With the number of options available in equine feeds, choosing which feed will work best for your horses poses some problems. Processed feeds advertise better digestion and efficiency, but is the extra cost worth these improvements?
Processed or natural feed for horses?
Convenience and time saving is a big benefit with processed horse feeds, but it is a horse owner's responsibility to provide the best possible feed to keep horses healthy.
According to Dr. Peter Huntington of Kentucky Equine Research, the many processing choices include grinding, steam rolling, flaking, micronizing, pelleting, boiling, chaffing, silaging, extruding, and expelling, and there is a seemingly never-ending stream of advertized blended mixes that use some combination of ingredients prepared in one or more of these ways.
Most processing methods aim at reducing the particle size and improving the digestibility and palatability of the feed.
According to research statistics, after grinding or rolling of cereal grains, the digestibility of fiber is either not affected or improved by only 5%. Given that processed oats may cost significantly more than whole oats, the benefits are hard to justify.
It is worth remembering that horses come equipped with a highly developed set of grinders in their teeth and will masticate particles to approximately 1.6 mm before swallowing. The eating of 1 kg (2.2 lb) of hay will require between 3,000 and 3,500 chewing movements while 1 kg (2.2 lb) of ground concentrate will involve only about 800 to 1,200 chewing movements. One might wonder considering that horse's teeth continue to grow throughout their lifetimes, if less chewing is a plus in the selection of feed.
It is also not true that crushing or rolling grains will reduce the protein content. Some destruction of the vitamin content occurs, but it is minimal compared to the horse’s total daily requirements. Grains are not a major source of the horse’s vitamin intake.
Grains in processed horse feeds are sorted at processing plants and graded. Superior graded grains go to human consumption. Lower graded grains go to animal consumption. By- products of the processing (soy hulls, wheat middlings for instance) become inexpensive fillers for horse feed.
Because the grains for animals are nutritionally lower than the human graded grains, feed companies must add synthetic additives to provide nutrients. These synthetic additives (including vitamins) are made from coal tar derivatives, petroleum extracts, acetone, formaldehyde, and other substances.
The processing of the grains themselves can expose the grains to temperatures exceeding 450 degrees. Enzymes and other nutrients can't survive in temperatures exceeding 145 degrees.
Sugar in the form of molasses and corn syrups are often added not only as a binder, but for palatability. Commercial feed companies rely on further processing after the grains are mixed with the sweetners, additives, and preservatives to produce the pellets or extruded or texturized feeds. The further processing of what originated as food now becomes a food product.
It is true that steam pelleting and cooking improve the digestibility of dry matter and starch, thereby increasing the available energy content of the feed. The belief that cooked grains produce less heat during digestion than uncooked grains results from the fact that that is improved digestion and reduced microbial fermentation reduces the heat produced as a result of digestion of fiber in the hindgut.
This same principle of reducing the heat increment of the diet can be applied to feeding horses in extremes of hot or cold weather. In hotter climates, the use of higher energy grains results in a lower heat increment of metabolism and will help reduce overheating with work.
Fats are also useful in this situation. In colder weather, horses will naturally select high-fiber diets, which increase the heat increment from hindgut fermentation, helping to keep the horse warm.
While there is no question that commercial processed feeds have provided convenience to horse owners and barn owners. It's easy to rip open commercial processed feed bags, scoop the pellets or sweet feed or texturized feed, and then pour it in the bucket.
According to many research sources, hay and grass forages should be the main sources of a horse's nutrition. Good pasture provides the maximum benefits, but in cases where pasture feed is not available, some kind of supplementation may be necessary especially for both young and older horses.
Convenience and time saving is a big benefit with processed horse feeds, but it is a horse owner's responsibility to provide the best possible feed to keep horses healthy, and that may take some research based on the workload and health of the horse.