Blog Hop: Nutrition

There is (was?) an awesome blog hop going around about what we all feed our horses. I've changed TC's diet a few times since I've owned him, and I'm in the midst of changing it now (reducing supplements since he was on a lot). This is what he's currently getting as of when this post is going out:

Hay:
AM (around 7:45am): 1 flake Grass; 1 flake Alfalfa
PM (around 3:30pm): 2 flakes Grass; 1 flake Alfalfa

The barn feeds 2 flakes per meal but I've opted to add another flake for the evening feeding so that he has food in front of him for longer (and he's a skinny minny on only four flakes a day). He used to get two grass flakes in the morning instead of having them split between grass and alfalfa, but I wanted him to have more protein/calcium, and the pasture where he's going to go eventually (if it ever dries out) feeds about half to two thirds alfalfa so he needs to get used to having more of it.

Grain:
3 quarts LMF Gentle Balance
12 vitamin E capsules (4800 IUs)
2 scoops SmartFlex III
1/3 cup Aloe Juice

TC gets his grain after he gets ridden, so won't get it on days where I don't go to the barn, which are few and far between right now. Eventually I'm hoping to have 1-2 days off of the barn per week, for now I still feel like getting him exercised every day is important.

The LMF Gentle Balance is awesome. TC doesn't need grain for energy or fat, just mostly as a way to get him to whinny at me. It's not too expensive, though I guess I could just be giving him grass pellets or alfalfa pellets and be paying a lot less.

He was afraid of this so we stood next to it for a while

Right now he's on the SmartFlex because SmartPak accidentally kept sending it to me.

Once as he's off the SmartFlex, I'll be putting him on MSM. He got on the SmartFlex when his stifle was acting up, it was always going to be just a short boost for while he was gaining strength. He's been looking good in his hind end lately, so I'm pulling it in favor of MSM, which is super cheap. I might look into other joint supplements later on, but for now he's not in so much work that I feel like he needs more. And honestly I'd probably want to start Adequan next year when he's doing Third if he's sticking around so joint supplements will probably stay off the table.

I might put him back on a hoof supplement. I had him on BioFlax 2.0 and liked that, though didn't order more when I pulled his SmartPaks. I think I might order more of that this week, though Omega Horse Shine is like 30 cents a day (vs 55 cents, lol told you I was cutting back financially) and it has pretty good protein levels. So we'll see.

I love the Aloe and Vitamin E. They're both so cheap that I don't even notice it financially, and it makes me feel better to know he's getting them. The aloe is for his stomach and the vitamin E is good for all sorts of things.

This picture cracks me up, I was talking to a friend
and he was so good about waiting for me, but sat
there with this look on his face a lot of the time

So his diet may change again- I'm still working it all out. But for now he's shiny and happy so that's good!