Location: ARDMORE, Oklahoma
How safe is your horse’s feed? If the feed is milled at a plant that also manufactures livestock feed containing ionophore, there’s a risk it could possibly be fatal to your horse.
Making sure feed for horses is safe
If your horse feed is milled at a plant that also manufactures livestock feed containing ionophore, there’s a risk it could possibly be fatal to your horse.
Ionophore antibiotics are added to feed to improve weight gain and control protozoan and bacteria infections in ruminants, swine and poultry. Several ionophores are approved for use in the United States with the most common being monensin, salinomycin, lasalocid, laidlomycin and narasin.
Horses are much more sensitive to ionophore poisoning than other species. For example, the safety zone for monensin in horses is 2 to 3 mg whereas cattle can tolerate 20 to 34 mg and poultry 90 to 200 mg. When higher-than-acceptable concentrations of ionophore are found in equine feed, a horse could be dead in less than 24 hours after ingestion.
Ionophore toxicity inhibits sodium and potassium ion transport across cell membranes, which can kill cells—especially muscle cells—leading eventually to total system failure and death. Signs of ionophore poisoning include poor appetite, diarrhea, muscle weakness, depression, wobbling, colic, excessive urination, sweating, lying down and sudden death.
Ionophore intoxication damages the kidneys as well as the skeletal and heart muscles. There is no specific treatment for a poisoned horse and those that survive usually have permanent heart damage.
Prevention is the best method for preventing ionophore toxicity. Do not allow your horse access to feeds for other species, and it is essential to store away any feed containing ionophores from equine feed.
To ensure your horse’s feed is never put at risk of contamination, only purchase products manufactured at an ionophore-free mill, like the Bluebonnet Feeds facility in Ardmore, Oklahoma.
Don’t confuse an “ionophore-free” with an “ionophore-safe.” For example, ionophores are not used in any feeds manufactured at the Bluebonnet mill, making it “free” of all ionophores. However, a mill that produces some of its feed with ionophores will use a series of flushes to clean the system and make it “safe” to manufacture horse feeds. But no matter how efficient the flushing procedure is, there is always a risk of cross-contamination.
Only a manufacturing system like that of Bluebonnet Feeds mill will guarantee your horse’s feed is ionophore-free.
As director of technical services for Bluebonnet Feeds, Jyme Nichols, MS, is passionate about equine nutrition and performance. Growing up in the northern Nebraska sandhills, Jyme was constantly involved with the family cattle ranch, horses and rodeo. Jyme attended college on a rodeo scholarship and earned her Bachelors degree in Equine Science.
Advancing on to graduate school she maintained her place in the rodeo world as an assistant coach for the Montana State University women’s rodeo team and earned her Masters degree in Equine Nutrition. Jyme’s graduate research focused on an effort to lower blood glucose and insulin concentrations in horses by feeding psyllium pellets.
The research was published in the April 2011 issue of Journal of Equine Veterinary Science, and Jyme was presented with graduate research awards from both the Equine Science Society and the American Society of Animal Science-Western Section. Jyme now lives in Lone Grove, OK with her husband Bryan and enjoys starting young horses on the barrel pattern and in the roping pen.
About Jyme Nichols, MS
Jyme Nichols, MS, is available as a regular equine nutrition columnist for publications and equine-related websites as well as a story source. Her Bluebonnet Feeds equine nutrition video advice can be found at bluebonnetfeeds.com/nutrition-quick-tips.
About Bluebonnet Feeds
For more than 30 years, Bluebonnet Feeds has manufactured a wide array of high-quality equine feed products, and has recently expanded its line of premium equine supplements through the Stride® brand. Using quality ingredients and specialized milling process, all of Bluebonnet’s equine feeds are carefully manufactured at a single mill in Ardmore, Oklahoma. For more information on Bluebonnet Feeds or Stride Supplements, go to www.bluebonnetfeeds.com.
Written by Jyme Nichols, MS