Feeding The Lactating Mares

Dr Nerida Richards

Getting a lactating mare’s feeding right is critical to ensure she can provide milk for her foal and provide the required nutrients for a foetus if she is pregnant again. A balanced diet is also essential to keep the mare healthy so that she can continue to produce healthy foals for years to come.

As for all horses, a mare’s requirement for energy (calories), protein, vitamins and minerals must be met. These nutrients and the role they play in a lactating mare’s diet are looked at below.

Energy

A lactating mare’s requirement for energy is double that needed by a mature idle horse. Not feeding a lactating mare enough energy means she will lose weight. If she is losing weight it will make it difficult to get her back in foal and could also reduce the amount of milk she produces for her foal.

In the reverse, if she is allowed to get too heavy in condition, her milk production may fall and the extra weight also puts unnecessary pressure on her joints and hooves which will cause pain and lameness for the mare.

The basis of a mare’s energy intake should be provided from pasture and hay. If pasture and hay is not enough to maintain body condition, high energy feeds like cooked cereal grains, high energy fibres and oils can be added to the diet.

To manage energy intake, you should assess your lactating mares for body fatness regularly and adjust their energy intake up if they are losing weight and down if they are gaining too much weight.

Protein

Lactating mares need good quality protein to enable them to provide milk for the foal and to maintain their own muscle mass. Not enough good quality protein in a lactating mare’s diet will cause milk production to fall, foals growth rates to slow and the mare will begin to lose muscle mass, which in turn may make it difficult for the mare to go back in foal. 

A majority of protein in the mare’s diet should be provided by the pasture and hay the diet is based on. When there is not enough protein in the pasture and hay to meet a mare’s requirements, good quality protein sources such as soybean, lupins, faba bean, canola meal and lucerne should be used to meet requirements. Poor quality sources of protein such as cottonseed meal which have low levels of essential amino acids should be avoided for lactating mares.

Vitamins and Minerals

Vitamins are extremely important in the lactating mare’s diet and have an impact on the mare’s health and fertility as well as the foal’s growth. Mares with access to green pasture will have the majority of their vitamin requirements met by the pasture alone. Mares with limited access to fresh, green pasture will generally need to be supplemented with vitamins.

A lactating mare has massive requirements for minerals, and particularly for the macro-minerals calcium and phosphorous, which are found in large quantities in milk. While milk only contains very small amounts of trace-minerals, it is important to meet her requirements for these nutrients during lactation so she can replenish her own body reserves and have plenty on hand to ensure the structural soundness of her future foals.

Not meeting the lactating mare’s requirements for minerals will mean her body reserves are depleted, leaving her susceptible to disease and lameness. Mineral deficiency can also reduce her milk production and fertility and can affect the soundness of future foals.

A lactating mare’s mineral requirements will be partially met by the pasture, hay and grains in her diet. However, because forages are typically low in minerals it is unlikely a mare’s full mineral requirements will be met, so some supplementation will almost certainly be necessary.

Vitamins and minerals can be supplemented using a concentrated balancer pellet or a complete feed, depending on your preference for style of feeding and how much feed your mares need to maintain body condition.

If you have mares that are easy keepers, using a pasture balancer pellet will allow you to provide the vitamins and minerals she needs without providing additional calories that could make her gain unneeded weight. On the other hand, if your mares are typically hard keepers, it would be easiest to use a complete feed that provides the mare with additional calories and high quality protein as well as providing the vitamins and minerals she needs.

Salt and water

Lactating mares should always have access to salt and very clean fresh water. Lack of salt and clean water can reduce milk production and slow foal growth.

Which is the best feed for your mare? When choosing the right feed and developing a feeding program for your lactating mares you need to consider the following:

• Do you have pasture available?
• What sort of pasture do you have and what is its quality like?
• Will your mare maintain bodyweight on pasture alone, or do you need to feed additional feed for her to maintain bodyweight?
• What hay do you have available and what is its quality like?
• Are your mares typically easy or hard keepers?
• Do your mares need to gain, maintain or lose weight?
• What stage of lactation are they in?
• Do you prefer to feed a complete feed or mix your own feeds using grains and supplements?

The answers to these questions will determine whether a complete feed or a balancer pellet is best for your mares and will also help you determine what amount of feed your mares need. If your mares are typically hard keepers or if you have very little or only poor quality pasture available a complete feed will most likely give you the best results. If you have good quality pasture and/or your mares are typically easy keepers in good condition you may find a balancer pellet is all that is required. Pryde’s EasiFeed have an extensive range of feeds specially formulated for breeding mares. The Pryde’s EasiFeed BioMare Cubes provide you with a complete feeding solution for your lactating mares. Pryde’s BioMare Cubes require no mixing, can be fed alone, are well accepted by mares as well as their foals and contain all your mares need to produce strong, healthy foals, year after year.

If you would prefer to mix your own feeds Pryde’s EasiFeed 150, 200 and 250 Balancer Pellets allow you to tailor your feeding program according to current pasture conditions.

To discuss your needs and have a feeding program developed from your breeding mares, contact Pryde’s EasiFeed on 1300 732 267 or use the EasiFeed Selector to have a diet formulated for your horse.

Don't Forget Your Dry Mares

Dr Nerida Richards

Dry mares in the early stages of pregnancy are perhaps the most overlooked of all classes of horses when it comes to feeding and nutrition. Because the dry mare is able to hold her body weight and even tends toward getting fat on pasture alone, it is common practice not to supplementary feed them until the later stages of pregnancy.

The Problem

While carefully managing dry mare bodyweight to ensure they don’t get too fat is extremely important, there is a problem with not providing mares with any form of supplementary feed. Pastures are notoriously low in many important minerals.

Copper and zinc, two of the most critical minerals needed for laying the foundation of sound skeletal development in the foetus are present in pasture at around half the level of that required by pregnant mares (Table 1). In heavily grass based and phosphorus fertilised pastures, more phosphorus can be present than calcium which puts mares at risk of a short term calcium deficiency and selenium and iodine, minerals important for correct foetal growth and continued mare health and fertility can be close to non-existent (Table 1).

If left unsupplemented, mares that are bred season after season will deplete their own body reserves of these minerals and develop deficiencies that will eventually affect their ability to reproduce and grow sound foals.

Pregnant Mares Requirements: Without Pryde's 150 Pellet

Graph One shows a pregnant mare's requirement for copper, zinc, selenium and iodine against the amount provided by a Hunter Valley NSW pasture used for dry mares (Source: FeedXL.com)

Balancing Act

In feeding the early pregnant mare (the first 8 months of pregnancy) it becomes a balancing act between controlling her body weight so she doesn’t get fat while providing supplementary feed that will fill the gaps left by pasture and hay. Being able to do this simply and quickly is also important as there is often not a lot of time available to feed dry mares.

Pasture balancer pellets provide an excellent solution for dry mares. They are highly concentrated, so only a small amount (500 g/day) needs to be fed to meet important mineral requirements. Balancer pellets are very palatable, so there is no need to mix them with anything, they can simply be fed as they are and if time is a serious constraint, mares can be fed 1 kg every second day. Feeding such a small amount per day also means they are not going to make mares fat.

Pregnant Mare's Requirements: With Pryde's 150 Pellet

Graph Two shows a pregnant mare's requirement for copper, zinc, selenium and iodine against the amount provided by a Hunter Valley NSW pasture used for dry mares plus 500 grams/day of the Pryde's 150 Balancer Pellet (Source: FeedXL.com)

* An iodised salt block should also be made available to mares in iodine deficient areas.

Dry Mares are Important

While dry mares appear to look after themselves on pasture alone, failure to meet mineral requirements can leave the mares at risk of reproductive and health issues and perhaps more importantly increases their in utero foal’s risk of developmental orthopaedic disease. Mineral balancer pellets are a simple and cost effective way to fill the nutrient gaps left by pasture without providing excess calories that will make them fat. Making sure these mineral needs are met will help to keep your mares fertile, healthy and producing sound foals season after season.

Pryde’s EasiFeed have an extensive range of pasture balancer pellets to suits various types of pasture that are perfect for dry mares. The Pryde’s 150, 200 and 250 Balancer Pellets require no mixing, are well accepted by mares and contain all your mares need to stay fertile and produce strong, healthy foals, year after year. The balancer pellets can also be combined with oats or the Pryde’s BioMare Cubes in dry seasons.

For an assessment of your dry mare diets, a mineral analysis of your mare pastures or to discuss your needs, contact Pryde’s EasiFeed on 1300 732 267

Hoof Care For The Broodmare

Dr Nerida Richards

The old adage ‘no hoof, no horse’ couldn’t be truer when it comes to a broodmare. While she doesn’t need to perform athletically any more, she does need to be able to support herself and the additional weight of her growing foetus during pregnancy and then have the ability to run with (or after) her foal and spend large amounts of time grazing to meet her enormous energy requirements during lactation. While hoof problems for mares aren’t necessarily a show stopper, they do cause pain and discomfort that is not good for her welfare and may also make her less willing to move about and graze as normal to meet her own requirements and provide for her foal. On top of that, mares with problem hooves become expensive to manage.

While expert hoof care from a trained and experienced farrier is essential for maintaining healthy hooves, this article looks at what can be done nutritionally to assist with improving or maintaining sound hooves in your broodmares.

High quality protein

The outer wall of a horse’s hoof is comprised mainly of keratin, an extremely durable material made from protein. While there are many amino acids in keratin, it is dominated by cystine, a non-essential amino acid that can be made by the horse in its body. Cystine is created when two cysteine amino acids are bonded together. Cysteine is another non-essential amino acid. However, it is formed in the body from methionine, which is an essential amino acid and must be supplied in the diet. Methionine is considered the second most limiting amino acid in horse diets and a deficiency of this amino acid can negatively impact hoof quality by limiting the amount of cysteine and consequently the amount of cystine available for the growth of keratin.

Because broodmares have elevated requirements for protein and particularly essential amino acids to support foetal growth and milk production, making sure their diet supplies enough high quality protein to meet these needs is essential if they are to be able to support their foal and maintain the health and integrity of their own body including their hooves.

Healthy Hindgut

Because of its role in cell proliferation, the water soluble B-vitamin biotin is essential for the growth of healthy hooves. Enough biotin to meet a horse’s requirements is produced by bacteria in the hindgut of healthy horses. However, if diets are fed that are too low in forage or if the hindgut environment is disturbed and particularly if uncooked grains are fed and allowed to ferment in the hindgut, the production of biotin may be compromised, in turn affecting hoof growth.

Because lactating mares do have very high energy requirements, it is easy to get carried away with feeding large amounts of grain based concentrate feeds and forget about the forage component of the diet. As a rule, mates should have free access to as much forage as they can eat. If you are hand feeding hay to mares, feed an absolute minimum of 1 kg of hay per 100 kg of bodyweight per mare per day. Feeding less than this will limit the amount of fermentable fibre the hindgut bacteria can access to produce biotin.

In addition, don’t feed more than 1 kg of concentrate/grain based feed per 100 kg of body weight per day. Feeding more than this will limit the amount of pasture or hay your mares will willingly go out and eat. And perhaps more importantly, make sure the grains you are feeding are cooked. More than 70% of the starch from uncooked corn and barley will travel undigested to the hindgut where it will be rapidly fermented, causing acidosis and disrupting biotin production and this is something you should avoid at all costs.

Balanced minerals and vitamins

Zinc tends to take the spotlight when hoof health is discussed, and while it is very important, supplementing with zinc alone won’t assist with hoof quality if there are other more severe deficiencies in the diet. Feeding too much zinc can also cause a secondary copper deficiency, which, instead of making hoof quality better, will only serve to make it worse. Nearly all pastures contain levels of zinc and copper that are too low to support the needs of a breeding mare and over time if left Unsupplemented for all or even part of the breeding cycle, hoof growth and quality may start to suffer.

Healthy hooves rely on a balanced diet, so when considering hoof quality, be sure to make sure all of your mares’ requirements for minerals and vitamins are met. If additional zinc is fed, be sure to also provide additional copper to keep the zinc to copper ratio in balance.

When should biotin be used

Several studies now have shown that biotin supplementation can improve hoof growth and hoof quality. But a biotin supplement shouldn’t be the first thing you reach for when trying to solve a hoof quality problem. Adding biotin to a diet that is mineral deficient or contains poor quality protein with inadequate levels of essential amino acids to support hoof growth is not going to work as extra biotin simply can’t compensate for other kinds of deficiencies.

However, if you have your mares on a well balanced diet that does contain high quality protein and is meeting all requirements for vitamins and minerals and you still aren’t happy with hoof quality, adding additional biotin to the diet is worth a shot to see if it will help. The recommended ‘therapeutic’ amount of biotin to feed for improved hoof growth is 20 mg/day.

Laminitic mares

Laminitis can develop in breeding mares for several reasons, some may be dietary related while others like cases of retained placenta aren’t. Regardless of the cause of laminitis, it is always a good idea to feed these mares in a way that avoids any chance of diet related laminitis occurring. Laminitic mares should be maintained on low starch, low sugar diets. Feeding low starch, low sugar diets removes the risk of grain fermentation in the hindgut and reduces the insulin load placed on a mare following feeding , both of which may trigger laminitis in susceptible mares. Energy in these diets can be provided by high energy fibres and oil.

Mares prone to laminitis should also be kept in moderate, verging on the side of light condition (condition score 5 on the Henneke 1 to 9 scale) to maintain a good level of insulin sensitivity and reduce physical pressure on their already fragile hoof structures.

Perhaps most importantly, laminitic mares should not be kept on low quality rations. They, more than any other mare need all the essential amino acids, vitamins and minerals they can get to help them repair their damaged hoof structures.

Healthy Mare, Healthy Hooves

There aren’t any tricks to maintaining quality hooves in broodmares. All that is required is a well balanced and high quality diet that meets requirements for amino acids, vitamins and minerals and provides plenty of fibre for hindgut fermentation and the natural production of biotin. All of these nutrients are required for good fertility and the production of sound, healthy foals, so in feeding mares to breed well developed and healthy foals you should be meeting all the goals for healthy hooves. However, you are likely to find some mares that despite a good diet, still have problem feet. These mares may benefit from additional biotin supplementation and further dietary adjustment.

The Pryde’s EasiFeed range of breeding feeds has got your mares’ needs for healthy hooves covered. Pryde’s EasiFeed use only the highest quality protein, with soybeans, lupins and faba beans used to provide optimum levels of essential amino acids. All feeds are fully fortified with balanced vitamins and minerals and the Pryde’s EasiFeed extruded feeds take care of your mare’s hindguts to allow for maximum natural biotin production.

For problem mares, Pryde’s Polished can be used to provide extra biotin, methionine, organic zinc and organic copper. Pryde’s EasiFeed can also cater for your laminitic mares with EasiFeed ‘Low Starch’ and the non-grain EasiSport on the menu.

For a full assessment of your mare diets and help with balancing diets to improve hoof quality call Pryde’s EasiFeed on 1300 732 267 or email info@prydes.com.au

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