Why does your horse need a balanced vitamin/mineral mix?
With the science of equine nutrition expanding rapidly, it is now more clearly recognized that horses have requirements for a wide variety of vitamins and minerals. Horses, just like people, need optimal amounts of vitamins and minerals to maintain overall health, performance levels, proper growth, and reproductive health. The requirement difference in optimal levels of nutrients can vary widely from horse to horse and breed to breed. Stress and activity levels are also factored in when determining a horse’s nutrient requirements. Horses with special needs such as pregnancy, Cushing’s syndrome, insulin resistance or founder can have exceptional needs for a number of nutrients to maintain optimal balance.
There is a wide variability in nutrient content of even the highest quality grass or alfalfa hay. Diets high in grass hay, which is low in calcium, can lead to calcium deficiency if calcium is not supplemented. Alfalfa hay diets are high in calcium, but may cause imbalances in phosphorus and/or magnesium. In areas of the country where selenium is naturally low in the soil, selenium supplementation should be utilized to prevent deficiency.
No hay (either grass or alfalfa) or grain will provide the exact levels of optimal nutrition for horses. The mineral content can change markedly from hay to hay and the vitamin content of grain and forages can decline rapidly during periods of transport and storage. Heat, humidity, and rainfall can also affect nutrient content of hay and pastures. With today’s modern farming practices, the pastures and hay contain substantially different levels of any number of nutrients. Complete feeds attempt to supply adequate levels of nutrients for horses, but oftentimes only include the minimum amount to maintain the basic NRC (National Research Council) recommendations. The levels of nutrients ingested are limited by the amount of grain fed. Any consumption above or below the recommended serving can lead to an over- or under-consumption of nutrients that can contribute to nutritional excesses, deficiencies or imbalances. Many horses now are on low-grain diets and can become overweight if they consume vitamin/mineral fortified grain products for their supplement needs. A horse’s optimal nutritional requirements are seldom, if ever, completely met by diets relying solely on pasture, hay, and grain.
As equine nutritional science progresses, it is now very clear that virtually all horses can benefit, some markedly, by the judicious use of a high quality vitamin/mineral/digestive aid supplements to ensure an optimal intake of nutrients to support the health and structure of all the body’s tissues. Complete and comprehensive vitamin/mineral supplements may also prevent deficiencies, compensate for stresses, and support life, health, growth, and reproduction in all horses.
Jack Grogan, CN
Uckele Health & Nutrition
Jack Grogan graduated from the University of Toledo with a degree in Public Health and is also a Certified Nutritionist who has studied extensively in the fields of biology, biochemistry and nutrition. He has been a consultant in human nutrition for 32 years and animal nutrition for 15 years developing nutritional formulations and programs. He has developed many state of the art nutritional supplements that are widely used today. He has been a technical consultant in the manufacture of a variety of nutritional and herbal formulas for better health, and uses his vast knowledge of nutritional balancing to help his clients achieve and maintain optimal health. Mr. Grogan is an expert in tissue mineral balancing and currently analyzes hair samples from around the world with Uckele Health & Nutrition, Inc. He has had a strong interest in assessing nutritional status and has worked with hair tissue mineral analysis for more than 30 years as a tool to aid in determining tissue mineral balance. Mr. Grogan has been doing hair mineral analysis on horses for many years and has had great success in balancing equine mineral chemistry to strengthen the basic metabolism and improve efficiency in horses. He acts as a consultant to numerous physicians, veterinarians, chiropractors, trainers, naturopaths, and nutritionists to rebalance the mineral status of a their clients and patients, as well as maintaining a busy nutritional consulting practice for his own clients.
