Why Feeding Twice a Day Isn't Enough
Horse eating out of 1.5" hole size Nibblenet I just came across an ad for a training barn that mentioned the fact that they feed "twice a day", as if this were a selling point. While it is a common practice in the horse industry to feed on a twice daily schedule, this is terribly inadequate if you look at the horse's biological requirements. Please allow me to explain why. Horses were designed by nature as "trickle feeders", meaning that they are meant to take in small amounts of food over a long period of time. In natural settings, horses graze at least 16 hours a day, with the pattern being nibble a little, walk a bit, nibble a little more. The whole physiology of their digestive system is set up to accommodate this model of consumption, starting with the fact that horses are constant acid secreters. This differs from humans, whose stomachs only secrete acid in the presence of food. The stomach of the horse, however, produces hydrochloric acid at...