"Long Stem Roughage" and Colitis

[Vicki1061]

Hi all,

I'm trying to remove "long-stem roughage" from my horses diet as he had/still has a pretty severe case of Right Dorsal Colitis. Really, this horse probably should have died last January, it was very severe. He's shockingly back to work now, except every now and then he gets these painful moments that can last a while (5 minutes to a few hours) - usually gas or sometimes he just needs to poop.

Anyway, Everything I read says that hay needs to be removed as the "long-stem roughage" irritates it.

So he's been on just Purina Equine Senior for a few months now, with about 3 flakes of soft hay scattered though out the day. He's been slightly sicker lately, and I think he may now have a stricture or scar tissue in the colon and maybe the hay is bothering him.

So - When you talk about chopped hay or Dengi, or alfalfa cubes, do you think they still want that out of the diet? It is still technically "long-stem roughage", but now it has been cut up so small that I don't think it would have the same effect on the colon and regular hay would(?) New Bolton hospital actually sent him home on Dengi, but he absolutely refused to eat it.

Thoughts? We are planning to give soaked alfalfa cubes a try, we have heard of a few success stories with that and my vet agrees it makes the most sense. He (The horse, not the vet) seems very bored without the hay, and in turn, is getting VERY destructive.

I read in a few places on here about the alfalfa pellets - not sure if we even have that around me. Brand names to look for?

Thanks for all the help! This is a really tough ailment to deal with!

[Whitfield Farm Hanoverians]

I have a friend who's horse has scar tissue that constricts passage of hay. He can eat only senior feed as a very wet mash & she gets the bagged chopped alfalfa & feeds it very wet also. No hay at all. He actually has looked better since she found out what to feed him. No more painful episodes. He's been on this for the past 2 or 3 years & is doing great.
I think the hay cubes would be even better, soaked to a mush of course.
Her horse can have all the pasture he wants.

[MidlifeCrisis]

I have a horse that recovered from right dorsal colitis. During his recovery, he was put on an Equine Senior diet. The vet hospital recommended TDI Senior. They felt that Purine Equine Senior had too much molasses. He was on that diet for 6 months. I had to throw him a few handfuls of hay to help satisfy his need to chew. Otherwise, he would chew on his stall. I also broke his feeding down to 4-5 feedings a day.

Now he is on 1/2 pellets and 1/2 hay. An all-hay diet will cause him to impact. I use a local pellet called Elk Grove Milling Stable Mix. My understanding is that the hay in it is chopped and then extruded into pellet form. Extruded pellets are what you're looking for.

3 flakes of hay sounds like a lot, but maybe that is a regional difference thing. My horse (QH) would only need 3 flakes of hay per day.

The vets also told me that pasture is good. The grass has a lot of water in it and is easily digested.

If you have questions, please feel free to PM me.

[LoriO]

If she doesn't pipe up here on her own, send a PM to MistyBlue, she had a horse with right dorsal colitis and came up with an excellent diet for him. She should be able to give you a lot of good advice

[MistyBlue]

Like the others have said...some horses just can't go back to long stem hay after RDC. Some can. Others need the hay reduced or soaked until soft. Depends on the horse and if there was any thickening of the colon wall from the colitis.
My gelding Moo had RDC too...what a nightmare, huh? Almost lost him also, due to being undiagnosed. I think everyone who's been through it has nightmares to tell about, RDC can be hideous to diagnose or treat.
The treatment we did was no stem hay at all for 6 months...most of what I read stated 3 months hay free and then try weaning them back on it. But I went the 6 month route, I guess just to feel safer. Moo did awesome on the soaked mushy food diet anyways.
I used soaked timothy cubes and dengi mixed in a 5 gallon bucket...everything soaked into mush and given 5-6 times per day. Smaller meals so as not to get backed up in or stretch the right dorsal area and very soupy to keep his interior as hydrated as possible. After that time he was started very slowly on very small meals of soaked stem hay...soaked enough to be soft. He was then rehomed with a friend and has been absolutely 100% since then and back on regular hay amounts that aren't soaked. We were lucky that he didn't have any scarring.
Another thing to think about removing is any extruded feed or even pellets that are dry. Colitis can sometimes cause pits to form in that area and small bits of dry feed can get stick in there and cause pain or inflamation.
The cubes don't really count as hay according to the RDC diet because it's the long dry stems that irritate the horse and not the actual hay itself...it's the shape and texture of the hay. The cubes are soaked before feeding and are just a mushy mess...like wet oatmeal. Nothing to irritate but they get the nutrition of the hay anyways. The dengi didn't bother my guy, but I did give a much smalller amount of dengi compared to cubes and it was soaked until soft. The pieces are smaller and might not irritate your horse.
I'd start first with just soaked meals of cubes and a complete pelleted feed for a couple weeks and see how he improves. If he's doing fine...try adding in a little soaked dengi at a time.
The only problem with the soaked diet people seem to deal with is the frequency of feedings and the lack of chewing for the horse since they only eat during the soaked meals. If you have pasture that's great. If not, they can get bored, which is also why frequent meals helps.
There are a variety of different cubes out there...Ontario Dehy makes forage cubes, alf/timothy cubes, alf only cubes and timothy only cubes. I fed the timothy only cubes...the reason my horse got RDC in the first place was alfalfa dengi and cubes before that...here in New England alfalfa isn't a grown hay and it's not a common feed. Many horses have never had it and in mine it caused stones. The stones and treatment I was told to use for that caused the RDC. So I stayed away from the alfalfa for safety's sake.
Another thing I learned with RDC is while the horse is healing, to keep them calm and quiet and no riding at first. Then after a couple months light hacking only. Any nerves cause acid build up which can be excrutiating on the RDC.

[Vicki1061]

Yeah - Nightmare barely covers it. I was laying in the stall with him so much last winter I seriously thought about installing a TV.

Thanks for all your advice!!!

I haven't heard about the pits forming, makes sense though. I'm going to give the straight, soaked alfalfa cubes a try, and remove the hay. I'm not sure if it will really help, but its worth a try. He actually seems to get more gassy than anything else, not sure why.

He started getting sick November 2008, and we didn't get the treatment straight on him until February 2009. So it's been roughly 7 months - and again, it was very severe and he probably should have died from it. That's why I think now he probably has a lot of scar tissue in there, and I think will need to be on this modified diet forever.

The gas is the worst though, and I'm not sure what causes it. We are actually giving him Mylanta on a regular basis now, several times a day. Seems to help, but doesn't always do the trick. (The barn looks like a bird bathroom because of the white Mylanta getting accidentally squirted out of the dosing syringe everyday when we 'reload')

Poor thing is just 5 years old and the sweetest boy you will every meet. RDC didn't rear its ugly head until 4 months after I bought him - the first time I ever decided to stop taking the cheap, needs work horses and go buy something nice and made for myself. I've been 'saving him' since (10 months so far), spent wayyy more money than I have in the bank, and have not gotten my nice horse out of it. :(

[MistyBlue]

Ah that must suck out loud Vicky. :no:
I wouldn't wish RDC on my worst enemy...getting it in the just purchased young "dream horse" has got to be a real kick in the pants.
Some of the stuff I've read on RDC has mentioned that scarred areas can cause folds or pits and grain getting stuck in there can hurt like hell. I guess similar to people having diverticulitis. (and yep, I massacred that spelling, LOL) So I would soak any pellets too.
The biggest pain the arse with the RDC was trying to get it diagnosed...it's a helluva hard thing to diagnose definitely. Basic diagnosis seems to be by symptoms and then ruling out everything else.
I had never dealt with it or even really heard of it before Moo got it...and I went through Hades and back and spent a bloody fortune trying to figure out what the hell was wrong with my horse. We were literally one weekend away from euthanizing him and having a necropsy done...and with help from advice on here and googling like crazy I found RDC and it fit him to a "t" from causes to symptoms. Figured it couldn't hurt to just swap him right to the RDC diet over the weekend and within 24 hours of soaking all his food, no grain and no hay I had a healthy acting horse.
I also spent a month of Sundays sleeping in my barn, worrying like hell, etc. Mine got it the same months yours did...and sleeping (or lack of sleeping) in a barn in winter wasn't fun. I ended up more sick than the horse over time. Nerves and no sleep and slowly going bankrupt will do that to a person. :winkgrin: Then the diet with constant soaking and feedings for so long...exhausting.
The gas...my guy got gassy too but he was always gassy and didn't seem more gassy than usual. I'm definitely no expert on RDC...others here can probably fill you in with better or more up to date info. Ghazzu on here was a real life saver, literally, for Moo. As were all the folks who also went through RDC with their horses too.
Is your horse gassy as in gas colics? Has he always gotten alfalfa before this? Maybe try using cubes that have less alfalfa or no alfalfa in them? Alfalfa can make some horses gassy, it's pretty rich.
And whatever you do, absolutely no NSAIDs like Bute or Banamine ever. And keep him as hydrated as possible.
There's some really good info I got on this BB from many other folks...try reading through this old thread from when I was going through this:
http://www.chronicleforums.com/Forum/showthread.php?t=70840
Or just try the search function with "right dorsal colitis" in the search box and search by posts. There's some good info.

[Vicki1061]

Yeah - the whole thing has been really heartbreaking. Worst of it is I know at some point (soon) I'm not going to be able to afford this anymore - then what?? Its all a long story but in the middle of this horse getting so sick I had let the lease go on my boarding farm and went back to boarding - and now I really can't afford this horse and my 26 year old that I've had for 14 years - and i can't really get rid of either one. It's such a mess I can't even begin to describe.

Looks like you really went through hell in the diagnosing - I did too, but not that much. He started out with Potomac, which we don't get around here so we treated with Banamine and ProPenn for about a week before we put it together and realized Potomic might be the cause - some Tetracycline and the fever was gone in 24 hours. But then it slowly came back, the horse developed thrombophlobitis (Yup, butchered that), and was always colicy at night, occasionally during the day. He also grew this huge edema on his stomach. My vet was away, so I was using another local vet that just treated with Banamine daily, and suggested he might have Lymphoma. My vet came home, went right to ultrasound and said in the least we have RDC.

Mind you we ended up putting him on all hay no grain for a while - I know we had a reason for doing that, but my memory is foggy around that and I don't recall why. I'm sure we did much more harm than good for doing that though.

time passed - and it just kept getting worse and I was loosing my mind (and 10lbs and probably almost my boyfriend), finally I sent him to New Bolton Center where they confirmed it and provided supportive care while I got some much needed sleep. (2 weeks of sleep = $6k)

While he was up there, he started to bleed and they did another ultrasound. They said the small intestines was slightly distended, which would point to IBD with RDC. (Oy - those are opposing treatments). But the bleeding stopped after 24 hours (We think it came from the colon) and I took him home and we treated for RDC. They wanted to operate, I couldn't afford it. Since coming home (and now living with my wonderful vet and his wife) he has been doing better, put weight back on and started acting like a horse again.

So - yes, we got the diagnosis for RDC pretty quick and my local, savior of a vet was right about it from go. However, every time he has these little episodes I keep remembering what they said about the small intestine and I wonder..

Not much I can do about it either way though. Its just he gets these episodes a lot and I don't know if its truly RDC or if the horse has IBD too.

So here I am with it - going to get the cubes during lunch today and just hoping for the best with that. The vet suggested the straight alfalfa. We do have a fairly good amount of alfalfa in the grass mix he eats now.

Sorry that was more of a vent than anything - I'm sure anyone who's gone through it understands. We should start an RDC support group..haha.

[Vicki1061]

Wow Misty - I love the post you have about the one vet saying Banamine can't cause RDC - yikes!

I wonder if my horse will ever not have the soupy poopies...he hasn't had 1 solid poop since last november.

[starkissed]

I think long stemmed hay is definited as longer than like 1/2 inch or so. Which isnt very long. So perhaps hay pellets, that have been soaked, would do the trick.

What does your vet have to say about this?

[MistyBlue]

I know, can you believe that a vet told me Banamine can't cause RDC because it's not Bute??? :eek: Between that and other weird behavior from that vet during the RDC debacle, I stopped using the entire clinic. Which stunk in a way because the head vet is extremely good...and the clinic covers a lot of extra stuff like acupuncture, lameness specialist, chiro, repro, etc and they do small animals too. *sigh* But the head vet stopped seeing clients regularly and got into town politics, leaving the wacked out young vet for the clients. I have a great new vet now.

If not a support group for RDC...at the very least t-shirts that say:
We survived RDC! ;)

So far everyone I know or every post I've read from folks who've gone through RDC say the same thing....it's horrendous to deal with. :no:

Good luck with your guy and sorry about the whole situation you're stuck in right now. Just keep plugging along, sometimes it's the only thing we can do. And remember to not get sleep deprived again. (the $6000 clinic stay was probably worth it to get some sleep, huh?) Take care of yourself too. Please keep us updated on here as you can...and we'll be wishing for the best for you and your guy.