Spring Grass And Digestive Health

The horse’s gastrointestinal tract is a fragile organ system and abrupt changes can cause a number of health issues, such as colic, hindgut acidosis or even laminitis. A step-by-step approach to instituting changes in a diet should not only include changes to concentrate feeds, but also changes to forage and pasture.

As daylight hours increase and access to grazing is also increased, intakes of lush or new grazing should be moderated, increasing in small time increments per day. It is important to remember calorie rich pastures can increase weight gain considerably, and as the horse reaches a desirable body condition, grazing may have to be limited if he continues to gain weight.

Many good doers can become extremely fat on pasture alone and this may also occur in horses that have been on an increasing plane of nutrition. When changing to richer pasture, reducing grazing time or using a grazing muzzle might be appropriate for a horse that tends to become overweight on forage alone. If pasture provides little in the way of nutrition, then calories must be derived from a ration of concentrate feed and good quality hay.

When horses suffer from digestive upset due to pasture or other forage changes, it may be beneficial to consider the use of digestive aids to ensure the microbial population in the hindgut is sufficient enough for these changes. An increasing number of horses seem to be suffering with problems that could be related to the hindgut, however this is harder to diagnose than stomach ulcers and can, therefore, go untreated. The hindgut of the horse is full of fibre digesting microflora and as they digest the fibre the horse eats, they release volatile fatty acids, which the horse then uses as energy. The problem is that they are very sensitive to change, and this can cause them to start to die. When they die, they release endotoxins which lowers the pH of the hindgut environment. This then becomes a bit of a vicious circle and the lower the pH drops, more microflora die off, and the pH drops even lower. This condition is known as hindgut acidosis and symptoms include loose, sweet-smelling droppings, weight loss, poor coat and hoof condition and poor appetite, amongst others.

During the process of microbial fermentation (when forage is broken down by microbes in the hindgut) B vitamins are produced, one of which is biotin. When a horse’s forage is restricted due to unwanted weight gain, they can suffer from poor hoof quality as a result. This is also the case for horses suffering with digestive disturbances.

One supplement we suggest using in these situations is Kentucky Equine Research EquiShure®. EquiShure® is a product that has been formulated to help horses suffering with hindgut acidosis.

EquiShure® is an encapsulated form of sodium bicarbonate that has been developed to help buffer the acidity levels in the hindgut. Encapsulating the sodium bicarbonate ensures it can ‘get through’ the more acidic environment of the foregut and therefore reach the hindgut. The encapsulation slowly breaks down over a period of 6 hours which is approximately how long it takes food to reach the hindgut once eaten. This ensures that once the product is in the hindgut the encapsulation has broken down and the sodium bicarbonate can work to buffer the acidity levels. It is important to add the EquiShure® to the feed just before feeding it to ensure the encapsulation starts to break down once the product has been eaten, not before.