HSF Equine Nutrition

01/14/2026

If your horse is pinning their ears when you saddle and instead of taking that as information you mock it, that is exactly what is wrong with the horse world.

That is not a funny moment.
That is not a “red mare.”
That is communication.

I am exhausted by videos of horses showing clear signs of discomfort or distress while humans laugh, tease, or dismiss it as personality. Even worse are the people openly admitting they post these clips because it makes them more money. Because it is controversial. Because it drives engagement.

When profit matters more than listening, welfare stops being the priority. And when money is prioritized, empathy erodes and welfare becomes negotiable.

A horse pinning their ears while being saddled is telling you something is wrong. Pain, fear, or anticipation of discomfort. The correct response is curiosity and concern, not ridicule.

Listening is the bare minimum of welfare. Mocking is a failure to meet the bare minimum.

01/13/2026

01/12/2026

BE CAREFUL NOT TO CONFUSE A 'HAY BELLY' WITH FAT!

I regularly see horses with quite large bellies, but who are not particularly fat. I also sometimes see horses with 'streamlined' bellies, who carry a moderate or high level of body fat.

In fact, out of two horses I saw on a yard whilst out doing Consultation visits a wee while back, the one with the larger (relative) belly had the lower external body fat level.

A 'hay belly' - a distended abdomen - tends to occur in horses who are not worked in such a way to tone their abdominal muscles, and who have a large intake of fibrous forage. Forage holds water in the horses' gut and the higher in fibre it is, the more it holds. The horse's hindgut has a volume of around 150 litres (half a large bathful).

Fat does not get laid down in significant amounts on the horse's belly, until they are extremely obese.

That said, overweight horses often have a 'hay belly' as well as excess fat, because many are out of work, in light work and/or are fed unrestricted forage.

There are exceptions to the above, but the key is to feel for fat (or condition score), and not just look at the horse's belly. Feel for fat in the neck crest, behind the shoulders and over the ribs, over the pelvis and at the top of the tail.

Feel free to share!

Also feel free to share your 'hay bellies' below!
🐴🍏

01/12/2026

I love watching my seniors eat their soaked feeds 🥰

01/09/2026

We have a nice break from the cold this week, with higher temps and some rain. This can bring its own mid-winter challenges, and I'm here to help!

01/09/2026

Chronic diarrhea is not normal! EVER.

Here are a handful of potential nutritional or nutrition related causes of chronic loose stool (diarrhea lasting over 4 weeks)...

- Missing teeth or malformations in the mouth can cause incomplete chewing, allowing food to be swallowed without fully being broken down.

- Forage with high water content (ie lush green grass).

- Forage with high NDF (dormant pasture or overly mature hay) can irritate the intestinal lining, especially in a horse with digestive issues like IBS or leaky gut syndrome.

- Abrupt changes in diet or moldy feed or hay (ex- high fat supplements added to quickly, ingredient changes, new hay).

- Sand in the GI tract.

- Dysbiosis (or imbalance of good to bad gut bacteria).

Always consult with your veterinarian first on horses with persistent loose stool. In addition, consider if/what nutritional support and management techniques may also help.

01/03/2026

Your horse is not miraculously one year older when January 1st hits.

As someone who has had a lot of Thoroughbreds, I find myself seeing this date used on a yearly basis to put horses into work or rush them to harder degrees of work under the assumption that they’re older.

My two TBs I have currently are born in April and May. They are several months out from their birthdays still. They are, however, fully mature so this would have less damage to them due to their age but if they were both younger, I would be looking at another 4&5 months of growth before they’d actually be their respective age.

The number of 2 year olds I see people getting on the second the clock strikes midnight (hyperbolic statement but you get my point) is disheartening to see.

I notice it a lot in the QH world as well. Horses are treated as a year older on this date and people clamber to put the first ride on their baby 2 year old, failing to remember that even if they did wait till their birthday, they’d be sitting on a horse who will not be fully matured in their spine for another 3+ years.

When you start riding the second you view it as some what justifiable based on a made up rule, it pretty much guarantees that rushing will be present in other ways.

Sometimes, we need to pause for a moment and seriously consider what rules serve us and which serve and protect the horses.

This is a great example of a rule and mindset that really only serves the human desire to rush.

I had to share some thoughts on this as it’s hard to watch it happen online every year.

Your horse is still a yearling on January 1st unless they literally evacuated the womb on January 1st.

✨Repost from a few years ago but still relevant ✨

01/03/2026

Not much feels better than a new hay delivery in the barn 🚚 🐴

01/02/2026