Question

I have a 23-year-old Quarter Horse gelding that weighs about 1,250 lb (570 kg). I use him for team roping and cowboy mounted shooting competitions, and he’s ridden three or four times weekly. I don’t feed him any grain, but he is allowed grass hay (a mixture of coastal Bermuda and fescue with some crabgrass) at all times, and a flake or two of alfalfa hay once or twice a day. He has always been an easy keeper, but he lost a bit of weight last winter. I am preparing for this winter, and I am looking for a high-quality senior feed to help him maintain his weight through the next few months, which are forecasted to be wet and cold. Can you help?

Answer

Here are a couple of things to look for when choosing a senior feed:

(1) As with any horse feed, you get what you pay for, so choosing an inexpensive feed does not pay off in the long run, because a feed can only be made economically by using some inferior ingredients.

(2) Senior feeds should be higher in fiber than conventional feeds (at least 15%), because they are designed to provide a portion of the horse’s daily fiber requirement. Look for quality fiber ingredients like beet pulp, soy hulls, alfalfa meal, and almond hulls near the top of the ingredient listing. Other low-quality fiber ingredients, like oat hulls, peanut hulls, rice hulls, and cottonseed hulls, may offer little in the way of nutrition or have some anti-quality factors.

(3) Aged horses benefit from concentrated energy sources like fat, so a guaranteed analysis should reveal 5% fat or more.

(4) To assist in fiber fermentation, look for yeast in the ingredient listing.

(5) It is difficult to evaluate ingredients if the manufacturer uses collective terms, so look for a feed that lists actual ingredients. An example of a collective term is “grains,” whereas specific ingredient would be “oats” or “barley.”

A well-formulated senior feed may make the difference in whether your horse will be able to maintain its weight through the winter. If you have further questions, please feel free to contact [email protected].