Have you experienced or are you concerned about any of these?

Let me tell you how all of the issues listed above are affected by EXCESS DIETARY SUGARS (grains, 24-hour access to hay):

The Two-Week No Grain Challenge

• First: Get a calendar or open an app and circle TODAY’S date. This will be your start date for the challenge. Photograph or take a video of your horse and write down everything about his/her behavior and body composition IN DETAIL.
• Second: DO NOT feed any grains, inflammatory foods, or excess sugars. This includes natural sugars, treats, and supplements with sugar ingredients (corn, wheat, oats, carrots, apples, molasses, honey) and inflammatory byproducts (wheat mids or middlings, seeds, hulls, seed oils, or any other byproducts). If your horse needs a medical supplement, find one without sugar ingredients and check with your medical professional.
• Third: DO FEED hay (grass, legumes, or grass plus legumes, pasture, water, and mined salt (salt from a mine such as Himalayan or Redmond, not with a sugar binder!).
• Fourth: Limit hay if adequate pasture is available. If feeding hay, limit this to daylight hours. Never feed hay around the clock (restricting hay overnight does NOT cause gastric ulcers).
• Fifth: Add a high-quality protein source. This is NOT part of the Two-Week No Grain Challenge. I add it here because after you become convinced of the benefits of limiting sugar in your horse’s diet, adding protein becomes essential to restoring the lost muscle, poor hooves, poor haircoat, immune and nervous system, and decreasing the “always hungry” activity.
• Sixth: Tell others about your success by sending them to this website. Subscribe to my YouTube Channel to learn more and send others there, too.
• (print this page and post it everywhere to remind you of these simple 6 steps, or hand it to others)

Why Take the Two-Week No Grain Challenge

Some horse owners have lots of money to spend on their horses, while others work three jobs to afford one horse. All owners love their horses, wanting to do the best for them and feel responsible for their best care. But is what you’re doing actually helping them? Do all the feeds and supplements help horses, or are they causing more problems? Is there an alternative approach to doing “the best” for your horses?

The core of the “Two-Week No Grain Challenge” is the removal of all ingredients that may cause gut inflammation. The initial benefits are seen in about 3 to 4 days, with most horses recovering from inflammation in about 7 days and all horses in 2 weeks.

The Two-Week No Grain Challenge is effective, costs nothing, and will save you money!

• You do NOT add more hay or pasture.
• You do NOT feed treats, carrots, apples, mints, sugar, or anything else.
• You do NOT feed vitamins, minerals, or balancers.
• You DO feed them ground plants (pasture, hay), mined salt, and water.
• You CAN feed one or two peanuts in the shell or a hay cube as a treat.
• You also retrain yourself by learning about the foods horses should eat and how they fuel your horses.

If you find this difficult, do it anyway. It is only 14 days, and you can always go back.

Start a journal with dates and observations. Judge for yourself. Did I mention this not only costs nothing but saves you money? The money you can use to become a member of The Horse’s Advocate and help spread this message to the world!

Thanks in advance for trying the Two-Week No Grain Challenge, becoming your Horse’s Advocate, and Helping Horses Thrive In A Human World™  ~ Doc T

If your horse has ANY health issues, please consult your veterinarian before starting any diet change. 

All horses will lose body fat without grain, revealing the underlying lost muscle. Adding back grain will only cover up this loss with more body fat AND cause more muscle loss (this is explained in my nutrition blogs and the Horsemanship Nutrition Course). Be careful in senior horses (25 years and older) because chronic inflammation may cause them to lose body fat and muscle. Removing inflammatory ingredients and adding high-quality protein is very important in these horses. I have several blogs and podcasts on feeding senior horses.

DISCLAIMER: I am not affiliated with any company selling grains, supplements, or protein products. I only want to create a conversation and develop thoughts, inspiring you to make better decisions about keeping your horses.

To recap the Two-Week No Grain Challenge:

The basics of feeding horses to make them healthy:

1. Stop feeding excess sugar to reduce or eliminate insulin production. Stop using feeds with lectins to mitigate or eliminate gut inflammation (grains, grain byproducts, and all supplements, including treats, carrots, sugar cubes, apples, etc.).
2. Feed pasture and clean hay at about 1.5% of body weight (15 lb / 1000 lb horse or 7.5kg per 500 kg horse). Soak the hay if necessary for at least 1 hour or more to reduce the sugars (non-structural carbohydrates, NSCs) in the hay. Reduce or eliminate hay when pasture is abundant, and feed it only during daylight hours.
3. Have unlimited access to water and mined salt (Redmond or Himalayan).

I highly recommend starting a journal to record every possible observation and commit to this diet for two weeks. If you feel capable, write a summary of your observations and send it to me with permission to post, helping me get the message out.

Remember, if you don’t like the results you are getting, you can always return to your original diet. No harm was done.

Suppose you want an in-depth explanation of exactly how horses process food, what food they should be eating, and how a lot of what horse owners are feeding their horses today is harming them. In that case, you may be interested in becoming a Premium Member to take The Horsemanship Nutrition Course and join our Community Discussions, which drive deeper into nutrition issues. But don’t worry if you want a quick summary – I summarize it in the links below. Check them out!

Some More Helpful Links from my Nutrition Blogs:

• Feeding Horses – The Frequently Asked Questions
• Feeding The Horse As Simple As 1-2-3
• Why Horses Should Not Be Fed Grain
• Chronic Protein Deficiency In Horses
• No Sweat!

Thank you for spending some time here today ~ Geoff Tucker, DVM.