intake, while meeting the workloads energy demands, by maintaining the body conditions.
2. Feeding appropriate quantities of quality roughage.
3. provide protein to your horse.
4. supplying vitamins and minerals.
Dietary Energy Sources are Carbohydrates, Fats and Protein.
The way you calculate is the Max. grain intake=.75% BW/feeding. |
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PonyBox
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Great article! sounds like you know a lot about horse nutrition.
Great article! sounds like you know a lot about horse nutrition.
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Jun 20, 2010
• 1,940 views
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