Feeding senior horses (typically considered over the age of 15) doesn’t have to be complicated. Some need adjustments to their nutrition as they continue to age based on their health status and body condition. Read on to better understand older horses’ nutrition so they remain happy and healthy into their golden years. Sponsored by Sentinel.

One of the most important complications in neonatal foals is failure of passive transfer (FPT). This is the inadequate absorption of antibodies from the mare’s colostrum. Approximately 5-20% of newborn foals are diagnosed with FPT. They are at risk for developing serious medical conditions.

To learn why passive transfer is so critical, how to check antibody levels in your foal, and what to do if failure of passive transfer occurs, follow the steps illustrated in this infographic.

This infographic gives you a visual understanding of how your newborn’s immune system functions. Then you can work with your veterinarian to prepare for foaling. And once the foal is born, you can ensure he receives the protection he needs.

Proper levels of the steroid hormone progesterone is vital to maintain a mare’s pregnancy. Learn what those levels can tell you about the mare, the role it plays in her pregnancy, and how it can be measured in this infographic.

Horses frequently get scrapes and small wounds that are easily treatable with topical antibiotics. But what type is the best to choose? When and why should you use them? Find out in this infographic on the basics of topical antibiotics.

Insect bite hypersensitivity (IBH, aka sweet itch) is an allergic reaction to the saliva of biting insects such as Culicoides midges, mosquitoes, black flies, and horn flies. Follow the steps in this visual guide to relieve your horse’s clinical signs of IBH and prevent future flare-ups.

Veterinarians consider MRI the gold standard for diagnosing equine musculoskeletal injuries. Learn more about this important diagnostic tool in our visual guide!

Wounds in horses can be difficult to manage and slow to heal. Understanding how they heal and the factors that might slow that process can help you better manage them. Learn more about wound-healing in horses with this visual guide.

The key to keeping your allergy-prone horse comfortable is figuring out the causes of his reactions and avoiding them. Learn more about allergic reactions in horses with this step-by-step visual guide.

4 Common Equine Respiratory Conditions

Respiratory infections and alterations in airway structure and function can cause horses to perform poorly, have difficulty breathing, and develop fever or nasal discharge. While some conditions, such as exercise-induced pulmonary hemorrhage, can get progressively worse over time, others, such as equine asthma, are manageable. Others still are infectious and require prompt action to keep surrounding horses healthy. The key is working with your veterinarian to pinpoint the cause of your horse’s respiratory issue. Use this guide to understand the conditions that can affect the lower portion of the equine airways.

Lower Respiratory Issues:

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Reducing the risk and frequency of contagious equine disease outbreaks can be challenging, but horse owners can help control introduction or spread of diseases on their farms by practicing good biosecurity. Biosecurity involves doing everything you can to decrease the chances of people, animals, equipment, or vehicles bringing pathogens (disease-causing organisms) to your farm either accidentally or on purpose.

Red blood cells, white blood cells, serum, platelets … veterinarians look for a lot of things when they run a blood test on your horse.

Called a combined complete blood count/chemistry profile, or CBC for short, this test’s results show what’s happening in the horse’s bloodstream at the moment the sample is drawn. While they can’t produce a perfect report stating that your horse has disease X and needs treatment Y, the various numbers, shapes, and sizes of the blood components can tell the clinician the horse is possibly anemic, losing blood, or fighting an infection or an immune-mediated disease.

Because all these figures and indicators are confusing, we’ve taken a visual route of describing a typical blood test and what its results might mean for your horse.

Learn about serum amyloid A and how veterinarians can use it for early identification of inflammation in horses with this visual guide.

Is your horse hairy, hot, and sweaty during winter workouts? Body clipping can help by removing hair and cutting down on cooling and drying time. In this graphic, we share five clipping patterns often used on horses: full, strip, trace, blanket, and hunter. Body clipping does create more maintenance to keep your horse comfortable during his downtime. Before you get started, learn more by reading “Clipping Your Horse’s Coat.”

The label, or feed tag, on each bag of commercial horse feed can supply you with a wealth of information. Learning to interpret the information isn’t all that difficult, and it can tell you whether the feed you’re buying is the right product for your horse.

The Association of American Feed Control Officials develops standards for feed products and their labels. Because each state has different label requirements, the information on a feed tag might vary depending on where you live. Certain information, however, is considered mandatory and should provide enough information for any horse owner to make an informed choice.

How Does the Equine GI Tract Work?

Having a clear understanding of equine gastrointestinal (GI) tract structure and function maximizes an owner’s ability to recognize the wide array of digestive conditions that can threaten horse health. Anyone who has suffered through the roller coaster of colic or battled gastric ulcers in their horse knows the balance between GI clockwork and ticking time bomb is tenuous. Here’s a color-coded guide to how each region works to help your horse digest food and utilize the energy (calories) he needs to thrive.

What Could Go Wrong?

The intestinal tract’s massive length, volume, and continual change in diameter and direction put it at risk of several health conditions, including:

• Gastric ulcers Caused by splashing hydrochloric acid in the stomach’s squamous and glandular regions.
• Colic Abdominal pain due to intestinal twists, blockages (e.g., impactions), or even inflammation.
• Internal parasites Horses are most commonly affected by ascarid, small strongyle, and tapeworm infections.
• Diarrhea Causes include bacterial infections such as salmonella, diet changes, or stress.
• Hindgut acidosis A sudden decrease in pH can make the large intestine’s contents more acidic than normal, potentially causing ulceration and diarrhea.

Take-Home Message

Assess horses’ health daily, maintain a consistent forage-based diet, integrate feed changes slowly to allow the microorganisms in the GI tract to adapt to those alterations, and consult a veterinarian immediately if you discover any abnormalities.

Osteoarthritis (OA, degenerative and progressive joint disease) is a significant cause of pain and reduced performance in horses commonly caused by musculoskeletal trauma from natural, repetitive concussion in the lower limbs. Any horse is at risk of developing OA, but aging, diet, obesity, joint injury, and genetics can increase the chances of disease. While OA is difficult to avoid, particularly as horses age, we can take steps to slow its advance and minimize pain.

If your horse produces roaring, whistling, gurgling, or fluttering noises during exercise, he might have an upper airway blockage compromising his breathing. Work with your veterinarian to create a diagnostic and management plan.

Do you have an itchy horse bugged by Culicoides? Learn more about insect bite hypersensitivity with our step-by-step visual guide!

Reducing the number of harmful particulates in your barn improves air quality and respiratory health and helps your horse live comfortably and perform better.

The horse’s endocrine system includes the hypothalamus; pituitary, thyroid, and adrenal glands; the pineal body; pancreas; and reproductive organs. The hypothalamus, pituitary, and thyroid are key players in equine endocrine disorders—the hypothalamus instructs these glands to secrete signaling chemicals called hormones into the bloodstream that direct certain organs to perform certain tasks. When organs and glands over- or under-secrete hormones or when tumors affect an organ, horses can develop disorders such as pituitary pars intermedia dysfunction (PPID, formerly called equine Cushing’s disease), equine metabolic syndrome (EMS), or insulin dysregulation (ID).

These conditions are concerning because they all put horses at risk of developing the devastating hoof disease laminitis. Further, they can be challenging to diagnose because early signs are subtle and affected horses don’t always exhibit the same signs.

We’ve created a handy chart to help you better understand endocrine disorders and how to identify and manage them. But first, let’s define these diseases.

Tall fescue is a hardy, nutrient-rich forage found on 40 million acres across North America. This pasture grass, however, can cause fescue toxicosis in pregnant mares, leading to pregnancy losses and reduced reproductive efficiency. So, breeders go to great lengths to keep late-term broodmares off tall fescue. It’s most prevalent in temperate southern regions.

Take-Home Message:

Consider all tall fescue endophyte-infected unless proven otherwise. If you have concerns about fescue toxicosis, your veterinarian and local extension specialist are your best sources of information specific to your region.

All athletic horses are at risk of developing joint disease from wear and tear. Veterinarians often recommend injectable products to manage osteoarthritis—the most common cause of equine lameness, ranging from joint inflammation to articular cartilage degradation and bony changes—and joint injury/pain. In our visual guide, learn about biologics, which now offer an alternative to steroid joint injections.

Diagnostic Imaging: Know your Options

Equine veterinarians have many tools at hand to help pinpoint problem areas and diagnose issues. Some of these modalities are portable enough to take on a farm call, while others are only accessible at clinics or hospitals. Use this visual guide to learn about the machines and technologies your veterinarian might use to look inside your horse and why.

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Take-Home Message

Your veterinarian can recommend the best imaging approach to diagnose your horse’s injury, disease, or health status. Know that not all clinics and practitioners have access to all these technologies, and prices can vary significantly by practice and location.

Understanding Insect Bite Hypersensitivity

Insect bite hypersensitivity (IBH) is an itchy and hard-to-manage allergic reaction to the saliva of biting insects. The bites elicit an allergic response in sensitive horses, resulting in hives (urticaria) and/or crusty patches of bumps. Insect bite hypersensitivity typically improves and worsens seasonally.

What can you do to manage it?

While IBH has no cure, your veterinarian might treat acute cases using antihistamines and/or corticosteroids. Topical ointments containing these drugs might also offer your horse relief, as can cool-water rinses and shampoos to remove allergens. It’s best to manage affected horses using a variety of approaches.

Computed tomography (CT) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) are two diagnostic imaging methods veterinarians can use to capture images of structures within your horse’s body. Learn more in this visual guide!