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A horse that is put out to pasture, receiving no outside work, will probably consume a couple flakes of hay a day and plenty of water.

A horse that is under light work, only one or two days a week or so, could be perfectly happy and healthy with sufficient pasture grass and hay. Although, some horses are "hard keepers" and lose or gain weight easily. For the lean horse, I suggest adding a cup or two of grain or possibly a weight gain supplement. For the heavy horse, I suggest a cut-back on hay or you could possibly use a grazing muzzle, which is comfortable and sane-they even make fleece-lined muzzles.

A horse under moderate work- 3-5 days a week will need grain and hay. I recommend around 3 cups of grain twice a day for the average horse, with two flakes at each mealtime. Horses kept in stalls 24 HR will need less or more based on exercise level from not getting the natural exercise of being in a pasture. You might want to consider a hoof or joint supplement as the workload increases-so do the needs of your horses. Again if your horse is a bit thin, weight-gain supplements are less expensive most of the time than just feeding more, which may not even solve your problem.

A horse in heavy work will need the same as above, with extra grain. You could also use an oil to give a horse more fat and calories to their diets. Also, as the horse sweats from work, he loses salt and water. So, adding a salt-or mineral- block to a pasture or stall is a "fun" and healthy thing to help a horse out. Also, for any horse, they need as much fresh water as they want. A dehydrated horse is an unhealthy horse.

Their are also supplements for coats, overall health(microvet), and much much more. I would recommend Formula 4 Feet for any hoof problem, including quarter cracks, thin walls, soft walls, abscesses, thrush, and basically any problem. Also, Cosequin, is a great joint supplement that actually repairs joints, building new tissue to actually solve the problems of Arthritis and degenerative joint disease, instead of just killing the pain.

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17y ago

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