Hello,

I was told about this site by someone on another board.

I have a yearling filly that has been losing weight over the last month or so. She's in with 13 other horses and ponies of various ages and sizes. She's been with them since November. I've been feeding good quality alfalfa/grass mix hay, lots of leaves and I've only seen a handful of weeds in all the bales I've bought over the last two years.

I put the filly in the barn to feed her free choice hay along with a pound of Omegatin weight builder and two pounds of Nutrena Youth. Well, she protested and stopped eating completely! She's also not very keen on eating the grain, she'll eat a small amount and then walk away.

All of the others are doing very well on just the hay. What else can I try and do to get this filly to eat and get her weight back up? She's de-wormed regularly and I've even tried Probiotics to help her.

Thanks for any advice/help!

~Michele

Where are you from? Minnesota

How did you locate this forum? Suggested from someone else

Hi Michele,

I gather you started putting her in the barn to feed because the others were competing for her food. Perhaps she just isn't happy with this situation and would like to be near her friends while eating.

From a nutritional perspective, there's something you can do to increase her appetite. I would give her a double dose of a B Complex such as B Plex, that contains all of the B Vitamins (there are 8 of them). This will not only improve her appetite, but will also calm her nervous system and improve digestion.

So, see if you can come up with a creative approach toward feeding time that she likes better. And, at the same time give her 2 scoops (2 ounces) of B Plex until you see improvement. Then, you can go down to a maintenance dose. Many horses have higher requirements for the B vitamins that they do not get from their regular diets. And, as a result, they develop borderline deficiences. So, I expect this will help.

Please keep me posted.

All the best,

Dr. Getty

Hi Dr. Getty,

Yes, she wanted to be out with the others. I thought about putting a friend in the barn with her but decided to turn her back out and see what happened. She's been back out for a few days now. I've stopped mixing the Youth in with the Omegatin - I feed her straight Omegatin and she LOVES it, she apparently didn't like the Youth. I also feed her with the others but separate so she doesn't have to compete. She's been on the Omegatin for almost a week and I'm noticing improvement. I also had to get another load of hay this last weekend and I got a nicer load than what the previous load was. It's greener, not as dry, and they love it.

I had another filly earlier this winter that lost some condition (grr) and I did the same thing with her (she did eat the Youth with the Omegatin and was willing to be in the barn by herself) and she gained everything plus back in two weeks. I then found out from her breeder that she had been a "hard" keeper for them too. I haven't had anymore problems with her though, she's holding her weight well now. Just needed a jump start!

~Michele

Where are you from? Minnesota

How did you locate this forum? Suggested from someone else