Whether you've got a broodmare, foal, performance horse or older horse, Equine Plus® is perfect for every horse in your barn.
By choosing one of our vitamin and mineral Equine Plus® Balancer Packs which addresses each individual horse's special needs, you can then buy [or make yourself] the same Equine Plus® Feed Base meal for a complete feed customized for the special needs of each and every horse in your barn. We can even make up custom mixes for your equines, as an enhancer, if a hair analysis shows your horses have specific deficiencies or toxicities. Equine Plus® will not only give you results, most people find that it's cheaper than what they're currently feeding because you feed so much less of it than competing brands.
Since common all-in-one commercial grains/feeds combine both the protein and carbohydrate portions of the total feed needs, it is impossible to maintain the necessary protein levels without overfeeding carbohydrates for most horses. Horses, like humans, dogs and cats today, are very sensitive to carbohydrates and tend to gain weight easily. Carbohydrates need to be fed as needed on a daily basis according to energy needs and workload, while the needed protein levels remain the same.
All metabolic biochemistry is fueled by protein: all enzymes, hormones, growth and tissue repair, immune function, nervous system, digestion, and energy metabolism. Carbohydrates are what the body actually burns for fuel, like wood in a fire, while the "fire" itself is driven by protein. A living body is actually 90% protein, bones and all, by dry weight. Protein composes all muscles, tissues and organs, hence protein is the most necessary part of any nutrition program. Protein is also the most expensive part of any feed program and is why protein in common commercial feeds is often so diluted with agricultural wastes and by products of little nutritional value in order to keep the price per bag low.
If you read the manufacturers feeding recommendations, you have to feed a lot more than you would normally want to feed or even are feeding currently, to get the recommended levels of protein needed per day. With Equine Plus®, you can satisfy your horse's daily protein needs without the carbs, and add the carbs as needed in the form of oats, oat groats or a rolled barley/oat combination energy feed, for the higher workloads of performance and racing horses or older horses who need more than just hay, or for winter weather needs. Additionally, the energy needs can be adjusted daily according to workload changes without compromising the daily protein levels. This is a boon for racing horses who do not need the same energy on days off, but still the same levels of protein. You don't have to sacrifice the protein with the carbs.
So, the real beauty of the Equine Plus® Feed program is that it can be very simply customized for every horse in your barn, of every age, every compromise and every different type of workload, all without having to have 10 different bags of food for 10 different types of horses.
Equine Plus® Feed can be purchased from one of our distributors or you can make it yourself using oilseed meals locally available from your feed store plus one of our customized Equine Plus® Balancer Packs to make the feed complete.
For more specialized needs, or if a hair analysis shows your horses has specific deficiencies or toxicities, our biochemist, Linsey McLean, can formulate custom vitamin/mineral and feed blends.
The Equine Plus® Feed Program will not only give you results, but most people find that it's cheaper than what they're currently feeding because you feed so much less than competing brands and all the individual supplements you may be using, without overloading your sensitive horse with carbohydrates or additives, filler or dangerous ag wastes you don't want.
Hay is the major carb source in the total diet, and by using the Equine Plus® Feed, the digestive efficiency is tuned up so that horses tend to eat less hay in response. They will get more nutrition out of the food they are eating. That helps offset the total costs too. However, if the horse is bored and has nothing to do all day but eat, then you definitely need to cut the hay levels to cut the carbs, or else the horse will surely gain weight on the same amount of hay. The Equine Plus® Feed will have tuned up the digestive efficiency so that the horse will get more nutrition out of the food he eats.
If they get the recommended amount of protein, they will not be so craving of the carbs, just as we humans have found. The higher the protein, the higher the metabolism and better able to deal with compromises like old age, obesity, founder and laminitis, lameness, arthritis, muscle soreness and stiffness, etc.
Just like people, there can be two horses of the exact same size and have different speed metabolisms. The slow one needs a bit more protein and the faster one needs a bit less protein and more carbs. TB's are the classic for the latter. With the Vita Royal Equine Plus® Feed Program you can easily adapt. Don't forget, that when you are adding oats, you are also adding some protein, so you back down a bit on the Equine Plus® Feed. The beauty of this feed program is its flexibility. You can custom tailor to the individual needs of each and every horse in the barn and on a daily basis too.
If you are mixing your own Equine Plus® Feed, the best and most accurate way of all is to just mix up the entire Equine Plus® Balancer with the meals so you have the complete feed done, store it and measure for every feeding. Only one mixing session and less opportunity for mistakes than trying to top-dress every feeding. Equine Plus® Balancer Packs are formulated to make about 50 lbs. of Hi Pro™ Feed.
Likely, if you add up all the expenses of the stuff you are now haphazardly adding to your feed program, you will find that you are most likely spending more now than you would with the Equine Plus® Feed Program. And you will be getting a better bang for your buck than what you have now, and your horse will show much better health too.
All horses lose some weight when transitioning, but that is not all fat, it is mostly toxic bloat, known as intracellular edema and inflammation, so you are really just seeing the true horse you had all along. You will see better muscle definition and a less bloated look after several weeks on the program.
For feeding older horses without teeth, you can also add Equine Plus® Feed and oat groats to a grinder/mixer while chopping hay, to make a wonderful and highly palatable, easily eaten complete feed that you can then add some moisture to. Feeding 8 lbs of this mix twice a day will give the compromised horse all he needs for the entire day. Soaked grass hay pellets or cubes can also be mixed with oat groats and Equine Plus® Feed to make a complete feed as with chopped hay.
If any of you want to give this a try, the recipe to make one day's worth (16 lbs) is 3 lbs. Equine Plus® Feed, 3.5 lbs. oats, and 9 lbs grass hay. If mixing large amounts of this mixture, mixers normally require multi-bushels of hay in order to operate, so the correct amount of all ingredients has to be calculated around the daily Equine Plus® Feed requirement.