advice on helping mare's appetite

[indebtedfarms]

My mare just spent a week in the hospital. She had colic surgery one week ago and is recovering from hyperlipidemia, ulcers and a lost foal. This little mare has been through heck and back but she continues to fight. I spent $7,500 at the vet to save her life. She just came home today and the vet says she HAS to start eating more. What can I give her to entice her to eat? Any suggestions would be great. Also, for those who have been there, how long is the recovery for hyperlipidemia? So far this is a long road. She has been through so much I just don't want her to go down hill now. Thanks

 

[Riverrose28]

Since I haven't had experience with this liver condition,yet, I can't give advice on how long it takes to recover, but as for enticing them to eat, try molasses, or chop up apples, or apple sauce, or chop up carrots and see if that helps. Good luck! and congratulations on your mares recovery.

 

[targetsmom]

I haven't dealt with hyperlipidemia, but have had multiple colic surgeries. A product I adore for stimulating appetite is Stomach Soother (www.stomachsoother.com) which is all natural pureed papaya. It will also help with ulcers and any stress situations (e.g. weaning). I have added it to feed or just given some in a dosing syringe. Hand grazing on the front lawn is often successful too, or feeding near a buddy, but not where the buddy will eat all the food. Another strategy is a slow feeder - for some reason Max would eat hay better from the slow feeder than he would if the hay was on the ground - maybe because it stayed uncontaminated. Soaked alfalfa cubes (also good for ulcers).. I gave those at every meal. Actually, I think I tried just about any feed I could think of. I would suggest try anything and everything and keep changing the menu. Good luck! My big horse just turned 25 and he has had half his small intestines removed - the last surgery was over 10 years ago.

 

[chandab]

I'm not sure what brand of feeds you can get in Casper, but if you can get Woody's Performance Horse feeds, their senior and Summer Heat are great (I feed a mix of these two feeds to my hard keepers and they look great and love the feed). Woody's is manufactured in Dickinson, ND. http://www.woodysfeed.com/BaggedFeeds.htm [My other horses, that are easy keepers are on Progressive Nutrition ProAdvantage grass formula (ration balancer).] Senior is an easy to digest feed, so should be a good choice for a horse recovering from illness; if you can't get Woody's brand, there are many other brands out there, I just really like this senior as it lists/uses real ingredients: alfalfa, beet pulp, oats, barley, soybean meal (then the vit/min are listed).

 

[AnnaC]

Glad to her that your little mare is home again, I'm sure she will feel less stressed now she is back on her home ground.

Feed wise I would give her whatever she fancies for now, but try to keep her food damped/soaked to help it pass through her intestines more easily. Of course grazing on good grass is not only often the best way to get horses eating again, wont overload the system, and is the most natural food for all equines.

If she is not that interested in food at the moment, then grazing plus a couple of small feeds of a good balancer will at least give her all the vitamins and minerals she needs - maybe with a few tasty treats added as has been suggested.

Good luck and sending best wishes for a full and speedy recovery.

Anna

 

[Jill]

Maybe try some weight building / high calorie stuff you can syringe into her. It's helped one of my horses... Try one of these two things. It has about 150-180 calories an ounce (about 60cc) and is palatable. It adds calories, is highly digestible, and stimulates appetite. Just use a big 60cc syringe and put it in her mouth a couple-few times a day. These things are great for convalescing animals.

Nich Quick Start (<--- link) or Dyne High Calorie Liquid (<--- link)

When there are liver issues (as in hyperlipidemia), you should limit the protein in the horse's diet to about 10% (based on conversations with my vet). This may rule out, or limit, a lot of the senior / junior types of complete feeds. Apparently when liver function is impaired, the horse cannot digest a lot of protein and it will turn into harmful substances (ammonia) in the body if there's too much protein in the diet (until the liver function is improved).

Years ago, I had a yearling filly need colic surgery back to back 2x (just days apart). She's 9yo now, so 8 years out from surgery. She's done just fine. We had to keep her confined w/ limited moving for a period of time post-surgery and had to be very careful that she eat only easily digested hay and feed, but she had no further colic episodes.

Good luck!!!

 

[targetsmom]

The latest Miniature Horse World has an EXCELLENT article on ulcers - the issue is available on-line at the AMHA website. For ulcers, you want to limit molasses (e.g. sweet feeds) because the sugar aggravates ulcers.

 

[Riverrose28]

The latest Miniature Horse World has an EXCELLENT article on ulcers - the issue is available on-line at the AMHA website. For ulcers, you want to limit molasses (e.g. sweet feeds) because the sugar aggravates ulcers.

Wow, this is good information, seems I learn something new everyday.

 

[kaykay]

The last time we did colic surgery we were advised to feed the finest stemmed alfalfa hay we could find and equine jr or sr soaked in water for the first week. The hospital actually had alfalfa leaves stripped from the stems for colic surgery patients. (I always wonder who they paid to strip it LOL)

For hyperlipemia the best thing is to walk them on green grass. This stimulates the appetite and gets them eating again. I have seen two horses saved from hyperlipemia by walking them on green grass to get them eating again

Sending prayers

 

[Michelle@wescofarms]

The mare we had with hyperlipemia, after that was under control, honestly gave her a 50/50 chance to survive (underlying infection we couldn't pinpoint and collapsing trachea) so she was sent home with meds and 'hope she makes it'.

We put out a buffet - alfalfa, grass hay, soaked feed (Nutrena Senior), even foal lac pellets wet/dry (she had a month old foal at the time), and she was on grass literally in my backyard. It took a few weeks, but her appetite returned. I think it was the third week when we knew she was recovering.

Keeping them hydrated is very important. We were giving her gatoraid/pedialyte syringed in her mouth a few times a day too, along with clean fresh water.

Her hyperlipemia was under control fairly quickly, as we were very aggressive with treatment. She just looked so weak, especially with the foal and other complications. The vets wanted to wean her foal, but if we moved it two feet away she stressed, so we just fed alot. Both survived, but honestly I expected to find her dead every morning the first week, terrible to say.

 

[Matt73]

If you can get alfalfa/timothy cubes. I would put those in a feed tub and make a slurpy with hot water. My filly, Willow, loved it when she was sick last year.

 

[Jill]

When we had a mare with liver issues (she's fine now thankfully), I was cautioned about the protein content of her feed (previous post) and was told to avoid alfalfa hay for that reason... which the vet went on to explain why it's important to keep the protein level down when there is decreased liver function. I know that when there is, it is not a quick fix and that one elevated reading can only decrease by 1/2 at the most every 2wks. Wishing you the best of luck and feeling like it's something you should discuss with your vets (maybe more than one) since there are really a couple of issues... the surgery recovery and the dietary issues associated with recovering from a colic surgery, and the (liver related) hyperlipidemia situation.

 

[mizbeth]

Hi

I agree, she should be on green grass and encouraged to eat that. She might eat on her own. I have a small yard I keep especially green and nice "just in case". I did have to use it recently for a mare that was very sick. I have one very small yearling from last year I put on it otherwise, he is too small to go with the others

Another thing you can try, is very wet, soupy beet pulp. I use the shredded with molasses. They almost certainly drink the fluid from it and eat the beet pulp as well. I would not be too concerned about sugar (although I know it irritates the stomach) my biggest concern would be to get her to eat PERIOD. You can give her rantidine, cimetidine, something for ulcers or probios to offset the sugar side effects.

Good luck............also try Kayro Syrup. I KNOW this is sweet, but almost certainly helps to increase their appetites.

Good luck and let us know how she does.

 

[indebtedfarms]

Well, she choked on the grass yesterday. Her appetite is back thank goodness but now she just lets the food sit in her mouth. She isn't swallowing it. So I have her back at the equine hospital. The vet is very optimistic. ( I took her to our closer vet yesterday for the choke and he thinks I should put her down.) Thankfully the vet in Sheridan actually thinks that minis are REAL horses too and totally disagrees with putting her down. We are looking at her esophagus today to see if there is any problem there. Anybody else had a horse not feeling good-packing her food???? Would love to know what you've done. Thanks

 

[targetsmom]

Were her teeth checked? I know that seems obvious, but we had a pregnant mare go off her feed and we realized she WANTED to eat, but it hurt. Got her teeth floated (really only one had a sharp point) and she was fine.

 

[indebtedfarms]

We had her teeth floated yesterday. She did have one kind of sharp one but that vet didn't think her teeth were causing the problem. I'm still hopeful that maybe it will make a difference.

 

[AnnaC]

I'm so sorry that you have suffered another setback. Is is possible that the tubes put down her throat during her op and other treatments, have bruised her so that it hurts to swallow and thus she sort of closes her throat as she eats knowing that it will hurt? Does this make sense?

Once again sending prayers that your sympathetic vets can help her.

Anna

 

[shelia]

Just a thought here, but maybe the tubing could have irrited her thought some. As long as she keeps improving that's is good.

 

[indebtedfarms]

O.k. her esophagus is perfect. Absolutely nothing wrong with it. Some food is getting through because he xrayed her and it shows food all over in the colon. He has no idea why she lets the food sit in her mouth. She has gotten better today-still not drinking as much as I would like-any suggestions on that? We brought her home again and I'm just suppose to watch her closely.

 

[albahurst]

O.k. her esophagus is perfect. Absolutely nothing wrong with it. Some food is getting through because he xrayed her and it shows food all over in the colon. He has no idea why she lets the food sit in her mouth. She has gotten better today-still not drinking as much as I would like-any suggestions on that? We brought her home again and I'm just suppose to watch her closely.

I have recently had two horses develop bleeding ulcers and high liver counts (as a result of pain meds for sore feet that were trimmed way too short). Their appetites were not good, of course, and they were certainly not drinking well. When the vet put down a nasogastric tube, she then also infused alot of water with electrolytes (something "blue"). This treatment was amazing - you could just see the turn around. Their digestive systems just seemed to get a 'jump start' with it. Electrolytes are crucial for proper muscle function, as would be needed for proper swallowing and digestive work, along with alot of other bodily functions. Plus, there are salts in the electrolyte mix that seemed to get them drinking on their own again and it also buffers the stomach. I would certainly ask about giving her a bolus of water/electrolytes.

As far as food for a horse with ulcers, my horses are not supposed to have actual grain for a couple of weeks. Also, any hay given should not have many 'stems', as they can scratch the ulcers. We are soaking alfalfa cubes in Pedialyte and water and giving alfalfa leaves about 6 times a day ( small amts). They eat leafy grass hay. The girls are also grazing on fresh grass and eating soaked beet pulp. Food is given in small amts many times a day. They are both on Gastro Gard and Neigh Lox, too.

Both of my girls are recovering well! I know your girl will, too