We had bloodwork done on Lightning. He is a really hard keeper and I am not sure why. Yes, he is an older stallion but it seems he has a much harder time keeping weight than he should. He isn't bad and I keep on top of things but I am still wondering if maybe there might not be something going on we can't see. He is also 20 years old. Not old, old but he could be slowing down a bit and so breeding the bigger mares may just be too much trouble for him. Time will tell.
Either way, we have a Skye baby coming. I can't wait!!
My senior stallion is somewhere around 20, and I'm thinking around Lightning's size. Che` is 31" and 175# (give or take 5#): he eats 1.5-175# senior daily and free choice grass hay, when he gets picky about the senior I add 1/2# alfalfa pellets to his diet. A few years ago he had some teeth problems, so had to be on some chopped hay and senior only for awhile, while we figured out the issue; tiny mouth so hard to get it figured out; found a slab fractured tooth and a bad ramp, once those were taken care of and he recovered, we haven't really looked back (he gets picky, so I've had to try a few different brands of feed, and at the moment we've landed on an extruded senior that he seems to like, it'll take more time to see how he does on it, he's getting about the same amount as the previous senior).
Ok, I started rambling. Lightning's hard keeper status could just be he's a stallion (some are just hard keepers, they think about their girls year round), could be he needs to be on more senior feed than hay, could be he'd prefer or needs a different type of hay (if you feed mostly grass hay, then perhaps a bit more alfalfa in his diet would help), might need to try a few different feeds before you land on what that he thrives on (unfortunately, sometimes that happens, and the whole herd cant' be on the same feed). Since, he's seen a vet, you've probably ruled out sand in his gut; or parasites. [The phone rang, so I've lost my train of thought.]
