Why does feeding become such an emotional rather than rational issue around horses? Is it because they stand and look at you in the most appealing way - until you venture into the field of course and then they put their ears flat back and terrorise each other. I have three fatties at the moment and I am determined to use the winter against them in order to make sure that I don't have to go into another summer worrying about laminitis. One doesn't belong to me so that's fine - he'll be going home anyway but the other two, Jack and Petra, seem to live on thin air. Of course Jack has never done a day's work in his life and arrived with me very cuddly indeed. Petra hasn't had as much work as I would have liked with me being away for a month in July and then injury and rain getting in the way. Nevertheless, I have to take full responsibility for both of them. They have access to about 6 acres of land between four but the grass is well grazed and not high quality; they share that with about 30 deer who come and go as they please. The fat three are getting a couple of handfuls of Fibregold to keep them smiling and no hay at all as yet. Even Chancer has a paunch and so he's only getting one feed a day and still no hay; he has got a rug on but the others are naked. The New Forest ponies are all coming home for one feed a day too but they look absolutely fine on that and the very poor quality but mixed grazing that they have outside. The only one I am really worried about, Thinny (Nelly's best friend) doesn't even belong to me but yes, she comes in and gets a good feed too.
All of this would be fine but the vets have indicated that being kept out without dry feed may be one of the pre-conditions for atypical myoglobunuria as horses are then inclined to eat everything they can get their teeth on - being fat doesn't mean they aren't hungry. In fact I think horses are constantly hungry as it is in their nature to eat nearly all the time - they have to work on the basis that food could be in short supply next week or the week after.
Horses also appear to be eternal optimists - they'll go back to an emptied bucket time and time again just to make sure that nothing has arrived when they weren't looking. When you think about it, food such as grass and leaves must seem to appear by magic to a horse and so it is always worth going back to the same place to see if something has "grown". Butting or nudging for food is also logical to them as that was the behaviour that led to milk magically appearing too.
