Whole Food for Horses

I started my journey into feeding whole foods to my horses, because I was confused and frustrated by the unbelievable number of different products, such as complete feeds as and additional vitamin and mineral supplementations.

Every week another catalogue comes through the mail with dozens of products promising to solve any type of equine problem. At the feed store there are numerous complete feeds (grains) to choose from – but which one would work for my horses?

I started…

  Processed foods for humans, equines, felines and canines all employ the same basic ingredients to get us and our animals "hooked" on the food.   These ingredients are Sugar, Salt, and Fat.

   Food scientists have focused on not only getting processed food to taste good, but to get our brains and the brains of our animals to crave more of these foods.  Because of course the more we crave the foods, the more we will buy, and the more the companies will sell.   There is a whole…

The beauty of a whole food diet is starting with what you have, and then sourcing as much as you can locally. Every area will differ pretty drastically as the same items may not be available nationwide, yet everyone has to start somewhere.

In terms of our horses, we all have to start with bulk of their diet which is forage, either some form of hay or pasture. If we're lucky, we have great pasture and ideal weather conditions to keep them maintained on that all year…

While the benefits of feeding fats and oils to horses are now widely recognised, a thorough review of the literature will show that saturated oils such as coconut oil are more effective at exerting a positive influence on the horse than the unsaturated oils. Until now, saturated fats have only been available in the unpalatable, impractical form of animal fat (tallow), and as a result have been virtually ignored in the diet of horses, meaning many of the benefits available from high fat diets…