Equine Health Feature
The Horse Report
Nutrition for your pregnant mare By LARISSA BILSTON, BAgrSc (Hons 1), Animal Nutritionist, Farmalogic As we move into Autumn, the excitement of finding out that your mare is pregnant may be wearing off. But have you thought about what you'll need to feed her from now until she foals? Provided your mare was in good condition and being fed a wellbalanced forage-based diet supplemented with high quality protein and a vitamin and mineral supplement to fill any gaps and correct mineral ratios, her dietary needs will not visibly alter much for the first six months of pregnancy. However, if she is lacking in energy or vitamins and minerals, her body will 'mine' its own resources to give these to the growing foetus. Roughage is the base of every good horse diet The first rule of good horse nutrition is to feed plenty of roughage - pasture, hay or chaff. Unless your mare is overweight, it is safe to feed as much grassbased roughage as she will eat. If your mare needs an energy source such as grain or pellets to continue in light work or to maintain weight, then you should continue to feed it and carefully monitor her body condition. Your mare needs to be a healthy weight (not too heavy, not too light) to maintain a healthy pregnancy, but her body's requirement for energy throughout pregnancy remains close to her need when spelling or in light work. PROTEIN REQUIREMENTS CHANGE IN PREGNANCY Pregnant, lactating and growing
Your mare needs to be a healthy weight to maintain a healthy pregnancy. horses need high quality protein in their diets - look especially at lysine, a key amino acid which horses must consume since they are unable to manufacture it themselves. Soybean meal is the ingredient most commonly used to add lysine to breeding horse feeds. During the final three months of pregnancy, your mare will need 50% more lysine than when empty. For example, a 600kg mare needs 46g of lysine/day at 11 months gestation compared to a requirement for around 30g daily when spelling. BALANCED MINERALS ARE CRITICAL Your pregnant mare's need for some minerals is higher than when spelling and in some cases is higher than the level she need-
ed to perform very heavy exercise. The main increases for mineral nutrition relate to calcium and phosphorous, which are needed in increasing amounts as the pregnancy progresses; and for copper, iron and iodine in the last three months. As with mineral supplementation in all classes of horses, it is imperative that your pregnant mare obtains all the minerals she needs, in carefully balanced ratios from all food sources. FATTY ACIDS FOR PREGNANCY Marine derived omega-3 supplementation boosts mare fertility and improves the rate of positive pregnancies after first cycle of mating, improves colostrum quality and facilitates normal development of the brain and nervous system in foals.
Correct omega-3 to omega-6 balance also supports the general health and well-being of mares through benefits to skin, reduction of itch, enhanced immune system function, maintenance of normal respiratory health, improved insulin sensitivity in overweight horses and reduced inflammatory hormones in joint fluid, indicating potential benefits to aging or arthritic broodmares. Since horses are not able to efficiently convert plant-sourced alpha-linolenic (ALA) into eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA) and docosahexaenoic acid (DHA), the two most potent anti-inflammatory omega-3 fatty acids, supplementation with marinesourced omega-3s (DHA and EPA) are advised for broodmares. Continued page 7
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