February 09, 2003

Fat Dog-Skinny Horse

I really love to hear from you the readers. Your questions tell me that you are very smart and are very concerned for your horse. As you graze through this pasture of knowledge, remember there is a lot of junk for you to sort through. Maybe some of my columns are in the junk category but maybe experience and education can make some difference.

How do we tell what is junk and what will stick to the ribs? As I have referred to many times, the pioneers were great observers. To survive, they would feed or try something and then watch for good, bad or no results.

My family has raised sheep for nearly a century. There is a saying, "a sick sheep is a dead sheep". I always wondered why? A sheep is covered with a thick coat of wool. It is difficult to observe the body condition until you physically handle the animal or you shear the wool off. Unless you weigh the animal it will be hard to tell if they are loosing weight. Many people then rely on the head for the first signs of illness. Nasal discharge, coughing or difficulty with getting up or moving around will be the first signs of an unhealthy sheep. If these conditions are secondary to bad nutrition, the animal has progressed beyond treatment in many cases. Medical treatments will not address the nutritional problem and the result is "a sick sheep is a dead sheep".

I contract feed replacement guilts for my neighbor who is a large hog producer. I believe that my neighbor's family is one of the best hog producers in the state. By the time a pig is observed to be doing poorly, medical treatment for that animal is seldom successful. This family will quickly diagnose the problem and usually changes the diet or management practices for the rest of the animals to avoid any other problems or casualties. I believe that their success is because of their nutritional knowledge rather than their ability to give shots.

Early diagnosis of a potential health problem is extremely important to keeping an animal healthy. How can we measure or detect health problems early? The dairy industry has an advantage because with today's technology, they can detect a problem quickly. They have equipment that measures the milk production twice a day. Any drop in production will indicate a problem with the animal and possibly the diet. The dairy farmer is there to address the problem before the animal becomes run down and will not respond to medical treatment.

I recently had the opportunity to visit with an equine nutritionist with one of the best companies in the country. The issue of how can we measure or detect successful practices used in the equine industry? He indicated that monitoring the animal's weight by scale or weight tape can be helpful. An animal that starts to loose weight is an early indicator of a problem like we see in sheep. Hair coat will be an indicator of diet, especially protein levels. Most horses are not worked hard enough to determine health by their ability to perform.

Probably the most common first sign detected by a horse owner of a possible problem is the horses desire to eat their sweet feed or water consumption. Because of the individual feeding of many horses and some dairy cows, this can be very helpful. Remember sweet feed is not natural to the horse or the dairy cow. Remember that horses with a fever will probably drink more water if available rather than less.

Here comes the junk part but it is 'my' opinion. I believe your farrier can observe an improved practice or potential problem with your horse's diet. If you screw-up feeding, it will show up in the hoof wall. If you were purchasing a horse, I would first look at the horse's feet as an indicator of the animal's treatment for the last 6 months.

I recently had the privilege to visit with a farrier from Wisconsin. He indicated he has observed the health of horse's feet change as they move from one barn to another. Good feet turn bad with very little change in the observed appearance of the horse. A horse that is not being fed properly will not get sick over night but like the sheep will deteriorate slowly to a point where medical treatment will not fix the problem.

The best part of this farrier's visit was his comment that when horses are fed a high grain diet, dogs feast on their fecal material. If a horse is fed a good forage diet with proper dietary balance, the dogs show no interest. A dog is a simple stomach animal that does very well on cereal grains. For a dog to have an interest in the horse's fecal material there must be something there to meet his needs. If the diet is not right, the horse has the ability to pass out undigested material in their fecal material.

To many times horse owners are feeding the dog rather than feeding the horse.