Tennessee Walking Horse Association of Oklahoma
News you can use...
I don’t know about you but my search to understand the needs of equine nutrition has taken me around many bends in the road over the years and has been tantamount, at times, to being in a quagmire. There is a lot of information out there and sometimes my mind has been boggled. Ultimately, it comes down to what you can live with, having made a reasonable attempt to understand the horse’s nutritional needs. Not wanting to suffer alone, I am sharing some of the recent information that impacted my feeding choices for my horses.(Excerpted from The Horse Journal 05/05) Feed manufacturers want us to believe processed is better. But is it? The common thought is that processing of grains improves digestibility in the small intestine. This would be beneficial in preventing undigested starch from reaching the large bowel, where fermentation could cause intestinal problems.
According to The Horse Journal, processing does not significantly improve the small intestine digestibility of oats at all. Cracking or crimping corn makes no significant difference either. Finely grinding corn does make it more available to the organisms in the large bowel—the opposite effect of what we are trying to achieve. High heat processing (extrusion, popping, micronizing) does slightly improve small intestine digestibility. Micronizing does make barley more digestible but the degree of improvement may be as low as 10%--hardly worth the cost.
Feeding your horse whole grains instead of pelleted feeds, commercial grain mixes or processed grains (cracked, rolled, crimped, steamed, popped or flaked) may be a solution that works for you. Whole grains cost less than commercial grain mixtures. You can inspect whole grains for quality and contaminants which you cannot do when they are processed or coated with molasses. Whole grains have their outer shell in tact and will keep for much longer without molding or spoiling. Keeping grains whole preserves their most valuable and fragile nutrients such as B vitamins, essential fatty acids and vitamin E.
According to The Horse Journal, if you are worried about a balanced diet, the Merck Manual is considered the bible of basic medical and management advice for animals and contains equine grain mix recipes. A simple mix anyone can prepare is: 40% corn, 40% oats and 20% alfalfa pellets. This mix is 12% protein and has a balanced major mineral profile. For a boost in branched chain amino acids for muscle support in high performance horses, mix 10% dried split peas, 35% oats, 35% corn and 20% alfalfa pellets. Add two ounces of ground stabilized flaxseed per day for omega 3 fatty acids, to round out the profile. You may also want to add a vitamin E and selenium supplement (or just vitamin E if you are located in a selenium adequate area) and a mineral mix that complements your hay.
WHAT TO DO WHEN YOUR HORSE BUCKS
There is a definite "classical" method one should strictly follow while one's horse is bucking.
1. Ensure that you have an audience. There is absolutely no point in being decked by your horse unless there are, oh, say a hundred people around to watch. This way, you will have made them feel better about their own inadequacies, and you won't have to go into tedious detail explaining to everyone you know exactly how it happened. It is considered good form if at least one of the audience members is either:
? a. Someone you admire and want to impress; or
? b. Someone you despise and don't want to give any ammo to; or
? c. Someone you have the hots for and want to impress; or
? d. Your best friend, who will have no compunction in falling over, laughing and pointing.
2. Try to be spectacular. I mean, anyone can just get bucked off and land on their backside, can't they? You want to try to make this "the decking to end all decking." The Titanic of bucks. You get the picture. Now, for this you will need the following: An extremely acrobatic horse - you want one of those twisty-turny jobbies last seen at the National Rodeo Championships; a supple back - you should practice somersaults, pirouettes and handstands at home; a hat-see, I can be sensible!!!
3. It is best if this buck comes at a time when everyone is watching you, but no-one is prepared for what is to come. During a dressage test is good. Your horse should be working nicely, giving no indication that you are about to become "the person who learned to fly." Of course, experts at this will point out that tail swishing, ears twitching back, and the tension around the nostrils, but they are show-offs and should be ignored. To the uninitiated, this will look like a dramatic performance which you and your horse have practiced at home.
4. When the horse leaves the ground, and launches you into the air like a cannon ball, it is far more gratifying for the crowd if you can let out a blood-curdling yell. Kind of William Wallace when they cut his, um, thingies off. Practice this at home. When the local rangers knock on your door, asking if you are keeping a wild cougar in your back yard, you will know you have it right.
5. You should try to stay elevated as long as possible. The longer the better. If your arms and legs fly in impossible directions, as if you were a rag doll, you will achieve additional marks for artistic impression.
6. When you land, try to do so with a thud! The kind of dull kind that you hear when you drop a melon from a great height. Try no to go "Splat" -- it puts the audience off their hamburgers.
7. Lie immobile for a while, as you horse runs off into the distance. After a suitable time, rise your head and groan: "you butt-head!"
ONE BUCKING THING AFTER ANOTHER
Liberty Ark Info Alert
Thanks to the great work of Ray Cunio and Doreen Hannes, and many others in the Liberty Ark Coalition, Senator Jim Talent and Congresswoman Jo Ann Emerson, both from Missouri, introduced companion bills yesterday which will say the “...Secretary [USDA] shall not implement or carry out, and no Federal funds shall be used to implement or carry out, a National Identification System, or similar requirement, that mandates the participation of livestock owners.”
This is a great step forward, but it is just a beginning. Before the bills were introduced, we submitted to the Senator and Congresswoman a list of additional issues that should be addressed in the bill. We were assured that our input will be requested as the bills move to hearings, and through the process.
The bills have not yet been assigned a number. They will be posted on the Liberty Ark website as soon as they are available. This is a great example of what we can do when we all work together. We were able to tell the Congressmen that we represented 72 organizations, and more than 1100 members in all 50 states. This is impressive, in view of the fact that we organized only a few months ago. But we need many more organizations, and many, many more individuals to sign up in support of this effort to eliminate the National Animal Identification System( NAIS).
Please make an effort to get your friends and neighbors to visit the website (http://libertyark.net) and sign the pledge. We’re going to need thousands of people if we are going to be successful in this battle. The folks who are pushing this plan have tons of money and powerful, paid lobbyists.
Get a supply of the new brochure, and a CD so you can provide accurate information to all the people you know. We have reached a new stage in this fight, and we need to expand the army.
The National Walking Horse Association Relocates to Lexington, Kentucky
Download the press releaseEquine Ulcers
Download the pdf file
Report of 2006 Annual TWHBEA Meetings