Nutrition

Nutritional management of equine gastric ulcers

Equine gastric ulcers are reported in all ages and breeds of horse. The incidence of equine squamous gastric disease in researched cohorts is reported to be between 11–92% (Murray et al, 1989;...

Weight management and feeding requirements for geriatric donkeys

Healthy geriatric donkeys mostly require a basic diet of good quality barley, oat or wheat straw, and limited access to grass. Donkeyspecific vitamin and mineral requirements have not been...

Approach to clinical nutrition

Overall, when forming a nutrition plan, the following key areas need to be considered. In addition, when advising on animals which may be competing under specific regulations, it is essential that the...

Advances in the understanding of laminitis and the role of nutrition in its management

Laminitis was previously broadly classified according to the differing pathways presumed to trigger its onset. At present, three main clinical forms of laminitis have been defined (Patterson-Kane et...

The role of nutrition and feeding in equine weight management

The prevalence of both obese and overweight horses is high (Giles et al, 2014; Potter et al, 2016). However, how this is categorised and reported could be clearer, as defining whether a horse is...

Equine obesity and the role of the veterinary nurse

In order to understand how to prevent equine obesity, it is first important to recognise what the term obesity actually refers to. Obesity is a qualitative term (Wyse et al, 2008), defined as an...

Optimised environments for horse health and wellbeing: the use of alternative grazing

Track systems involve placing a track around the outside of a field or several fields, and keeping the horses on this tracked area rather than in a central paddock. Items such as water, shelter, hay...

Esomeprazole in the treatment of equine glandular gastric disease

A total of seven horses met the criteria for inclusion, including two Thoroughbreds, one Arabian X, one Welsh Pony, one Riding Pony, one Standardbred and one Warmblood. There were three geldings and...

How human behaviour change science can help us manage obesity in horses

A useful way of thinking about how change happens is to divide it into stages, as in the stages of change model (Prochaska and Velicer, 1997; DiClemente and Prochaska, 1998) (Table 1)..