While researchers continue to learn more about the causes of laminitis, it is still often difficult to pinpoint the cause in individual cases. As the onset of laminitis is an emergency situation, frantic owners are often thrown into a maelstrom of information about different trigger factors without the benefit of a calm, rational mindset to sort it all out into a practical plan of action.
Removing excess carbohydrates from horse's diet
If your horse is showing signs of laminitis or Equine Metabolic Syndrome on a hay only diet, soaking hay can be the most cost effective thing you can do.
- Do we focus on the aspects of fructan and its proliferative effect on acid producing gut bacteria?
- Should we focus on simple sugars that trigger high insulin and Equine Metabolic Syndrome?
- Must we know which of these mechanisms are in play before we start addressing the cause of our horse’s laminitis? Do you wait until your vet can pull blood samples and test for insulin?
- Do you need to wait until you pull a hay sample and get it tested to see if the hay is part of the problem?
- Do you have to save up enough money to even start these often expensive and time consuming testing procedures?
No. You have to do something now!
Start soaking your hay, along with removing all grain products from your horse’s diet. Both fructan and simple sugars are soluble in water. You don’t need to know which carbohydrate is causing the problem. You just need get rid of them. Removing excess water soluble carbohydrates can make a huge difference to horses with laminitis within a few days to a couple of weeks.
You could resolve the laminitis and prevent permanent rotation of the coffin bones even before you get blood or hay test results. In fact, a sudden improvement in laminitis after removing excess carbs from the diet can serve as a diagnostic tool for Equine Metabolic Syndrome, as well as the treatment.
Even if you are not yet sure if your horse’s lameness is truly laminitis, soaking the hay will only remove some excess calories for a short time. No great loss, with possibly life-saving gains. So don’t wait. If your horse is showing signs of laminitis or EMS on a hay only diet, soaking hay can be the most cost effective thing you can do. The Soaker, is an easy, time-saving way to accomplish this vital treatment.
The Soaker is an automatic hay soaker that will fill, soak, and drain, all on its own. Made in the USA, The Soaker is a non-electric automatic hay and feed soaker that has standardized hay soaking. It is a timed, portable, self-contained unit that only requires a pressurized water source to run. Currently in use at UC Davis and Loomis Basin Equine Medical Center.
By Kathryn Watts of Safergrass.org