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I'm with Angie on this. There are only two things I would add.  If you 
live in a low selenium area (which FL is) you might want to supplement 
selenium. But I would do blood work on the horse to find out if he does 
needs it and a follow up blood test to determine the levels.

The equine nutritionist at Seminole feed told me (he holds a PhD in 
equine nutrition, spent 15 years as a resercher at Louisiana Tech.before 
he went to Seminole and in the same position at Southern States) that 
most feeds are designed to be fed at about 5 pounds a day as far as 
vitamines and minerals. Many people - especially those who pasture their 
horses 24 hours a day - feed less. In that case he reccomended 
supplemention with a good all purpose, vitamine/mineral/protein 
supplement. There are a lot of those around, Buckeye, Seminole, KER all 
make such a supplement.

As far as hay in FL. You can get some mighty fine Tiff 44 in FL. Tiff44 
is a hybrid coastal and most people reccomend it over coastal for 
horses. Actually most people that say they feed coastal in the SE are in 
reality feeding Tiff 44.

But in general - a good high quality feed, grass and/or hay, selenium if 
needed, water and free choice salt will pretty much fill the bill.

Truman


rides2far@xxxxxxxx wrote:

> OK, here's where I see a problem. I'll admit, I know very little about
> equine nutrition, but there's this thing called a feed company that has
> people who work for them who do and they balance out a ration. I
> supplement that with a high quality coastal hay which is *far* more than
> "just a babysitter". When I was at the PNR convention in Portland they
> had a man with a computer program there for the 3-Day Eventer convention
> held in the same hotel. He would put in what you fed and tell you how all
> the different things interacted with one another.  He nabbed me as I went
> by and asked me what I feed. I told him he wouldn't be impressed. I go
> for a commercial mix 10% protein 6% fat horse feed, coastal bermuda hay
> (all they'll clean up) and free choice salt. He said that was the
> smartest answer he'd gotten all day. He showed me some examples of people
> who were trying to do a better job than just feeding...god
> forbid...straight "horse feed". They would add one thing that threw the
> whole balance out of whack, then throw in some vitamins that were the
> same vitamins provided in another, and this would counteract that. If you
> want to do better than the feed mill's nutritionists, you'd better
> *really* know what everything has in it...and hay matters a LOT, it's the
> MAIN thing they're eating so you can't just blow over that part. 
>
> Angie
>  


--

"The opposite of a correct statement is a false statement. The opposite 
of a profound truth may well be another profound truth."    Niels Bohr 
-- Nobel Laureate, Physics




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