Sulfur is a critical part of all proteins and horses need it to create protein, particularly the protein of their hooves and hair!
If sulfur in your horse’s diet is so important, why isn’t it included in FeedXL?
We don’t include sulfur in horse diets in FeedXL because the chance of a deficiency is virtually zero. Forages contain enough sulfur, so that even if intake was reduced to just 1% of bodyweight, maintenance requirements would still be met.
It is possible that a diet based on straw could become sulfur deficient, but as long as you use FeedXL to make sure protein requirement is met, the assumption is that sulfur requirement will also be met.
By feeding the right amount of forage, you should be able to meet your horse’s sulfur requirement. Check out our blog on how much forage your horse really needs.
Interested in learning about protein and how it’s quality affects your horse? Read more in our blog Understanding Protein Quality
Do you have a question or comment? Do you need help with feeding?
We would love to welcome you to our FeedXL Horse Nutrition Facebook Group. Ask questions and have them answered by PhD and Masters qualified equine nutritionists and spend time with like-minded horse owners. It’s free!
At FeedXL, we often recommend beet pulp for horses as a source of fibre and energy – but did you know that it’s also a great source of amino acids?
Sugar beet pulp and oats (another common source of energy) both have similar protein content of around 9%. The advantage of beet pulp is the amino acid profile – it provides higher levels of lysine, methionine, threonine, leucine, isoleucine, and valine than oats within the same amount of protein.
Why is this so super?
Lysine and threonine are two of the essential amino acids that horses can run out of the fastest, making them very important to supply in the diet. Isolucine and valine are branch chain amino acids that are key to muscle recovery.
While we don’t recommend feeding beet pulp for horses purely for its protein, when added as a source of calories and fibre, it can also bring in a good level of essential amino acids. This makes sugar beet a pretty super ingredient.
Oats
Sugarbeet Pulp
Crude Protein
%
9.1
9
Lysine
g/kg
3.5
7.1
Methionine
g/kg
1.4
1.6
Threonine
g/kg
2.8
4.4
Leucine
g/kg
6.6
6.3
Isoleucine
g/kg
3.3
3.8
Valine
g/kg
4.6
6.1
Data from PremierAtlas 2014
Along with other ingredients that are fed wet or soaked, it’s important to enter them correctly in your horse’s diet in FeedXL. Not sure if you should be entering the dry weight or the wet weight? Read this helpful article: Wet or Dry Weight
Do you have a question or comment? Do you need help with feeding?
We would love to welcome you to our FeedXL Horse Nutrition Facebook Group. Ask questions and have them answered by PhD and Masters qualified equine nutritionists and spend time with like-minded horse owners. It’s free!
Oaten hay is commonly fed to horses. Recent research by Jackson et al (2018)1 suggests however that we should be cautious with oaten hay as it may be negatively affecting our horses’ dental health!
The Study on Oaten Hay and Horse’s Teeth
Dr Kirsten Jackson (https://dentalvet.com.au) and her co-researchers found in a study of 500 Western Australian horses, that oaten hay was significantly associated with an increased incidence of dental caries (tooth decay).
Image credit: Dr Kirsten Jackson (https://dentalvet.com.au)
How does Oaten Hay do this?
Dental caries form when bacteria in your horse’s mouth metabolise sugars in the hay/ feed and produce the by-product of acid. This acid demineralises the teeth causing decay which in horses generally means the outer layer (cementum) is stripped from the teeth.
Because oaten hay can be so high in water soluble carbohydrates (WSC; also loosely called ‘sugars’) the oaten hay feeds the oral bacteria, a lot… and then they produce a lot of acid… and the acid demineralizes (eats away) the hard part of the teeth.
It is thought that the near constant supply of sugars to the bacteria in the mouth when a horse has constant access to oaten hay, and therefore the prolonged periods of exposure of the teeth to the acids produced by the bacteria is what puts horses on oaten hay at higher risk of disease.
What about other types of hay or pasture?
Dr Jackson reports that in the same study it was found that a meadow hay based diet was protective. And horses with access to good quality grazing all year round were less likely to have peripheral caries than horses that had no access to grazing.
Other similarly high WSC hays like ryegrass hay and other cereal hays like barley and wheaten hay will potentially put horses at the same risk as oaten hay.
What can be done if my horse has dental caries?
The good news is that because a horse’s teeth are constantly erupting, and the acid produced when high WSC hay is fed only affects the part of the tooth that is physically exposed to it (so the tooth below the gumline remains unaffected), dental caries can be treated.
Jackson et al 2021 showed that when oaten hay was swapped for a lower WSC meadow hay, it allowed teeth to start to recover.
The authors note that full recovery generally takes around 2 years.
Image credit: Dr Kirsten Jackson (https://dentalvet.com.au)
Should oaten and other high WSC hays be completely avoided?
Not necessarily. It seems in this study that it was horses with free access to oaten hay that were most affected.
If you are in an area where other type of hay is difficult to source and using SOME oaten hay helps to get you through, then using some, mixed with a variety of other hays and/or access to pasture is potentially OK.
Also not all horses on oaten hay were affected so there is some individual variability in susceptibility to the caries so some horses can be ok on oaten but if your horse has caries it is best to avoid it. If your horse is on oaten hay and this can’t be avoided it is probably a good idea you have regular veterinary dental examinations conducted every 6 months.
If you are spoilt for choice with hay and can avoid oaten hay, you are probably best to avoid it completely… especially if you have a thoroughbred as they were also shown to be at higher risk!
References
1. Jackson, K., E. Kelty, and M. Tennant, Equine peripheral dental caries: An epidemiological survey assessing prevalence and possible risk factors in Western Australian horses. Equine Vet J 2018. 50(1):79-84.
2. Jackson, K., E. Kelty, and M. Tennant, Retrospective case review investigating the effect of replacing oaten hay with a non-cereal hay on equine peripheral caries in 42 cases. Equine Vet J 2021. 53(6):1105-1111.
Do you have a question or comment? Do you need help with feeding?
We would love to welcome you to our FeedXL Horse Nutrition Facebook Group. Ask questions and have them answered by PhD and Masters qualified equine nutritionists and spend time with like-minded horse owners. It’s free!
Copra meal – It’s an interesting ingredient to consider for your horse’s diet, made from the flesh of the coconut after a lot of the oil has been extracted.
Copra tends to divide people, with some horse owners loving it and some not a fan.
What do we think of copra meal for horses?
If it’s quality copra meal, regularly tested for aflatoxin (a mycotoxin that commonly contaminates copra meal) and not burnt during the drying/oil extraction process then it is great stuff.
It has a lovely oil content which interestingly has virtually no omega 3 or 6, so it won’t unbalance your omega ratios. It is also predominantly medium chain fatty acids which are unique and have some advantages over long chain fatty acids for digestion and metabolism.
Copra meal is high in phosphorus. It is not unique in this respect. All grains, legumes, oilseeds and their by-products are high in phosphorus. On this, here is what you need to remember… no single ingredient is a perfect diet.
We combine feed ingredients for a very good reason, and that is because they each bring their own unique set of nutrients to the diet. Being high in phosphorus and low in calcium is actually USEFUL because so often we end up with high calcium in diets and phosphorus is a sometimes hard to come by and relatively expensive nutrient. So when we can use naturally high phosphorus ingredients it helps to fill this requirement in a diet.
For example, a lucerne/alfalfa, beet-pulp based diet is high calcium, low phosphorus. Add copra and it raises the phosphorus without also unnecessarily increasing calcium. And that helps you both meet phosphorus requirement and keep the calcium to phosphorus ratio balanced (FeedXL works all of this out for you!).
Copra meal is high in fibre and it makes for great fibre diversity. If you have an easy keeper, 80 g/day will add fibre variety without adding too many calories.
Copra also tends to be quite rich in trace minerals, particularly copper and zinc which are often in short supply in horse diets because pasture and hay tend to be low in those nutrients.
Last is protein. Protein is an interesting one. Copra has a reputation for being a poor quality protein. And yes, if you compare it to soybean it is poor quality. BUT, and this is a big but, we don’t ever use copra for its protein. As in we wouldn’t recommend you use copra for a horse that needs extra protein in its diet because there are better options.
So, what’s the BUT?! Well, we use copra as a source of energy… and compared to OTHER energy sources like cereal grains and beet pulp, copra has BETTER quality protein… so it’s like an extra little bonus, in adding energy you also get more essential amino acids than if you had used say cooked barley or beet pulp. As long as it is being used as a source of energy and not being used for protein as such.
Copra is a beautiful ingredient for horses on two conditions; one, that it is high quality copra meal you are using. And two, that you feed it as a part of a balanced diet, which FeedXL makes easy! 😊
Do you have a question or comment? Do you need help with feeding?
We would love to welcome you to our FeedXL Horse Nutrition Facebook Group. Ask questions and have them answered by PhD and Masters qualified equine nutritionists and spend time with like-minded horse owners. It’s free!
Confusion around what form of flaxseed (linseed) is best/safest to feed our horses is nothing new. While many of us thought the concerns around cyanide poisoning for horses were laid to rest, recent safety issues around flaxseed supplementation in human diets, more specifically for toddlers and children, has warranted us to look at this again (EFSA CONTAM Panel, 2019).
There are very few published research studies available in horses around the safety of feeding flaxseed. And there are no published reports of cyanide poisoning that we are aware of. Most safety information is extrapolated from other species including humans, rats, dogs, cattle and pigs. Although information is limited, we aim to answer three questions for you:
Should we be concerned about the potential of cyanide poisoning in horses?
What is the safest form of flaxseed to feed our horses?
Does form then affect the fatty acid composition of flaxseed?
How is flaxseed commonly fed to horses?
Currently, whole and freshly ground flaxseed are the most common ways of feeding flaxseeds to our horses.
Whole flaxseeds are deemed relatively safe from the point of view of cyanide poisoning as the two things (more scientifically, the precursors for cyanide production; cynanogenic glycosides and the glycosidase enzyme) that combine to produce cyanide are contained separately within the intact whole seed. Once eaten, the chewing action grinding the seeds can allow for cyanide production, but it is thought that this is quickly halted once the flaxseed reaches the stomach and the enzyme becomes deactivated by the gastric acid.
Anecdotally horse owners have found that whole flaxseeds can pass undigested through the gastrointestinal tract presenting in manure, with some finding flaxseed plants growing in their paddocks (great for biodiversity in the pasture, but not so much benefit to our horse in getting those added fatty acids in the diet as we had hoped).
Freshly ground flaxseed has become popular for this reason – with limited time for cyanide to form, preservation of fatty acids and to ensure our horses could access all the goodness within the seed coat freshly ground flaxseed is an excellent option.
Realistically, what is the likelihood of cyanide poisoning in horses?
It appears not likely.
Extrapolated from other species, a horse’s maximum ‘safe’ intake of cyanogenic precursors is 0.4mg/ kg body weight… or 200mg for a 500kg (1100lb) horse (Dusica, I. et al., 2012).
So, even if a flaxseed product contained the highest concentration of cyanogenic precursors reported in the European Food Safety Authority database (407mg/kg) (EFSA CONTAM Panel, 2019), it can be still be safely fed at up to 500g (~1 lb) per day for a 500kg horse.
How much flaxseed can I feed safely?
There is no established recommendation, but we can be guided by amounts that have been safely fed in a few horse-specific studies.
In a Canadian study, horses were fed 100g (3.5 oz) per 100kg (220 lb) body weight per day (500 grams for a 500 kg horse). This study looked at the supplementation of flaxseed for reducing skin reactions like ‘sweet itch’ (O’Neill, W. et al., 2002). The authors reported no negative effects of feeding milled flaxseed at this level and reported reduced skin reactions in response to the induced skin irritation in the flaxseed supplemented horses.
Other studies in 2009 & 2012, fed a much lower amount of milled flaxseed, estimated to be 150-165g (5.5-5.8 oz) per day. Between these two studies, positive changes in blood and muscle omega 3 content and improved immune function were reported in those supplemented with flaxseed compared with control groups (Vineyard, K. et al., 2009; Hess, T. et al., 2012).
Based on these few studies and figures extrapolated from other species, up to 100g (3.5 oz) per 100kg (220 lb) or 500 grams for a 500 kg horse per day can be fed safely.
Most horses (65% according to Facebook Poll conducted on the 15 October 2020 by FeedXL Horse Nutrition Calculator) receive 100-250g (3.5-8.8 oz) flaxseed per day.
If you are concerned about cyanide toxicity, what can you do?
Research has shown that heating flaxseed can reduce the amount of cyanogenic precursor present.
One study showed microwaving flaxseed for just over 4.5 minutes on microwave power of 400W reduced precursor by 25% (Dusica, I. et al., 2012). Beware though, you can burn flaxseed in the microwave! Microwave power > 560W for 6 minutes caused samples to burn.
Other studies have also shown that microwave roasting achieved the highest level of precursor reduction (83.3%) in flaxseed (Feng et al. (2003).
Happily, this study also showed that there were no major changes in the main nutrient and fatty acid profile caused by microwave treatment.
Similarly, extrusion (140 degree Celsius) significantly reduced cyanogenic compounds (84%) but did not significantly change the fatty acid content – even after storage for 60 days (Imran, M et al., 2015). Limited information is available on micronized flaxseed specifically.
Interestingly, the perception that fatty acids in raw ground flaxseed deteriorate quickly is not supported by various studies, all showing minimal difference in fatty acid composition after 2-4 months storage (Khalesi, S., et al. 2011).
What about oil?
The good news is that oil doesn’t contain the cynangenic compounds of whole or ground flaxseed. It can be less stable in terms of fatty acid composition, therefore must be stored correctly and used in a timely manner. But if the reason you are feeding flaxseed is for the oil content, then using the oil may be an option worth considering.
With flaxseed oil products though, you do not get the benefit of other nutrients whole, ground or milled flaxseed provides to a diet including like protein, fibre, minerals & vitamins.
Summary
So, are we any closer to knowing what is the best and safest form of flaxseed to feed our horses? Honestly, we think it comes down to personal preference.
With cyanide toxicity appearing to be less of an issue for horses due to the low amounts commonly fed in comparison to body weight – whole or ground flaxseed is acceptable. Due to anecdotal evidence of whole flaxseeds passing undigested through the gut, freshly ground flaxseed is favourable to ensure fatty acids can be absorbed.
Ground flaxseed also offers the benefit of providing the wonderful fibre and other nutrients along with the omega 3 fatty acids compared with flaxseed oil.
Practically, freshly grinding flaxseed is not for everyone. If this is the case for you, using a stabilised (pre-heat treated) flaxseed product may be a better option.
If you are still concerned about cyanide poisoning, microwaving your flaxseed should significantly reduce the cyanogenic precursor and is unlikely to affect the fatty acid content. Be careful microwaving though to make sure you are not burning the flaxseed.
And do your own research on the safest way to microwave them based on your specific microwave. As a guide you should be able to safely microwave them at 400W for 5 minutes. But the quantity you microwave at any one time will have an effect on the appropriate time you should use.
Feeding rates will vary depending on a horse’s energy requirement and amount of omega 3 within the diet however up to 100g per 100kg body weight appears safe…the economics of feeding this much we are less sure about!
References
Dusica, I., Kokic, B., & Tea, B., Colovic, R., Vukmirovic, D. & Slavica, S. (2012). Effect of microwave heating on content of cyanogenic glycosides in linseed. Ratarstvo i povrtarstvo. 49. 63-68.
EFSA CONTAM Panel (EFSA Panel on Contaminants in the Food Chain), Schrenk, D., Bignami, M., Bodin, L., Chipman, J.K., del Mazo, J., Grasl‐Kraupp, B., Hogstrand, C., Hoogenboom, L.R., Leblanc, J‐C., Nebbia, C.S., Nielsen, E., Ntzani, E., Petersen, A., Sand, S., Vleminckx, C, Wallace, H., Benford, D., Brimer, L., Mancini, F.R., Metzler, M., Viviani, B., Altieri, A., Arcella, D., Steinkellner, H. & Schwerdtle, T., (2019). Scientific opinion on the evaluation of the health risks related to the presence of cyanogenic glycosides in foods other than raw apricot kernels. EFSA Journal 2019;17(4):5662, 78.
Feng, D., Shen, Y. & Chavez, E. (2003). Effectiveness of different processing methods in reducing hydrogen cyanide content of flaxseed. Journal of the Science of Food and Agriculture. 83. 836 – 841.
Hess, T., Rexford, J., Hansen, D. Harris, M., Schauermann, N., Ross-Jones, T., Engle, T., Allen, K. & Mulligan, C. (2012). Effects of two different dietary sources of long chain omega-3, highly unsaturated fatty acids on incorporation into the plasma, red blood cell, and skeletal muscle in horses. Journal of Animal Science. 90. 3023-31.
Imran, M., Anjum, F., Ahmad, N., Khan, M., Mushtaq, Z., Nadeem, M. & Hussain, S. (2015). Impact of extrusion processing conditions on lipid peroxidation and storage stability of full-fat flaxseed meal. Lipids in health and disease. 14. 92.
Khalesi, S., Jamaluddin, R. & Ismail, A. (2011). Effect of raw and heated flaxseed (Linum usitatissimum L.) on blood lipid profiles in rats. International Journal of Applied Science and Technology. 1(4). 84-9.
O’Neill, W., McKee, S. & Clarke, A. (2002). Flaxseed (Linum usitatissimum) supplementation associated with reduced skin test lesional area in horses with Culicoides hypersensitivity. Canadian journal of veterinary research = Revue canadienne de recherche vétérinaire. 66. 272-7.
Ratnayake, W., Behrens, W., Fischer, P., Labbe, M., Mongeau, R. & Bearerogers, J. (1992). Chemical and nutritional studies of flax-seed (Variety Linott) in rats. Journal of Nutritional Biochemistry. 3. 232-240.
Vineyard, K., Warren, L. & Kivipelto, J. (2009). Effect of dietary omega-3 fatty acid source on plasma and red blood cell membrane composition and immune function in yearling horses. Journal of Animal Science. 88. 248-57.
Meet The Author: Samantha Potter, MSc
In 2009, Sam completed a Bachelor of Equine Studies and it was during this time she developed an interest in equine nutrition. Pursuing this passion, Sam went on to complete her Honours followed by her Masters degree in equine nutrition at The University of Melbourne. Since 2015, Sam has worked as an independent nutritionist and enjoys supporting horse owners manage their horse’s nutrition in her role with FeedXL. To learn more about Sam and to ‘meet’ the rest of the FeedXL team, check out our About Us page here.
Do you have a question or comment? Do you need help with feeding?
We would love to welcome you to our FeedXL Horse Nutrition Facebook Group. Ask questions and have them answered by PhD and Masters qualified equine nutritionists and spend time with like-minded horse owners. It’s free!
When using products commonly soaked prior to feeding (things like beet pulp, copra meal, high fibre pellets and hay that is soaked to remove sugars), always enter them into your FeedXL rations as their dry weight.
The Two Main Reasons to Always Enter Dry Weight:
When you add water it increases the weight of what you are feeding, but it doesn’t add any nutrients itself.For example, if you are feeding 500 grams of beet pulp which contains 5.9 MJ of digestible energy, then this is the amount of energy we want to be taken into account in the diet. If you add 1.5 litres of water to that 500 grams of beet pulp and feed a total of 2 kilograms of WET beet and enter THIS weight into FeedXL, FeedXL will not realise the water has been added and think you are feeding 2 kilograms of dry beet and therefore put 23.6 MJ of energy into the diet. Big difference! And a huge overestimation of the actual energy being fed.
FeedXL also won’t be able to accurately estimate pasture intake if you enter the wet weight of the feeds because FeedXL won’t know that a portion of your feeds are water and will therefore count that water weight as feed weight and will reduce pasture intake accordingly.
You might now be wondering why we don’t then allow you to specify you are feeding the product wet – the answer is simply because FeedXL can’t possibly know how wet you feed your soaked ingredients and you will likely make them a bit wetter or a bit drier each time you feed, so it is most accurate to just have everything entered in its dry form.
So, always remember that when you’re weighing your horse’s feeds, enter amounts into FeedXL in their dry form in order to accurately develop rations for your horse. Then go ahead and add as much or as little water as you like!
Do you have a question or comment? Do you need help with feeding?
We would love to welcome you to our FeedXL Horse Nutrition Facebook Group. Ask questions and have them answered by PhD and Masters qualified equine nutritionists and spend time with like-minded horse owners. It’s free!
Are you ready to start using FeedXL to build a balanced diet for your horse? Entering accurate information on your horse and what you are actually feeding is so important for making sure the diets you get out are accurate. Here are the most important things you need to get right!
Bodyweight
Your horse’s bodyweight is the most important piece of information used to calculate your horse’s daily nutrient requirements.
If it is too heavy, nutrient requirements will be overestimated and you will end up over feeding your horse.
If it is too light, nutrient requirements will be underestimated and you may end up under feeding your horse.
The best way to get a bodyweight for your horse is to weigh him. BUT, when weigh scales are not available, we recommend using our bodyweight calculator.
The bodyweight calculator lets you enter the girth and length measurements of your horse and it calculates the bodyweight for you. We highly recommend that you measure your horse’s girth and length, and whenever possible weigh your horse on a set of scales to calibrate or confirm the girth and length weight measurement method. All you have to do is measure your horse as shown hereand then enter the measurements into FeedXL and we calculate the weight for you. Easy!
You can change the horse’s weight after it has been saved by using the Retrieve Horse button and editing the weight. It is important to check and update your horse’s weight regularly and update the diet if the weight has changed.
Tip: To get to this screen, click the ‘Bodyweight Calculator’ button when entering your horse’s details.
Weight of Hay
It is really easy to over or underestimate the weight of hay you are feeding. If your horse has access to Free Choice hay, enter it here at the ‘Free Choice Forages’ step.
If you feed hay in specific amounts each day, get yourself a set of fish or luggage scales and weigh each type of hay you feed so you can enter the weight accurately. This can then be entered in the ‘Prepare Diet’ step where you will add any other items fed by weight.
Weight of Feeds and Supplements
It’s also very difficult to accurately estimate the weight of feeds and supplements you might use as their weight per volume is so different depending on the ingredient. Get yourself a set of $20 kitchen scales and weigh everything you feed so you can get a really accurate assessment of your horse’s diet.
The secret to how to enter your horse’s diet info into FeedXL is simple: entering accurate information means the assessment of your horse’s current diet will be accurate. And of course, when you make adjustments and create your preferred diet, you should also weigh accurate amounts when you are feeding to make sure what you are feeding is the right amount!
Do you have a question or comment? Do you need help with feeding?
We would love to welcome you to our FeedXL Horse Nutrition Facebook Group. Ask questions and have them answered by PhD and Masters qualified equine nutritionists and spend time with like-minded horse owners. It’s free!
In FeedXL you may notice that some feed ingredients do not have complete data. This means that this feed ingredient’s label provided by the manufacturing company does not contain information for all of the nutrients examined by FeedXL.
Keep reading to learn what this means, how to see which nutrients are ‘missing’, and what to do about it!
What Does it Really Mean When Data is Missing in FeedXL?
When adding feeds to our database, we use the most complete information the manufacturer provides. Most manufacturers label according to legislative requirements so it’s not uncommon for feeds to have incomplete data. You can still include it in your diets, however, you will be working with incomplete data.
When ingredients have missing data in FeedXL you can help us make the data better by contacting the manufacturer and asking them to provide missing nutrient data.
If you find data on packaging or online that we don’t have in FeedXL, you can ‘edit’ the ingredient and add it yourself for our review, or you can email us at support@feedxl.com with the missing information and we’ll add it for you.
How To Know Which Nutrients are ‘Missing’ and What You Can Do About It
If you want to see which nutrients are ‘missing’ information, simply click the ‘View Data’ link. A panel will open that shows the nutrients we have a value for, indicated by a green tick. And which nutrients are unknown, indicted by a yellow ‘?’.
Then, if you want to see the actual values, tick the ‘I am not a robot’ box in the top right corner, play its game and you will see the actual numbers for that feed ingredient. And notice there is an ‘Edit’ button on this screen which could come in handy later.
So, by now you know which data we have for a particular feed ingredient and which we don’t. Let’s look at what happens when we put this particular feed into a diet.
This horse is an 1100 lb (500 kg) horse in moderate work grazing average quality ‘Autumn’ pasture. When we add 4.5 lb of this feed to the diet, this is what our nutrient graph looks like:
Notice the little yellow triangles on Iodine, Sodium, Vitamin B1 and Folic Acid. This is telling you that at least one ingredient in this diet is missing data for this nutrient.
If you switch to the nutrient table and look at Iodine as an example, you will see a note telling you exactly which ingredients are missing data for this nutrient. In this case, it says:
Please note:This may or may not be a true deficiency. Purina Omolene #500 Competition may contain iodine but information on the amount is not currently available. In the case of commercial feeds you could contact the manufacturer(s) and request more complete information so we can include it in the FeedXL database.
How To Know if It’s a True Deficiency or Not
This is where the tricky bit starts. How do you know if it is a true deficiency or not? And what can you do about it?
Knowing if it is a true deficiency is tough. In this case, because the feed is meeting copper and zinc as well as vitamin E requirement, you would be reasonably safe in assuming that the feed will meet the requirement for iodine, vitamin B1 and Folic Acid.
Selenium is low though and this may throw some confusion in. But remember in many places the addition of selenium is regulated and feed companies are cautious with the amount they add so they don’t exceed requirements for horses on high selenium forages. So, it’s largely safe to ignore selenium when making mental estimations about what to do with diets like this.
What To Do If Your Diet in FeedXL Contains Feeds with Missing Data
What should you do with a diet like this?
First, contact the feed manufacturer and say ‘Hey, can I please have the data for the nutrients that are missing from your label analysis’. In many cases companies are willing to supply this. If they do give you the additional data, you can then use the ‘Edit’ button shown previously, to add the nutrients yourself. Or you can simply email the information to us at support@feedxl.com and we will enter it for you.
If you get the additional data this will make it really easy for you to balance the diet as you will know exactly what you are working with.
If you don’t have complete data, here is how to proceed:
Top up selenium levels. You will find selenium supplements in the blue ‘Balancers & Supplements’ tab.
Add enough salt to get the sodium level to around 50% (the feed will contain some salt, so you don’t want to take this right up to 100%). And THEN, make sure your horse has access to free choice salt. You could use iodized salt in this case to give some iodine as well.
Here is how the diet looks after making these adjustments:
Diet After Adjustments
Diet Graph After Adjustments
Advanced Nutrient Graph After Adjustments
Final Thoughts
It is best to really insist on the feed supplier providing the information, OR if you’re not happy with their response, use a feed supplier that does supply full information.
The days are gone where feed companies should expect you as their customer to be happy to use a feed without knowing exactly what is in it. So, speak up, ask for information, and let your feed supplier know how important it is to you to know exactly what is in the feed or supplement products you are using! If they get enough people like you asking for this information you will create change!
We do ask for it as well, but it is far more powerful when you as their customer asks for this information.
In the meantime, if you are stuck or worried about how to interpret missing data in your horse’s diet, jump on our FeedXL Nutrition Forum and post your horse’s details, diet and the nutrient graph and tables and we will help you with what we think is best to do for your specific case!
Do you have a question or comment? Do you need help with feeding?
We would love to welcome you to our FeedXL Horse Nutrition Facebook Group. Ask questions and have them answered by PhD and Masters qualified equine nutritionists and spend time with like-minded horse owners. It’s free!
Are your soybean hulls safe? Because some of them definitely are NOT!
Soybean is a great ingredient in a horse’s diet. The protein is amazing and year in, year out we feed it to horses with stunning results in muscle, bone quality and milk production.
BUT… it MUST, MUST, MUST be heat treated correctly to make it safe to feed!
Why Must Soybean Be Cooked Before It’s Fed To Horses?
Uncooked soybean has a few anti-nutritional factors. The most significant one is trypsin inhibitor. Trypsin is a protein-digesting enzyme made by your horse. Your horse uses trypsin to cut up protein into amino acids so they can be absorbed.
Trypsin is like a little pair of scissors whose only job is to cut up (i.e. digest) protein. The trypsin inhibitor in soybean effectively ties a piece of string around the end of these protein-digesting scissors so they can no longer cut any protein up.
The end result… decreased protein digestion! So you can be feeding plenty of protein but if any soybean products you are feeding have active trypsin inhibitor, protein digestion will be reduced! A lot! And the problem is it reduces protein digestion from ALL protein in the diet, not just from the ingredient containing the trypsin inhibitor (i.e. the soybean hulls).
How To Know If Your Soybean Product Is Safe For Horses
Here is an example of two samples of soybean hulls from a large riding horse stable. The horses in the stable were being fed two different brands of soybean hull. The stable manager had gone to long lengths to balance these diets using FeedXL. To look at the diets on paper you’d expect lovely, rounded, well-conditioned horses.
But they weren’t. The horses being fed the most feed had little muscle. Spines were tent-shaped, rumps were flat and shoulders and chests thin and narrow. Something was wrong and it wasn’t immediately obvious… until we tested the soybean hulls!
A rapid colour test was used to check for likely active trypsin inhibitor, to make sure they had been heat-treated enough to destroy all trace of trypsin inhibitor. When heat treatment has been done well, the samples tested should show no trace of a colour change. If heat treatment was not done properly, and active trypsin inhibitor is still present, the sample turns pink. How pink determines how active the trypsin inhibitor will still be… more pink = more active trypsin inhibitor (which is not what we want to see).
And the results, to be honest, are scary! The hulls in the photo at the front lit up like a Christmas tree! Bright pink everywhere indicating lots of active trypsin inhibitor. These ones likely have received no heat treatment at all and are totally unsuitable for horses. Yet they were packaged and sold specifically for horses.
The ones in the back, you could see had received enough heat on the outside of the pellet to deactivate the trypsin inhibitor. BUT inside the pellets there was still pink indicating active trypsin inhibitor.
The stable feeding these was contacted and told to stop feeding the first pellet immediately. No wonder their horses had no muscle! This product, which they had been feeding for close to 8 months, would have been stopping a lot of protein digestion. And this is not theory… you could SEE how much these horses were deficient in protein, despite their diet containing plenty of it.
The second pellet (in the back) we wouldn’t recommend feeding either. It will put your horse in a bit of a two steps forward, one or two steps back situation… helping with energy intake but partially blocking protein digestion.
When soybean is PROPERLY cooked, there should be ZERO trace of pink, as shown in the sample on the right here of well extruded full fat soybean. The sample on the left is raw, ground full fat soybean. It is, of course, bright pink… just to show how much the bean itself reacts with this colour test BEFORE it is cooked.
THIS extruded soybean (on the right) is how ALL soybean products SHOULD and in fact MUST look to be safe to feed to horses.
By now, if you are feeding soybean hulls you may be feeling a bit anxious… wondering if the brand you are feeding is OK or not… it might be, but it may not be either.
How To Test For Trypsin Inhibitor in Soybean
And it is a little bit hard to advise you on what you should do. First step is probably to contact your soybean hulls supplier and ask them to provide any photos they may have of this quick color test check for trypsin inhibitor. Or for a lab analysis for likely trypsin inhibitor activity.
If you are in Australia, Symbio Labs in Brisbane (https://www.symbiolabs.com.au/) can test soybean hulls for you to show you if they have been heat treated enough to be safe to feed.
If you are in North America, you can order a test kit and test your soybean products yourself (https://canadianbio.com/Store).
If you are elsewhere in the world please get in touch with a local feed or food testing laboratory and ask if they are able to assess soybean hulls for trypsin inhibitor activity.
Unfortunately yet another case of buyer beware.
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A: No. And in fact, it would be impossible to create a diet that had every nutrient in FeedXL exactly at 100% of your horse’s requirements.
Q. So if not 100%, where should the nutrient levels be sitting? And what is normal? Because some of the amounts on this graph look really high?! Isn’t that dangerous???
A. Good question! And the answer is it depends on the nutrient. Forages, for example, contain high levels of some nutrients like iron and potassium. Because diets often have lots of forage, these nutrients will almost always be high in the diet.
BUT that doesn’t mean it is dangerous. In fact, if you push a nutrient to a dangerous level, FeedXL will warn you – the bar for that nutrient will turn red, like this, to warn you that the nutrient is now at its ‘upper safe limit’ and needs to be reduced.
Q. OK, that’s good! So, I know if I get a nutrient WAY too high FeedXL will warn me. BUT I still don’t know what is normal for all of the nutrients. Where should I expect to see them?
A. Yep, let’s walk you through them! We’ll use this graph and go through each nutrient.
Digestible Energy
This should sit, for most horses, somewhere between 90% and 105% of requirements. SOME horses have a lower or higher need for digestible energy (calories) so you may see the odd horse sitting below 90% or above 105%.
BUT, if you do enter a horse and the Digestible Energy is low or high and this does not correspond accurately with what you are seeing in your actual horse (meaning if the Digestible Energy is low in the diet you enter into FeedXL, normally you would expect to see weight loss. If it is high, normally you would expect to see weight gain) you MAY need to double check the information for this nutrient that you have entered into FeedXL as this is a small red flag that something has not been entered right.
For example, if you have entered bodyweight that is too high, the Digestible Energy level will be low and vice versa. Or if you haven’t weighed your feeds and hay or classified your pasture correctly and you have entered amounts or qualities that are too low, then Digestible Energy will appear low and vice versa.
Quick Tip: If Digestible Energy in your horse’s diet is below 90% or above 105%, check that you have entered your horse’s bodyweight and weights of feed and forages correctly. You can also refer to this article on How to Check if What You’ve Entered into FeedXL is Correct which can guide you a bit further on getting it right.
Crude Protein
The Crude Protein level in the diet should always be at or above 100% when entering this nutrient into FeedXL. And it is best to try to keep it less than 200%. For performance horses that are stabled and in work try to keep Crude Protein below 160% if you can… it is not always possible!
Depending on your forages, you may see Crude Protein go very high (well above 200%). Is this an issue? Generally it’s not, but there are some situations (like very hot, humid climates or when a horse is stabled) that it is not ideal. Sometimes, if it is your pasture for example that is high in protein, there is not a lot you can do about it. If the horse is stabled and fed hay, you should try to switch some of the higher protein forage (e.g. alfalfa/lucerne) for a lower protein forage (like a meadow/grass hay), to bring the overall amount of Crude Protein in the diet down.
Lysine is your indicator of protein quality (you can read about Protein Quality here https://feedxl.com/30-understanding-protein-quality/). When entering this nutrient into FeedXL, Lysine should sit between 100% and 150%. If it is lower, it indicates your protein quality is low and your horse will struggle to do things like build muscle or make milk. In fact, when lysine is low in a diet you will likely see your horse losing muscle over his topline… it’s an important nutrient to get right in the diet.
Lysine may get quite high in some diets depending on the amount and source of crude protein. But if you follow the guidelines above for Crude Protein, you will find Lysine levels will adjust accordingly.
Calcium
Calcium should be at or above 100% in the diet and it’s good to keep it below 200%. Ideally, below 150% but depending on the feeds and forages being used, it is not always possible to achieve this. The amount in the diet shown here is lovely, more than the horse needs but well below 200%.
It is important with calcium to also check the calcium to phosphorus ratio in the diet (look in the Nutrient Table) to make sure it is within the right limits with phosphorus. And if you like to use the extra ratios, you can also check its ratio with magnesium, which as a guide, should be 3: 1 or less.
Phosphorus
Phosphorus should be at or above 90% and ideally below 150%. You may see some diets with high phosphorus ingredients like Rice Bran pushing phosphorus higher than this. If it is above 150%, be sure to check the calcium to phosphorus ratio on the nutrient table to make sure this is still balanced (there MUST be more calcium in a diet than phosphorus).
NOTE: You cannot calculate the diet’s calcium to phosphorus ratio off the numbers on the graph. It is always best to read the ratio off the nutrient table. FeedXL will warn you if the calcium to phosphorus ratio is too high or low!
Copper, Zinc, Selenium and Iodine
We group these trace minerals together because they all share the same characteristic that they are almost ALWAYS at low levels in forages. Which means they are nearly always deficient in diets before you add fortified feeds or supplements.
This means that you can aim to keep these nutrients as close to 100% as possible. The diet shown here uses a single vitamin/mineral supplement to meet trace mineral requirements.
This is what the diet looked like before I added the supplement:
You can see these 4 minerals are all low. I used the Supplement Finder (i.e. the BIG PINK BUTTON on the Results Step) to find a supplement that would fill all of these gaps. Ideally what you want to see when you use a single supplement is that at least one of these minerals is sitting very close to 100%. That is your green flag that you have the amount of supplement at the right level. Increasing the amount from this point is just a waste as all requirements are already met, while reducing it would mean the amount of this nutrient (selenium in this example, which is sitting at 101%) would no longer be meeting requirements.
The same rules also apply when using a fortified feed to meet vitamin and mineral requirements. Except that you also have to consider the amount of Digestible Energy the feed is adding.
This is not a super simple concept, so if you are confused, please keep asking questions, as the more you understand this, the easier it will be to use FeedXL effectively.
Quick tip: You can try to keep copper, zinc, selenium and iodine as close to 100% of requirements as possible. If these nutrients are above 200%, I would be trying to find ways to reduce them. This may mean switching feeds or supplements!
Manganese, Iron, Magnesium and Potassium
These minerals are almost always HIGH in forages. Therefore, you will almost always see them sitting well above your horse’s 100% level in the diet. Is this a concern? No. There are always exceptions, but for the majority of horses, no, it is not a problem when these minerals are well above 200%.
Thing is, because these nutrients are rich in forages, it is almost impossible to get them closer to the 100% mark. You could reduce the amount of forage, but the downside of that (higher risk of ulcers, boredom, compromised hindgut health, higher risk of dehydration and colic) far outweighs any potential upside. In fact unless levels in the forage are extreme and the bar for a nutrient goes red, there really is no upside to reducing forage.
If you are concerned, because sometimes it does look scary, just read the notes in the FeedXL Nutrient Table or the hover box on the graph to put your mind at ease. For example, Iron in this diet is at 331%. Which seems really high! But, the notes will tell you:
“While this horse’s iron is higher than it needs to be it is still within the safe range. His upper safe level for iron is 6,019 mg or 943% of his RDI”
So, the upper safe limit is 943%. This diet is a long way off that, so even though 331% seems high, it is very much within the safe zone!
For those of you who like to look at the iron: copper: zinc: manganese ratio, it is calculated for you in the Nutrient Table.
Sodium and Chloride
Sodium and chloride are the two components of ordinary table salt. So together they can make a feed taste very salty. If a feed gets too salty your horse may stop eating it, because it simply doesn’t taste good (and can’t blame them!). So, I like to keep sodium as close to 100% as I can, by adjusting the amount of salt in the diet.
There are a few exceptions. If your horse is in a very hot and humid climate you may need to feed more (more info here https://feedxl.com/40-electrolytes/) or if you are trying to increase water intake for some reason, more salt is useful. But under normal conditions, sitting sodium at or very close to 100% is best. BUT also, always make sure your horse has access to free choice salt!
Chloride is a bit of a lucky dip and its final level in a diet will depend on the amount in your forages. I don’t pay too much attention to where chloride ends up. In fact I don’t think I have ever had to adjust a diet specifically to change the level of chloride (for any dairy nutritionists reading this, it does play a big role in DCAD, but that is another story for another day 🙂 ).
Vitamin A
If you are obsessive about getting nutrients close to 100% in your FeedXL nutrient chart, Vitamin A is your friend! You will notice it is nearly always sitting on 100% of requirements. Why?
Well, in forage, the ‘vitamin A’ content is not active vitamin A. It is in the form of Beta Carotene which can be converted to vitamin A IF your horse needs vitamin A. So, they will only convert it if they need it.
FeedXL models this physiology and takes into account ALL vitamin A from feeds and supplements as this will be an active form of vitamin A (which can become toxic, so we need to count all of it). But then FeedXL will only convert vitamin A to active form from forages IF your horse needs more vitamin A.
For example, if your feed + supplement provides 80% of your horse’s requirement for vitamin A, FeedXL will just top up the remaining 20% of vitamin A from forages to meet 100% of your horse’s requirement. Which is why Vitamin A is very often sitting right on 100%.
If your feeds and supplements provide more than 100% of your horse’s requirement for vitamin A you will see it above 100%. This is OK, as long as it is within safe limits (though personally I would keep it under 200%).
Vitamin E, Vitamin B1 and Folic Acid
These three are grouped together because they will often be low in diets before you add some kind of fortified feed or supplement. And they are all relatively expensive nutrients, so for the sake of cost, you want to make sure your horse’s requirement is met, but if levels of these vitamins go above 200%, you may be paying a lot for nutrients your horse doesn’t really need. Keep them between 100% and 200% if you can. In the case of this diet, the supplement used was rich in Folic Acid, so it has tipped above 200%, but the E and B1 are at nice levels so nothing to worry about with the Folic Acid in this case.
Quick Tip: Keeping these nutrients below 200% will make sure the diet is not excessively expensive!
Vitamin B2, Niacin, Vitamin B5 and Vitamin B6
This crew are all grouped together because forage is OFTEN high in these vitamins so you will normally see levels WELL ABOVE 100% for all of these vitamins. Is that something you should be concerned about? Not at all. In fact all of these except vitamin B6 are considered non-toxic. And the vitamin B6 upper safe level is very high (in this diet the upper safe limit is 5000%!!).
Quick Tip: You can ignore these nutrients as long as they are ‘green’. They will almost always be well above 100%, but it is nothing to be concerned about!
I hope that helps you a little to read the graph and to put your mind at ease about what is and is not normal for certain nutrients. If you have questions, please be sure to ask in the FeedXL Horse Nutrition Forum on Facebook!! We truly want you to know as much as you can about what FeedXL is showing you!
Do you have a question or comment? Do you need help with feeding?
We would love to welcome you to our FeedXL Horse Nutrition Facebook Group. Ask questions and have them answered by PhD and Masters qualified equine nutritionists and spend time with like-minded horse owners. It’s free!
