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RE: [RC] Rice Bran before a ride? - Susan E. Garlinghouse, DVM


Got a question:  I was recently told that I should stop feeding rice  
bran before a ride, but I didn't get any details as to why.

I feed Natural Glo, which is balanced for calcium, so it shouldn't  
throw the Ca:P ratio off.  Is there some other reason to not feed  
rice bran the week before a ride?

Thanks

That may or may not have evolved from my recommendations to stop feeding
fats a few days before, and also during, a ride.  Fats have a high satiety
factor, (call it the "cheeseburger effect"), meaning that a high-fat meal
satisfies the appetite for longer than a low-fat meal does.  It happens in
horses as well as people, and in horses, lots of fat may suppress forage
intake immediately prior to and during a ride.  Forage has a much more
critical role in maintaining gut motility, and also as a secondary role in
driving water intake---both a lot more important than anything fats have to
offer during a ride weekend.  Fats have their advantages as a consistent
part of the diet, but offer few advantages if fed immediately before or
during the ride itself.  So even if you're already offering hay (and
presumably you are), you want to do everything you can to encourage maximum
intake and not suppress his appetite for forage in any way.  Does that make
sense?

While I don't recommend actually adding fats to the ration before or during
the ride, I'm mostly referring to pure fats---adding vegetable oil, Cool
Calories, cocasoy, those sort of things.  I'm not as concerned about feeds
that are a normal part of the horses' ration, which coincidentally provide a
fair amount of fat---rice bran, Ultium and other high-fat formulated
performance feeds, flax, sunflower seeds, those sort of things.  In those
cases, you're probably not actually feeding all that much pure fat.  If you
also balance it against the benefits of keeping the horse's ration
consistent, and presumably feeding him something he likes and will eat well
at a ride, then I wouldn't get too excited about really restricting or
removing every scrap of rice bran from his ration the week before a ride.

Hope this helps.

Susan Garlinghouse, DVM


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Replies
[RC] Rice Bran before a ride?, Beth Walker