need advice about feeding new cob

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KERRYS.WALES

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Oct 25, 2005
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just bought a cob mare and im not sure if im feeding her right. the dealer told me to feed a scoop of barley and a scoop of sugarbeet(before soaking) and feed it twice a day. also feed hay. does that mean once it is mixed i should divide it into two portions or should i feed that amount x2. she is 4 years old and 14.1hh. she lives out. sorry if i sound thick but my other pony only has hay and im not used to feeding anything else:eek:
 
I am totally fearful of feeding Barley. I was under the impression it is heating. If you want to give your cob a bit of Pazzaz then feed Barley. Not sure about it needing a full scoop though. :eek: I have a 14 2hh cob. He is fed about 8 leaves of hay a day. He also gets 1 scoop of beet and chaff and 3/4 scoop of non cooling mix for breakfast and tea. If I were you I would stick to the adlib hay and introduce beet,chaff bit by bit. Mix with water to make it easer to eat. See how he fairs on that. Then see how much you are exercising him and choose a mix that doesnt produce a monster...
 
What sort of condition is she in? To be on the safe side I would probably stick with that (split into two feeds) then wean her off the barley (I seem to remember it helps gain weight, so unless she's skinny possibly not the best feed for a cob).

My 14.1 cob mare is out 24/7 with a bale of hay going into her field every day (shared between three horses), and 1 feed a day of 3 handfuls of hi-fi lite, and a small scoop of staypower muesli, which has her supplements mixed in in the summer (not on any at the moment).

Good luck with your new horse!
 
Thanks For Advice

a lot of people have said that she doesnt need barley so shall i just stop giving it or should i reduce it gradualy. can you tell me what chaff is:eek: . im new to this feeding thing. thanks
 
Hi hun

Barley is usually given to horses in hard work who are using up a lot of energy, and can make them hot headed. It has more energy than oats but low in fibre, and has a poor calcium to phosphorous ratio.

You should feed according to the type of horse, type of work, temperament, condition, age, size, living out etc.
You should give no more than 2.5% of your horses body weight unless in extremely hard work such as racing. You can get a tape which you can help determine the horses weight.

For instance a horse weighing 500kg (1080lbs approx) would perhaps require 22-32lbs of food which is made up of fibre/concentrates split up 2-3 even 4 feeds a day etc depending on work.

Resting horses ie maintenance diet 1.5% of body weight in food, medium to strenous work 2.5-3%. Horses need plenty of fibre too and you need to get the balance right for fibre and protein.

For instance maintenance diet would consist of 100% fibre such as hay, race training which is very hard work would be 30% fibre and 70% concentrates such as oats, barley etc.

Hard work would mean eventing, cross country, endurance, light work 1 hr walking maybe trotting, medium cantering, jumping, dressage.

Feeds should be split up, eg don't give your horse a huge bucket of food, he has a small stomach.

Hope this helps. Don't forget there are plenty of good books out there to help you further.

Regards
DebO
 
thanks deb

just bought a weight tape so will be going down and seeing what she weighs.
when i questioned the dealer about barley he said she needed it cos shes young(nearly 4). thanks for all your help:)
 
Hi

If she is only 4 then she is still growing and needs a balanced diet.

Why not invest in some good books, such as BHS stable management which has detailed info on feed stuffs, correct ratios etc or if I remember right their Stage 2 book deals with feeding as well. If you can't afford to buy them check out ebay or your local library.

Don't forget you can get your compound feeds which are already made up in the bag, so you don't need to worry about buying in different types and making it up yourself.

It's always best to weigh your food out, you can get little scales which you hang up with a hook on the end to put your haynet on, or a bag with food in to check the weight. It's no good going by a scoop of this and a scoop of that unless you know the weight of it is.


Regards
Deb
 
if she is only 4 and growing/filling out, and is a cob, then you don't really want to touch barley - I used it on a skinny tb ex racehorse but wouldn't let a cob near it.

also she is likely being a cob to be a good doer, so you might want to look at some of the compound foods aimed at the native ponies, laminitics, where she will get vits and minerals but not a lot of calories.

at this time of year, you aren't likely to be working her much (?) so grass and hay should be pretty much ok for her rather than lots of hard food - what is her weight like now?

Rosie my cob is 15hh and 16 years old, she is out during the day and in at night, when she has plenty of hay and a small feed (1 scoop of sugar beet with a tiny top dressing of happy hoof) monring and evening. she only gets an extra meal if she has worked - i.e. hacked out for 2-3 hours then she gets a bucket on her return. She is a recovered laminitic so we are careful with her.

Just be careful that your 4yo cob from a dealer may well have had the backside worked off her to keep her compliant and that they tend to go through the tantrum stage at 6yo. They are often brow beaten into being quiet rides and then suddenly one day wake up and say, sorry don't agree with all this after all.

If she has been worked quite a bit, might be nice to give her the winter off and restart her in the spring when you have more time, rather than trying to do much with her, particularly if she ends up being a bit sharp. I only ride Rosie sat/sunday at the moment but she is a 'mature' girl and you could put a saddle on her after months and she would be good.
 
We have two very cobby type ponies each 14 odd hands each. We had one since she was three years old. With her we have made sure that she has enough hay during the day to ensure she is nearly always eating. We also then introduced a low starch / low carbohydrate/high fibre feed for native ponies or ponies at rest / light work and look on side of the packet for recommened daily portion. We then gave this with some chaff, about half a scoop in each feed, along with a couple of carrots / apples, watered this down so as not so dry. So the daily portion of feed (in the packet) was divided between two feeds, then half a scoop of chaff plus carrots etc for each feed. This we did to ensure that she got enough to ensure that she grew properly. Now she is nearly seven and only still in light work we now give her 1 scoop of chaff, with a vitamin and mineral supplement, with omega oil, again split into two feeds a day. As well as ad lib hay to eat as well.
Before feeding your pony see if it is overweight or not. If overweight then feed less than recommened portion and add a mineral and vitamin supplement to one of the feeds each day. This is because a recommended portion will contain x amount of vitamins / minerals, so if reduce the portion, then reduce vitamins/minerals, so adding these in a vitamin/mineral supplement is needed.
If underweight then give recommended portion and see how he goes over say two weeks or so.
Also is he rugged at all? How much shelter does he have in the field? I do not put heavy weight rugs on our cobs unless it is perishingly cold. But I do rug up with lighter weight ones, as this does give protection against the wind and rain.
Horses and ponies use the hay to help keep them warm, so do need to have a constant supply for most of the day, they can go a couple of hours, but not much more without eating something.
The best way to see if you horse / pony is ok,, is if he looks fine, bright eyed, good coat, and no problems that you can see.
Hope this helps, but would also look for a good book on horse nutition, but get one you can understand, there are loads that are far too technical, good for some people, but I find them too difficult,
Good luck with your new baby, hope you and he have loads of fun together.
 
Dodson and Horrell run a very good customer support line for feed questions. I used it before.

As for chaff, it's a kind of high fiber mixture. However, my mare got too hot in it; some horses can get hyper if fed on a rich alfalfa diet. My vet did not approved feeding her chaff for that reason. He says it was too high in protein for her, considering the little amount of work she did.
Having said that, many people have good results and like to feed the stuff to their horses.
 
Thats an awful lot of sugarbeet.

I've got a 14.2 Welsh D x and she gets two small single handfuls of sugarbeet (unsoaked) which makes about a scoop and a half soaked (v. watery) and that does her two days!

I'd feed your cob depending on condition and temperament, assuming you ride twice in the week and at weekends for 1 hour a time the folllowing:

Hifi or chaff 1 scoop over two feeds
Pasture mix or similar low energy mix 1/2 a scoop between the feeds.
If she needs weight/condition I'd give her 1/2 - 1 scoop of sugarbeet between the two feeds.

As a rule the amount of sugarbeet you have dry will be four to five times that wet as you should soak it in 4-5 times its dry amount.

eg. If you have one scoop of dry sugarbeet you would need to add 4-5 scoops of water (min of 4) and would make 4-5 scoops of wet sugarbeet.

Sugarbeet is very fattening.

How big is she?
 
im glad eventually someone commented on the sugar beet not being soaked!!! i was waiting for that!!!
I have always been under the impression that u NEVER feed a horse unsoaked beet as it can cause colic????
I had a 14.1hh cob a few years ago and he was in moderate work and was 4, i fed him 1/2 scoop of alpha a or molly chop, 1/2 scoop of course mix and 1/2 scoop of SOAKED sugar beet!!!

Please make sure the beet is soaked before you feed it to your pony!!!
if it is pellets its 24hrs soaking, shreds is 12 hrs soaking and speedibeet is 9 mins!
 
please be careful, i had nasty accident a few weekends ago - look it up on general, horse let rip, and it transpires it was the hard feed alpha a i gave him. he had 5 feeds one week and went mad at the weekend, completely mad and nasty, totally out of character, poor chap, can't say he was that happy either, completely hypo with no where to let off steam, we both had a miserable weekend. i have 10 year old section d lives out 24/7 just on haylage and that is the way it will stay :D

my advice would be to get some good impartial advice. a few of the young 'finer' breed horses are on the new sugar beet and it is non fizzing and they swear by it. i was recommended to put my daughters horse on baileys 4 if he looses weight (he's not cob) :) bu tis 5 yrs old
 
He needs good quality hay, A non heating feed, such as a cool mix or pony cube for light work, a mineral lick and a good chaff. I would maybe give a full scoop of wet sugar beet a day if she is losing weight. A full scoop of dry sugar bet once soaked does about 6 of mine!

We feed our lot barley and sugarbeet because they need the energy, but mostly they need a good hay or haylage. Too much grain is not good for them as they are designed to eat grass, grass and more grass!
 
Kerrys.wales please say you were soaking the sugarbeet!

Most cobs can live on good quality hay and maybe some fibre food like Hifi alone.

Wouldn't recommend Alfa A. I feed it to my mare in small amounts as she has been in hard work but its very rich.
 
fudgie foo. course the sugar beet was soaked. it was 0ne scoop of dry sugar beet then put in a bucket with water and soaked for 24 hours. it was then split up between two meals. i worry about changing anything as that was what the dealer was doing and she seems fine. i cut the barley right down to a handful in each meal. thanks for your advice:)
 
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