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Feeding: Encouraging Round the Clock Foraging

It is an established fact that the digestive tract of the horse is designed to be processing food constantly during the horse's 18 waking hours. But modern horsekeeping practices provide the horse with a big ration all in one convenient pile twice a day. There are two profound problems presented to the horse's health with this set up: first, the horse mows through a forage ration that should last 9 hours at light speed, and hours lapse before the next meal; and second, the horse stands perfectly still while the aforementioned mowing takes place, instead of being forced to walk constantly in search of the next mouthful. Not only is the entire ration consumed far too quickly for digestive health, but also the horse is left with nothing to do but wait for the next meal. The boredom breeds bad habits and additional health issues. The most obvious solution, feeding more to keep the horse eating and the gut busy, quickly leads to overweight horses -- who are STILL eating their ration too quickly!

Some horse owners fortunate enough to have acreage have implemented the "paddock paradise," an innovative approach to creating a more natural lifestyle for our domestics, pioneered by natural horse advocate and barefoot hoof care guru Jaime Jackson. If you have even a little bit of room, I highly recommend the concept. You can order Jaime Jackson's book by the same name off of his website www.primechoice.com, or simply Google "paddock paradise" for lots of interesting ideas.

Many horse owners, however, are forced to board their horses, usually in pens no larger than 24X24. While it is virtually impossible in that setting for the horse to get the thousands of steps a day optimum for his overall health and well being, there are ways to improve the situation. You can move feed and water on opposite sides of the pen. Or buy a special feeder (or build one yourself for a fraction of the cost) to slow down hay consumption, like the ones from SlowDownHayFeeder.com or BusyHorse.com. Better yet, place several such feeders around the pen to encourage the horse to walk instead of standing in one place.

Remember that horses are inquisitive and social creatures. Use these traits in your favor, and be creative: see how many steps you can add to your horse's day, and how long you can make his forage ration last!