Lizzy Meyer
The best diet for a VITAL HORSE! Not a short reply-sorry in advance.
Excellent topic and my favorite one! This has been a passion of mine so hold on tight! You can get as minimal or as fancy as your heart desires!
When in doubt think of what they would eat in the wild and mimic that. Forage, forage, forage. Not too rich, not too high protein, not for racehorses (unless they are), and variety! Make sure your horse eats free choice hay/fiber. They should not go more than 4-6 hours without hay-ulcers can develop. Remember, horses secrete stomach acid ALL-THE-TIME....bicarbonate in saliva buffers it.
Find a variety of grass hays and feed them all (introduce gradually). Avoid the ones super high in sugar like rye "founder fodder." Beware of the super-green hays or the ones that are a bit moist. Ask the grower if your hay is GMO and if it has been sprayed much. Most will be fertilized and sprayed-but some are not so bad, others are so bad the horse will not eat. Do the best you can and make friends with people who have access to non-sprayed native grass hay. Learn to be a hay hunter.
Try your best to find native grasses, the very best choice of all-usually lower in sugar and more nutritional variety. Sometimes these mixes are called meadow mixes, grass-mix, wild grasses, or local grasses. See what you can find locally.
Most alfalfa is GMO now unless the grower states it is NOT. Alfalfa is fine if it's making up under about 20% of total diet. I go way under that amount even as personal preference.
Other forages are beet pulp (I do not feed if the horse is a non-sweater, or if the source is GMO-which is pretty much all BP in the US). Speedi-Beet from the UK is not, but it is hard to find and has a high carbon footprint. Timothy pellets, alfalfa pellets (make sure non-GMO source), orchard grass pellets, etc are all fine options to soak with water and add variety and excellent fiber to your horse's diet without adding too much sugar.
Let your horse eat weeds! Take your horse for a walk and let him pick what he needs. Country roadsides can be full of medicinal weeds/herbs. If that's not an option, plant horse-safe tonic herb gardens if your pasture does not already grow these. You can get creative and plant them along your pasture edges or corners. (nettle, dandelion, chickweed, peppermint, cleavers, rosehips are just a few).
The grain portion of a horse's diet is always overrated and overstressed in my opinion. If you feed the average horse correctly-as an herbivore who eats 95% forage, the amount of grain in their total diet is trivial. Their nutrition is coming from grasses, both fresh and dried, and other forages
Grains that are safe for non-metabolic types include whole oats. For the elite athlete who is sweating daily, a little rolled barley (small amounts as in a couple cups) might be used. This really depends on the horse (personality, condition, energy needs, energy level).
Fats I think should be used conservatively given that horses don't have a gallbladder, but are better than too much starch. If the horse needs energy-you are safer feeding a fat than a starch. Yes, they can digest fats in the small intestine, but I do not like to use very much. When I do, I use small amounts as in a couple ounces, of hemp oil (good for ulcer horses, and ones that need muscle) or coconut oil (good for immune system).
Other foods you might add for variety or treats in small amounts: peanuts (unsalted and shelled), almonds, papaya, sesame seeds, banana (no peel), pumpkin seeds, grapes, oranges, squash, celery, pomegranate, basil, sprouts, blueberries, strawberries, pumpkin, the list goes on.
Good omega 3's: chia seed and flax seed. I feed whole seeds and add some water before feeding.
Vitamins MUST, I stress MUST, be from non-synthetic sources. I like to either make my own from herbal recipes or use a pre-made herbal mixture, or use a pre-made whole food supplement.
Horses do wonders with plant digestion and nutrient extraction with their 14 inch diameter fermentation vat aka, the cecum. They are built to get their nutrition right out of plants-minerals are naturally chelated (that means bound to an amino-acid that enhances digestibility) When horses are fed their vitamins/minerals via plants/herbs, their body instantly recognizes the food and all of the co-factors that go with it ensure complete digestion. That's 100% and no stress on the body!!
My pet peeve is synthetic vitamins and minerals-if you research how they are made, it is pretty awful. Here are some classic examples: B-vitamins are from coal-tar, vitamin C is from sugar hydrogenated with acetone, and vitamin D is from irradiated cattle brains.
Even better, feed companies (and supplement companies) regularly add much more than the horse actually needs since well, they are not very digestible. They have to ensure a certain percentage of absorption which is only possible with a mega-dose. The horse absorbs about 10% of a synthetic (made in lab of chemicals). The rest is detoxed from the body, daily.
THAT takes up a lot of energy over the life of your horse. That's energy that could have been used for healing a micro-tear in a tendon....or growing more hoof, or healing that itchy skin.
Minerals-there are some good free choice loose powdered ones on the market, but some do have synthetics and sugars to avoid. Selecting the right one is the "do the best you can category." Good unrefined sea salt is a good additive in times of need such as winter to ensure hydration and summer to replace electrolytes lost in sweat. This can be free choice or added to feed (max 1 tbsp per feeding).
Adding water to feed is amazing for digestion-best digestion comes from a hydrated gut. If you have a chance to add hydration to your horse, do it!
You can use foods to help your horse recover from illness. For example a uveitis horse or a chronic inflammation case, I might use foods high in antioxidants and anti-inflammatories.
Recipe might be: blueberries, pomegranate juice (no added sugar), fuji apple (highest source of quercetin), whole orange or half a lemon, and strawberries.
I put this in a blender and feed a little less than a cup a couple or more times a day. Food is medicine and the body knows exactly what to do with it.
Learn to read labels above all else-remember feed companies market and make alot of money this way. If horses have free choice clean hay (not the high octane super-lush type), just good basic hay that they can munch on all day, they will likely be on their way to a healthy gut-their foundation for health.
I do not go by the NRC guidelines-I go by what works for the horse and their basic needs as a foraging, trickle-feeder, herbivore.
I did not intend to write this much but I just can't stop once I start! Feel free to ask me specific questions!