Natural Horse Health - for a healthy body

Natural horse health covers many topics including feeding, supplements, natural horse remedies, herbs, alternative therapies, natural horse vets, horse vaccines and deworming.

Feeding for Natural Horse Health

Average calorie needs for a mature 1,100lbs horse:

• Maintenance: 16.4Mcal = 19lbs hay (approx 2% of body weight)
• Breeding Stallion: 20.5Mcal = 25lbs hay
• Mare, late pregnancy: 19.7Mcal = 23lbs hay
• Mare, lactating (first 3 months): 28.3Mcal = 33lbs hay
• Mare, lactating (after 3 months): 24.3Mcal = 28.5lbs hay
• Light work: 20.5Mcal = 25lbs hay
• Medium work: 24.6Mcal = 29lbs hay
• Heavy work: 32.8Mcal = 38.5lbs hay

(from The Horse Journal: Guide to Equine Supplements and Nutraceuticals by Eleanor Kellon, VMD) see sidebar.

Vitamins and Minerals for Natural Horse Health

All horses need certain vitamins and minerals for a variety of body function and many are vital to good health. However, healthy horses on good pasture usually don't need any extra vitamins, except maybe for vitamin E if the horse is working very hard. But when horses are on a grass hay diet, supplementation of vitamin E at 1,000 IU per day is beneficial (2,000 IU if in hard work).

Minerals are slightly more complicated as they can compete with each other for absorption so they need to be feed in the correct amounts in relation to each other.

• Ca:P (Calcium:Phosphorus) ratio should be between 2:1 and 1.2:1
• Ca:Mg (Calcium:Magnesium) ratio should be 2:1
• Cu:Fe (Copper:Iron) ratio should be 1:4
• Cu:Zn:Mn (Copper:Zinc:Manganese) ratio should be between 1:3:3 to 1:5:5

Herbs

Herbs can be very beneficial for a range of conditions and illnesses. Below is a list of herbs that can be beneficial to your horse's health - click on the link to read more about each one.

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