Colic
Unfortunately, we have seen quite a few episodes of colic in the last 10 days.
What is colic?
It describes the display of abdominal pain in our horses
What does it look like?
One or all of the following: rolling, pawing at the ground, sweating, flank watching, lifting the upper lip with head stretched (flehmen reflex)
What causes it?
There are many causes of colic, but in the last week it has been associated with a nutritional change. The wet ground combined with these warmer days has caused a flush of grass. This will continue over the next month or two. This sudden flush of grass has caused a change in the diet your horses it. The grass has a higher water, starch and sugar content compared to the winter diet they have been used to. We all know that our horses are poor digesters of starch, and in combination with this excess sugar, it causes a change in the food to the hind gut microbes.
This imbalance and change causes irritation to the bowel lining and causes painful spasms.
We see this GI upset as colic.
How can we prevent it?
Be proactive and reduce the grass intake to your horses. Introduce their access to this grass slowly, even with an hour per day access, or strip grazing.
In addition, reduce the sugar and starch content of their bucket feed to counter act the fibre change.
Lastly, consider proactively using products such as Equishure to reduce the hind gut acidosis which occurs during this time.
I hope this helps. We don’t want to see each other after hours 🥰