Hi Suzanne,

We don't recommend only feeding 2 "meals" per day. The recommendation would be to take the total amount of hay for the day and split it into 3-4 feedings so that he never goes more than 6 hours without food. Using the small mesh hay nets is good - some horses need to have those doubled or even tripled to slow them down enough (I have one of those). With the new hays being lower in s/s than last year's hay you may be able to allow him to free feed without gaining excess weight. Another idea would be to soak the hay to lower the s/s further so it would be less calorie dense and he could eat more for gut fill time.

I agree that the stress of not eating is something you need to avoid so for the week until the test I would stick with the free feeding routine and work on the weight reduction/total amount eaten reduction after the blood work is pulled. Fasting and stress will negatively affect your blood work results so you want to avoid that.

Lavinia, Dante, George Too and Peanut

Jan 05, RI

EC Support Team