joint supliments and feed

Question
QUESTION: i hav a 15hh xID 2 years old currently on 24.7 grass and a daily hard feed for his vits and mins , his weight is good the supliment he gets now is limestone flour , should he be on a better joint suppliment such as glucosmine as he  growins . thanks ..

ANSWER: Hi Jill,

Thank you for your question.  Young horses are designed to form strong joints and cartilage when they are your horse's age, and don't necessarily need joint supplements.  They are genetically determined to do so...they use 'naturally' occurring nutrients to get the job done.  Having said that, they can benefit from additional glucosamine/chondroitin/MSM supplementation especially if their diet is at all lacking in available sulfur or various quality amino acids.  If you want to feed this type of supplement, feed one that combines glucosamine, chondroitin sulfate and MSM.  To help older or performance horses, vets often suggest glucosamine dosages of 10000mg/day, chondroitin at 8500mg/day and MSM at 12000mg/day.

I always recommend making sure the rest of the diet is in order before necessarily going to remedies, so I have a few suggestions for your horse's diet that will also help with proper development...as your horse will continue to strengthen and develop joints and cartilage up to the age of 4-6 years old.  You are doing the right thing to add vitamins and minerals to the diet.  Ensure that your horse is getting enough calcium (37 grams), phosphorous (21g) and magnesium (13) daily and calcium and phosphorous are provided in a ratio of 1.8:1 calcium to phosphorous.  Don't be too concerned with slightly overfeeding these minerals because not all that they eat is going to be available to the horse (I would say that you could safely feed up to twice the requirements without ANY concern).  These minerals will help largely with bone development,  which prevents joint breakdown in the long run.  Also, you are going to want to ensure that you have enough zinc (430mg) and copper (108mg) in the diet as they play an integral role in synovial fluid and cartilage development.  The ratio of zinc:copper in the diet is as important as the overall amounts...with a requirement of a ratio of 4:1.  You may want to also think of adding some quality amino acids to the diet...from quality protein.  All of this sounds complicated but the good feed companies have built this into their supplements for horses of that age group.  I'm not sure what feed companies you have available to you...but if you were in Canada, I would suggest that you buy 'Optimal' from Purina.  'Optimal'  has all of the above suggestions built in, and you only need to adjust the feeding rate.  If you give me an idea of what company you would like to deal with, I would gladly make a more precise recommendation.

I hope that helps to some extent, please let me know if there is anything else I can help with.

Thanks, Corlena

---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: hi corlena i use spillers food and the type is a new feed recomended by them called cool concentrate if u could let me know what u think that would be great

Answer
Hi Jill,

Thanks for getting back to me.  The type of supplement that I was suggesting is more like Spiller's 'Gro N Win'.  It is designed to feed small quantities for balancing forage rations, so you don't need to feed a lot.  The cool concentrate is more of a high fiber high fat complete feed (low in starch), designed to round a ration whose forages are not capable of supplying sufficient nutrients.  If your horse is on decent quality forage 24/7 and is not doing a lot of work, then the 'Gro N win' will round out the diet just fine.  If the quality of forages in your pasture is nominal and/or your horse is in training then you will want to feed something like the 'Cool Concentrate'...mostly because it brings more energy density, needed for a growing + working horse.  You would want to feed about 1kg/day of the 'Cool Concentrate'.  Of the 'Gro N Win', only 0.5kg/day would suffice.  When pricing the two you will find the 'Gro N Win' more expensive but keep in mind it's lower feeding rate.  Honestly, I would prefer to see you feed the 'Gro N Win' as it is formulated more precisely for your horse's age group.

I hope that helps.  

Thanks, Corlena