He's out without a rug help

D

dcp

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Mar 31, 2005
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Need your help the past two nights Charlie has been out without a rug on :eek:

Last year I kept a rug off him quite a bit and he lost weight his coat also went stary he just looked terrible :( He was only getting maybe a handfull of chaff and mix if this makes any difference. I don't want to wrap him up too much but at the same time I hate the thought of him being cold. I am giving him a feed once a day a few handfulls of balancer and some chaff will this make any difference to his weight? Tonight is supposed to be 10 degrees so think I'll keep the rug off.

Would love to hear from other Tb owners and if they are rugging just now.
 
I have a TB mare.

I haven't got her rugged up at all now.
Unless it gets really cold & wet i am going to leave her, if however the weather does get bad i will put her lightweight back on.

She is coping fine.

I live up in the North & where i am situated the weather does tend to get worse than other places.

I'm sure Charlie will be fine too.
 
not full TB, but arab X Tb, Bo has been naked now since..hmmm....end of march and is doing a little too well :D
Don't be affraid to up his feed if he doesn't do well, I think you are always better to feed a little more of the right stuff (depends on whats lacking eg oil for coat etc) than to put a rug on :D
 
All the horses at our yard are now out without rugs including 2 elderly tb's in their late 20's. We rug up well in the winter and feed hay but now they are on their summer grazing they just have grass except when they come in to work and then they get a feed. None of them are underweight,if anything they are mainly verging on overweight.
 
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Are you seriously only letting him graze?

Most thoroughbreds have high metabolisms. You NEED to feed him good hay- most horses will eat around 15-25 POUNDS a day. A handfull of chaff isn't going to satisfy a TB. You should NOT need a rug on a horse.

Get him good quality hay, and if you need to, grain/alfalfa.

Feeding a handful of chaff a day with grazing to an easy keeper is acceptable. Feeding that to the typical thoroughbred is unacceptable unless they have the ideal 10+ acre well-grassed pasture, which I doubt is the case.
 
From a diet perspective 80% of his feed should be fibre which is provided in the grass or hay/haylage.The other 20% for a horse at rest or in light work should be hard feed. Chaff is more for slowing down a fast eater rather than providing any sort of nutrient value of which there is very little. I would swap the chaff for Alpha A and continue with the hard feed plus a little oil unless you use the Alpha oil. In winter I would suggest you continue with the feed you are giving plus maybe some sugarbeet.It's fine that you feed once a day now but in Winter if he does drop weight then you may need to feed twice a day as you can't feed too much in one go. Feeding a big bucket of feed is a waste of time as the horse can not process all that food and the nutrient value is wasted.
 
My boy is a tb x who feels the cold easily. He is currently out in just his fly rug, occasionally with his lightweight turnout on if it's going to be very wet.

He is fed once a day and is now given 1/2 scoop of chaff, 1/2 scoop of alpha oil, and 1/2 scoop of mix with carrots, apples, parsnips and his supplements.

Charlie should be fine without a rug:)
 
my 24 yearold tb x shp has been out without a rug since march.
My purebred arab who has aphobia of cold has also been out without a rug. If they are getting the correct nutriants in thier feed and enough fibre then no horse should need a rug at this time of year.
 
From a diet perspective 80% of his feed should be fibre which is provided in the grass or hay/haylage.The other 20% for a horse at rest or in light work should be hard feed
Click to expand...

Thats the maximun ammount of hard feed to fibre feed ration you should give, at any time of year, most won't need it in summer, TB or not.

Charlie is getting all the right things from the balancer, if his coat goes dull you could add a little linseed oil, this can really spruce up a dull coat, but often a good body brush is enough, when they don't have rugs on the get far dirtier, even in summer, it just takes alot more keeping clean :D
You have changed his diet since last year, so unless he is cold just keep weight taping him every couple of weeks, if you start to see it falling you can then possibly increase his hard feed to compensate or just give him a haylage net when you bring him in to ride.

He may be a chilly mortal (I'm one of those, currently curled up on the sofa with a blanket :D) in which case he may need a little more protection than some, if he gets wet when its cold then just pop a rain sheet on to keep the wet out, I'm sure he will be fine :D

J x
 
My thoroughbred, who is used to being rugged up to his ears all the time, is currently out tonight at only 6 degrees in his lightweight turnout. If he wasnt on the skinny side (was like that when I got him) then he would be out naked. Its just so I can keep the weight on him that Im feeding him!
 
Charlie doesn't always finish his feed so I see it pointless is wasting money by making up large feeds when they just get left.

You should NOT need a rug on a horse.

Should but do.

I learned last year that Charlie was cold and although I didn't want to rug him up I didn't feel I had any option plus everyone else telling me that I had to. Is feed going to compensate for him being out un rugged? I'm possibly going to switch the balancer for a supplement as he isn't eating even half the recomened amount.

Charlie's a good weight just now everyone is comenting on how great he is looking I'm just so scared he goes back to the state he was in last year.

I'm sorted with my feed for winter he has done really well this year!

As for bringing him in and feeding him haylage I can do that sometimes but not all the time as the stables are far from the field and he gets upset and being alone. Sometimes he just isn't interested. I get really confused because everyone else just stopped feeding their horses as soon as they were at grass but then they don't have TB's.
 
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My TB drops weight at the slightest thing :rolleyes: . He goes out rugged at night (lightweight or medium depending on temperature) and unrugged on warm days, or lightweight if it's wet or cold. He gets one feed a day - 900g calm and condition, 500g Alfa-A, 250g (dry weight) speedibeet, garlic granules and a large mugful of soya oil. I'm slowly building up how much calm and condition he gets - ideally I want him on around 1.2KG as I'm putting weight on him.
 
Does he go out with others eg run around a lot to keep warm?

IMHO, there are all these "rules" but you know Charlie best and have to go by what you feel he needs, monitoring his weight / scoring / energy / mood etc. They don't all fit into text books - my chunky Welsh cob was shivering in wet & windy May and ended up being rugged overnight a few times (as well as feed continued). I'm sure theoretically he would have survived being left that way, but he'd have been a real "Victor Meldrew" for a while! I wanted to send rugs for cleaning AND ease off feeds but circumstances didn't allow. And we don't have the excuse of him being a TB! I wouldn't worry what others are doing - go by Charlie.
 
Hay/ haylege will replace the need for a rug. digesting it will help him keep warm
 
yes grass will, but some fields done have the bulk they need. in spring even though our field has good grazeing we had a bale of haylege put in the field to help them along, then we took thier rugs off
 
I agree that feed (fibre) can replace the need for a rug, the process of digestion creates heat so its like switching the central heating on :D

Be careful about switching his balancer for just a supplement if that is suiting him (which it obviously is), is there another balancer in the range that is more concentraited? I think the lammi ones often are (you feed less but still get all the goodies in it)
If he is not eating the feed you give him cut out the chaff, its of little nutritional value anyway, he may be more keen to eat the balancer then.
Oil is a great way to get calories in without fizz and it will give him a nice coat etc, so if he won't eat alot then a slug of oil will help him hold his weight, if he needs it.

J x
 
Sounds like an idea but everyone else is watching their horses weight so doubt they will be up for that (re haylage) It's going to be warm this week so I'll keep it off and keep weighing him. Thanks for the tip Jessey I did try feed the balancer alone but he was chewnig it strangly and it kept falling out his mouth but is fine when it's got a little chaff. Will buy an oil.
 
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All tbs at our yard are out without rugs.

One mare in particular drops weight very easily, but shes out without. She gets fed and supplements with oil

I also thought horses could deal with being cold better than dealing with being too warm? no matter what breeding they were? If the sweat its harder to replenish salts etc ?
 
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