feeding broodmares

[anotherdeal1]

What do you all feed your expectant mums??

[emma3870]

i fed suregrow. you can feed it with just chaff or on its own. i also use it on the youngstock. if they are fattish i wouldnt bother just yet and just put some vitamins in a tiny bit of chaff

[fairleykismet]

I feed as normal, making sure they have enough grass and hayledge.

[pentaran]

Feed reasonably as normal until the last three months when the foal is growing rapidly. Go by how the mare looks as well. Be careful with natives and proprietary stud feeds as sometimes they are too much for them. Sometimes mares do themselves at the expense of the foal and sometimes it is the opposite they are all different. Small natives sometimes do very well on good quality hay/ haylage , something like Alpha Oil and a good quality general supplement like Equivite. If you find that your mares stable gets to the stage where your eyes sting with the ammonia smell when you muck her out it means there is too much protein in the feed for her and she is just excreting it in the urine - a total waste of money and not good for the liver and kidneys either and also can lead to stocked up legs.

[zizz]

mine gets baileys lo cal but switches onto baileys stud balancer and stud cubes in the autumn. the youngstock get stud cubes.

[haylage]

Same diet as per normal untill the last 3 months, and then all I give is Baileys stud balancer with usual feed, because they are welsh B's they tend to get to fat! in the last month I change from hay to haylage.

[kidside]

normal diet until month 7 then switch to spillers stud mix with normal feed, they stay on this until the foal is weaned

[drenrowstud]

we feed the natives happy hoof and top spec lite till xmas then we switch to alfa oil if they start to drop weight .

with the big ones we tend to feed alfa oil sugar beet equilibra and then add in a stud mix if they need it around xmas as they get closer to foaling we tend to split there feeds down into smaller feeds but more of them , i know i could face a big meal when pregnant so i treat them the same little and often .

we only feed the pony mares concentrates if they really need them .

we turn out on a sand school in the winter so th only other addition is some boilled linseed jelly 3 times a week we find it helps to stop any sand they ingest sticking in there intestines

[tamrik]

saracen do a nice mix called "mare care" which covers all eventualities!!!! had good results in t/bs.

[emlybob]

Suregrow is great for mares that carry alot of weight and are good doers as it has all the nutrients in it without the calories. For a mare that needs condition a stud cube is the best option

[harrythepig]

It is perfectly safe to feed magnesium. Feedmark have a supplement which contains selenium, magnesium and vitamin E to which is marketed for brrod mares to support milk production. My vet recommended I fed it for my mares first foal from half way through her pregnancy and until weaning. I will be doing the same again in this pregnancy.

[sparkle]

I feed Fast fibre, Alfa a Oil and Baileys stud balancer and will feed that until the foal is weaned. It was recommended to me by a few different people and I've had her 3 year this year and it's her best winter yet (I know she's 8 months pregnant but she still has a nice covering) and the lady from the stud has been to see her a few times and said she looks incredibly well