Dudie & Brownie weekly photos & update

Here is a picture of Dudie this week. Dudie...well, does he look better or not? I think he looks just a little better, but it is slow progress for sure.
Each feeding, his diet consists of 2 lb alfalfa pellets, 3 lbs 4-way grain, 1 1/2 cups soy protien power, 2-3 flakes of grass/alfalfa mix hay and now I have added 1 1/2 cups of rice bran.
He is NOT eating all his hay, he stomps quite a bit of it around the ground. Now that he is not so 'hungry' he seems to be getting picky and even in his grain bucket, if I put the alfalfa pellets on top, he noses them out to get to the grain first LOL. I now put the pellets on the bottom so he eats them last and he seems to eat most of it. I just started the rice bran a few days ago, so no visible results yet on that



Brownie looks GREAT (to me :-) and the boys are loving to ride him!!! Brownie is currently getting 1 lb of grain, 1 cup soy and 1 cup rice bran every feeding in addition to his flakes. I figure this will continue the weight gain but help him get more muscle as he is worked instead of just alot of fat. I don't really feel or see much ribs on Brownie at all anymore.....I am watching to see how the riding affects him. I do think he needs a little more weight and alot more muscle to make him fully healthy.

Dudie & Brownie weekly photos & update

This is the current picture of Dudie. I see huge improvements in Brownie but I don’t think I see much in Dudie. I need to re evaluate the feed and see what I can change to help Dudie gain more weight. Dudie is currently getting 2 lbs alfalfa pellets, 3 lbs 4-way grain, 1 cup soy protein powder, a splash of corn oil and 2 fat flakes of hay at each feeding! I am going to look into rice bran.



Below is the picture of Brownie for this week. He is looking really good! I am happy with his progress!

1st ride on Brownie!

Today we saddled Brownie and rode him for the first time! He is GREAT! He was fun and easy to ride and seemed to enjoy having a job to do and working with us! Son #2 will be working with Brownie the most this year in 4-H! What a blessing this horse is!

Dudie & Brownie weekly photos & update

Here are today's pictures of Dudie & Brownie. Brownie is looking GREAT! Dudie, still not sure. Dudie is up to a scoop and 1/2 grain (3lbs), 1 cup soy powder and 2 lbs alfalfa pellets along with his hay. We will see how he does with that. It is also slowly getting a bit warmer, so that might help too. He is getting all his grain because we hold the bucket, but he is probably not getting all the hay he needs so I am going to have to kick Brownie out of the round pen and integrate him with my other horses so that Dudie can get ALL the food I put in there. I do realize that he was worse off to start and he is older, I am just impatient and I want to see him filled out and healthy faster than I am seeing. I think he might look a tad better this week. The cold weather and snow are not helping him gain weight. His body is having to work too hard and burning too many calories that he is just not taking in right now. I guess it will just take time.

I went out and let Brownie out of the round pen so he is now with my other 3 horses. They are getting along GREAT! He is so happy to be out and is enjoying running around with this wind blowing today......It appears that he might even decide to be the new herd boss around here.....he is so full of energy that he is pushing Teddy around out there. LOL I am very happy with Brownie's weight gain and I think we can start riding him next week and giving him some exercise!

After we let Brownie out, we gave Dudie some more hay and a fresh bucket of grain. The weather has been so yucky, I think he just can't keep the weight on....just too cold! It will be easier to know for sure how much he is personally eating now that he is in the round pen alone. Praying that I can figure out how to put weight on him.....I really want him to look as good as Brownie does! I wormed them both the other day with a different wormer, thinking that might help too.....I also added some soy meal powder for extra protein for them too.

Dudie & Brownie weekly photos & update

Here are the pics I took today. The yellow on Dudie is Fur-all spray. I let them out of the round pen a few days ago to run (and to see how they would do with my other horses) Brownie LOVED it! He ran and ran with my big boys and they all got along well. Sadly, Edward decided that Dudie was weak and he started biting him and chasing him. I quickly put him back in the round pen and sprayed his bites as a precautionary so nothing would get infected and they would heal quickly. Thankfully none of them were bad, just bite marks mostly. Dudie needs to be in the round pen anyhow, to make sure he gets ALL of his food each meal.


Dudie & Brownie have been here over 2 weeks already! I weighed everything tonight so that I would know exactly what I have been giving them. Here is what I did.

I talked with the guy at the feed store before they got here and this is what he suggested. The first day, they each got 1 lb 4-way grain, 1/3 c corn oil 1 flake alfalfa and as much grass hay as they would eat. The second day I upped it to 2 lbs 4-way grain, 1/3 c corn oil, 2 flakes alfalfa and as much grass hay as they would eat.....that's what they got the first 2 weeks. Twice a day of course.

Thursday, I was not happy with the weight gain (not fast enough for me) so I changed it. They are now each getting: 2 lbs alfalfa pellets, 2 lbs 4-way grain (this fills about 1/2 of the 8qt bucket), the rest of the bucket is filled with soaked beet pulp, and 3 flakes of alfalfa each meal. They seemed to be gaining a little, but I am hoping to see better results this next week. I am not an expert feeder.....I just go by instinct and results. That is what I did with Teddy 6 or 7 years ago, but it has been a LONG time and my horses are all easy keepers now. I am having a bit of a learning curve right now. I am getting more comfortable with them and feeling more confident that they will not colic on me, so I am getting more adventurous with my feeding :-)


Below is the picture of Dudie. I think he still looks bad and I am not happy with his progress. Hoping to see more improvement by next week!