What Do Horses Eat? Complete List of Nutritional Horse Food
We all love horses, even some of you might be having them at your house or your farmhouse. We hope that you all who have horses must be having a good time playing with them. Also, enjoy doing horse riding as well. But along with this fun, you have to provide them with a healthy diet. To maintain their health and to keep them fit and fine. Today, we have brought for you a complete list of nutritional what do horses eat, which you must feed your horse as a part of their diet plan. Let us read ahead and check out these foods in detail.
Table of Contents
Pasture Grass
Every one of you might be knowing that horses and other herbivorous animals eat grass. Tender plants and pasture grass is the most common food that horses love to eat. Grass contains all the nutritional requirements for the horse and most of the time horses are fed grass so that makes them remain healthy too.
But, keep one thing in mind that you shouldn’t give too much grass to the horse who is not used to it, give a low quantity of grass daily and gradually increase it as a heavy quantity of the same won’t be good for their health. You can feed a heavy quantity of pastures to the ones who are hard keepers.
Hay
It is also another good and healthy food option for horses. Hay means dried grass. It might be possible that you don’t get fresh green grass near your house or farm and so you can’t feed your horses with it but it’s ok, fed them with hay which is equally nutritional.
Hay is actually filled with more fiber which is really good for your horse’s health. Grass contains water and little fiber which is not healthy and nutritional for your horse. Also, provide a low quantity of hay to the new ones and increase their diet gradually.
Treats
Treats include things like fruits, vegetables, candies, grains, egg or something similar. Many people have the habit that they feed the horse with the same thing as they are eating, especially kids. Kids go out and feed the horse with these treats as it makes them happy. Occasionally, it is fine and ok to provide them these treats but one should avoid providing it often.
Sugar candies are not that good for them as too much sugar will lead to obesity. Many people provide them meat which is also not good, providing them occasionally is fine but one should refrain from providing them too much of meat as they are herbivorous animals. It also disfunctions their intestine as meat is strange food for them.
If you want to feed them with these horse treats then do so in small amounts. Also, inform your kids not to provide treats often. Keep a watch on your horse’s eating pattern and monitor its weight regularly so that it doesn’t get overweight.
Grains
Grains are also good for horses, you can feed them corn, oats, barley, wheat, milo, molasses, beet pulp, and soybeans. They are really good for their health and you don’t need to do any extra efforts for feeding them these grains, just take some amount in your fist from your house and put it on the ground and horse will eat them.
It also contains silica which is good for dental health too. But, make sure that you don’t provide too much of these grains to them as nothing is good excessively.
Concentrate Mixes
You can mix various things containing an ample amount of vitamins and minerals and this will be really good for their health. For example, you can mix molasses, bran, grains, beet pulp, flaxseed and other sources of vitamins and minerals and feed them. Here you can see some awesome Horse Boards that could be very helpful.
These concentrate mixes are available in mixed form in the market too, you can buy it directly from there and you will be free from the hassle of buying all these items separately and then mixing them. All the nutritional needs of your horse will be fulfilled with these concentrate mixes so we will emphasize this very much to feed your horse to keep them fit and fine.
Water
Water is a necessity and we shouldn’t include it on this list. However, you have to take care that freshwater is provided to your horse. Toxic and polluted water will pollute their health too so make sure that you don’t allow them to drink water anywhere apart from your house.
One who is eating hay grass will require more water to drink than the one provided with lush green grass as it already contains water in it.
Conclusion
So, here was an overview of what do horses eat. Now, you have got the idea about what should be included in a horse’s diet so just provide this nutritional food to them and keep them remain healthy, fit and fine.
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