Ration Balancers- Nutrena? Purina? Other?

[buschkn]

I have some fatties and am considering a ration balancer. I would like to try and find something I don't have to go to separate feed store for if possible. I have easy access to Nutrena, Purina, anything at TSC, but can also go to Southern States if need be (Triple Crown? not sure the brands they carry).

Thanks!

[deltawave]

What is your question? :)

I am a fan of ration balancers, but there is nothing magical about them--they are a good way to get a lot of the "extras" into a horse (like amino acids, vitamins, etc.) without feeding a lot of concentrate.

But if I had a fat one, I'd probably not feed much of anything other than hay and whatever they need on top of that vitamin/mineral-wise--my chubby pony does fine on grass hay and a vitamin/mineral product, chosen based on our hay analysis. She gets about a tablespoon of the ration balancer that the others eat only because she thinks "grain" time is the best 30 seconds of the day. :lol:

[buschkn]

Well I guess thats what I was thinking- RB so I don't feed a lot of concentrate but they still get vit/min. Better to just buy a supp and give them a handful of my reg grain so they eat it? Never really had this problem. :) One of them is a pregger mare.

[JB]

Nutrena doesn't have a ration balancer.

Tractor Supply now carries Purina, and while I've been told from a few that they won't do any special orders, I also know at least one store that has ordered the Enrich 32, which, along with Enrich 12, are not part of the regular Purina lineup at TSC in general. However, I don't think I'd count on them to have it in supply on a regular basis.

Southern States carries TSC, and their 30% and 12% balancers are nice. So, given that they are a regular product, will be in stock, that's what I'd go with.

[purplnurpl]

Progressive
and
Alliance Nutrition

also have diet balancers.

I just use a multi vitamin like Glanzen (Horsetech) or Equi VM (Eukele) mixed with 1 cup of beet pulp.

[Philliab]

I love the Triple Crown 12% and 30% ration balancers; my horses loved and thrived off them.

[cloudyandcallie]

Seminole Equalizer.

But you can email the Seminole Nutritionist Larry Mack and find out what grain or ration balancer he thinks would fit your horses' needs best.

[ahf]

I feed Triple Crown 30 to all broodmares and growing stock from weaners to 2yo's. I particlularly like it for one hard-keeper BM that runs out of room to hold food in her last 45-60 days. I feed it with some wet beep, table salt in the winter, and Ration Plus as a pre-biotic. And the hard keeper mare gets crimped oats.

BUT....for my air fern broodmare...I've changed her diet to beep and Uckele's Base Mix 55 for broodmares and foals. 4 oz a day is pretty much all she needs. I suspect this mare is IR, and this diet has already allowed her to drop some weight - and substantially reduced her neck - yet she looks great. Later in her pregnancy I'll add some alfalfa to meet her DE needs.

The last thing I've done is subscribe to FeedXL (www.feedxl.com) and it may be the BEST thing I've done. I can tweak the diet of my broodmares for their stage of pregnancy, and fiddle with feed, forage, and supplement amounts until their needs are being met according to the chart.