Transcript:

[0:00]

Uh, so Scott, on behalf of— you can’t really see me anymore— but I’m the president of OCTRA, and this is our first October stock for 2021. The spotlight graciously accepted my vlog enough to offer my request to have them come talk to us. There were a lot of questions that everybody had for Scott, so I’ll turn it over to you. Thank you very much for everything you do for our club — you sponsor us quite a bit, and we all appreciate the knowledge that you and your company provide us.

[0:37]

Yeah, thanks for having me. It’s a pleasure to speak to the group. I don’t know if you guys are fully aware of the history of Mad Barn. Some of you are probably aware of it a little bit, but essentially, when I was in grad school, I was selling mineral out of my car — not because I was trying to start a business, but because we were making mineral and there was some demand for it. I always kept it as a side business, and it was really just a mineral vitamin supplement for a long time.

[1:14]

Then, I was bringing performance electrolytes back and forth across the border. After getting caught a couple of times and having to leave some behind, I realized electrolytes aren’t that complicated, so why not make them here? We started making the electrolyte in Canada years ago. Time went on, I finished my master’s and went back for my PhD. In the interim, I worked for feed companies and throughout all levels of the feed industry. The horse mineral and electrolyte business was always on the side until it got too big to be a “side hustle.”

[2:06]

Eventually, we came up with the name Mad Barn and filled out the product line. Some of our most popular products, like Visceral+, came later. The Standardbred world is actually the whole reason Mad Barn even exists, so I thank you guys. That’s also part of why I love the sport of endurance — I come from a racehorse background, but endurance has the same camaraderie and care for horses. In endurance, just finishing with a healthy horse is winning, and that’s what I love.

[3:04]

Horses are incredible animals, and we’ll get on with feeding these oxidative machines. At any time, feel free to interrupt with questions. This will be about 45–50 minutes of information, then we can get to questions. We’ve grown a lot — close to 15 of us now. We have full-time nutritionists on staff who analyze horse diets all day and put together formulations. We’re also placing our first PhD student this fall if we find the right person. That’s really the crux of why Mad Barn exists: to help drive research to better understand the physiological and psychological requirements of the horse, enhance their welfare, and optimize performance.

[4:29]

We take profit from the company and put it back into research. That was the whole point of starting Mad Barn. Horses are my passion — I do other nutrition work, but equine is my focus. I always start presentations with this point: we’ve never lived in a time with such easy access to information, but also such variation in quality. On Google, the top search results aren’t necessarily the best — they’re the best marketed. Use Google Scholar to find peer-reviewed research and avoid marketing bias or social media misinformation.

[6:12]

We all have cognitive biases, especially confirmation bias — seeking information that supports what we already believe. This ties into the Dunning-Kruger effect: people with the least knowledge are often the most confident online. As you gain expertise, you realize how much you don’t know. In horse nutrition, even with 20+ years of study, every answer raises more questions.

[8:30]

If you take nothing else away from this: allow horses to express their intrinsic behavior and forage as much as possible. Provide adequate nutrition — but not too much. Overfeeding, even in athletic horses, is a huge problem. Selecting appropriate forage is more important than choosing feed or supplements. Minerals and vitamins are often the biggest shortfall, and exercise is critical. For electrolytes, salt is the number one — loose, free-choice salt is usually the best way to provide it.

[10:05]

Nutrition must consider behavior. Horses need to forage about 12 hours per day. If they can consume their daily forage allowance in just a few hours, they’ll look for other things to chew — bedding, manure, fences. Select forage that allows them to meet their foraging needs without over- or under-supplying calories.

[13:41]

Feeding performance horses isn’t just about nutrients — it’s about behavior, the microbiome, digestive physiology, and recovery. Horses are aerobic machines with more fast-twitch fibers, higher muscle glycogen, and a VO₂ max twice that of humans. But glycogen loading doesn’t work for horses, and they recover more slowly than humans.

[15:53]

Energy and protein requirements increase with work level, but nutrient density doesn’t always have to increase, as working horses will eat more. Many horses can perform at a high level on forage alone, without grain, if forage is selected carefully. If more energy is needed, add fat first, then digestible carbohydrates — balancing to maintain glycogen stores for recovery.

[18:23]

Forage selection and pasture management are overlooked in horse nutrition. Managed properly, pasture could meet nearly all nutrient needs except minerals and vitamins. Nutrition planning should optimize hindgut fermentation, then add fat and carbohydrates as needed based on workload and recovery needs.

[21:00]

So, how to feed the back end of the horse — basically, we need to understand what it is we’re putting into the horse. If you think of a forage analysis, or when we look at forages: the cell wall components are the structure, or the “rebar,” that holds the plant together. The NFC portion — the fructans and pectic substances — would be like the concrete holding everything together. Then the cell contents are everything inside, which are your sugars and starches.

[21:29]

We want to maximize fiber digestibility and get as much energy as we can from the structural components of plants. Only when necessary should we start adding in starches and a little bit of sugar — but fiber should be our first focus for the horse.

[21:46]

This brings me to NDF — Neutral Detergent Fiber — and the fact that not all NDF is created equal. In ruminant nutrition, NDF digestibility is a big deal because it can vary greatly. Alfalfa or different grass hays can be anywhere from 40% to 70% NDF, but digestibility can swing by 15–20 points. Right now, when we calculate digestible energy for a horse from forages, the only things we consider are the ADF content and crude protein. We give no consideration to digestibility.

[22:27]

For performance horses, having a good understanding of digestibility would help us formulate better, healthier diets and minimize the amount of grain needed. This isn’t as critical for maintenance horses, but it’s significant for high-performance ones.

[23:01]

Another major challenge in nutrition, next to predicting energy, is predicting energy intake — how much is your horse actually consuming? If your horse is working hard, you want it to consume as much as it can. NRC guidelines suggest 2–2.5% of body weight, but actual data shows horses can voluntarily consume 3%, and ponies — because body weight is lower — can go up to 5%.

[23:42]

This is why ponies in particular can get into trouble. On lush pasture, a pony can easily consume 5% of its body weight in dry matter per day, allowing it to gain about 2 pounds a day — a huge rate for such a small animal. Left unchecked, this leads to obesity, metabolic syndrome, insulin resistance, and laminitis.

[24:27]

We can also use this to our advantage with performance horses, maximizing forage intake to maintain gut health and still ensure enough calories. Looking at fresh pasture intake specifically, mature horses can consume 3.2–5.4% of body weight — showing that 2–2.5% is on the low end when high-quality fresh forage is available.

[25:13]

The single biggest opportunity for improving nutrition, welfare, and lowering feed costs is maximizing pasture use. But in early spring, pasture can be extremely high in sugar and protein, so horses need to be working at a level that matches that intake. Idle horses on rich pasture are at high risk for obesity and laminitis.

[26:13]

Could you do a forage-only diet for a high-performance horse? Yes — but the forage must be extremely high quality. For example, Italian ryegrass is extremely high in sugar and digestibility (though it’s not typically grown for horses). In an example diet at 3% body weight, with salt and a good mineral/vitamin, energy requirements for heavy work can be exceeded without grain.

[27:26]

Dry hays generally have lower intake than fresh pasture, but voluntary intake is still over 2% for most forages — even the less digestible ones. Decent timothy grass hay can hit around 3% intake. For a performance horse, 14–15 kg of dry hay can supply a large portion of its energy and protein needs.

[28:10]

Forage selection can make a huge difference. In one example for a hard-working horse, a low-quality hay diet required 4 kg of oats and 0.5 kg soybean meal to reach 100% energy needs. Swapping to a moderately higher quality hay allowed for the same intake but reduced oats by 1 kg, eliminated soybean meal, and slightly increased energy — simply due to better forage quality.

[29:47]

This is why testing hay matters. Without testing, you could be switching between hay that meets high-performance energy needs and hay that barely covers maintenance, without noticing right away.

[30:16]

The number one factor impacting athletic performance — aside from training — is body weight. Most horses carry too much fat. In endurance, for example, top finishers in one study had about 6.5% body fat, compared to 11% for non-finishers.

[31:13]

Excuse me — and it makes a lot of sense, right? Particularly in endurance, you’ve got a thermal load you have to dissipate. The more fat there is on a horse, the harder it is for them to dissipate heat. The more they have to sweat to cool down, the more weight they’re carrying, and the more energy they’re expending. Lighter is going to be faster.

[31:33]

By the same token, when they looked at the Tevis Cup, the mean body condition score — basically a measure of fat on a horse — was 4.5. But if they came in under 3, no horse at a BCS of 3 or lower completed the race. So you do need some level of fat, particularly in endurance, to fuel the horse for rides like the Tevis Cup, which is notoriously difficult.

[32:01]

Weight, as I’ve talked about, is a hindrance to performance. This chart shows digestible energy requirements above maintenance at various speeds. As speed increases, energy requirements rise exponentially. From a biochemical standpoint, this is because once you enter anaerobic energy use, it’s much less efficient than burning fat.

[32:29]

Looking at the equations as energy per kilo of body weight — including the horse, tack, and rider — as mass goes up, energy expenditure goes up. As mass goes down, energy expenditure drops. Wherever you are on that speed curve, if you’re lighter, you can go faster and use less energy. The takeaway: reduce excess body fat on the horse and, for ourselves as riders, keep our own weight in check.

[33:04]

One of the biggest weight reservoirs in the horse is the gut fill — the feed and water in the digestive tract. This is a double-edged sword: it provides water, electrolytes, and energy reserves, but it’s also extra mass the horse must carry. The goal is to optimize the weight with the benefits of those reserves.

[33:37]

For example, an extra 4 kg of hay intake can be 10–24 kg, or up to 50 lbs, of added weight the horse carries. That’s a significant energy cost during a ride. Compare that to racehorses: Lasix is commonly used for exercise-induced pulmonary hemorrhage, but studies show it doesn’t reduce bleeding. It’s still popular because it causes mild dehydration, about 2% body weight loss, which makes horses lighter and improves race times.

[34:36]

This brings us to feedstuffs and their water-holding capacity. Grains hold less than 1 g of water per gram of grain — often less than zero. On the other end, flax or dry beet pulp can hold 4–5 times their weight in water. Psyllium is similar. The same weight of feed can result in very different amounts of water held in the gut.

[35:10]

For endurance, dry beet pulp is great for hydration because it holds a lot of water. But too much is just extra weight. It becomes a balancing act: minimize weight while maximizing water-holding capacity and electrolytes in the gut before an event.

[35:45]

For short-duration, high-speed events like jumping or racing, you’d want to reduce feeds with high water-holding capacity to make the horse as light as possible. Replace them with feeds like soybean hulls, some grains, and fat — which is calorie dense and light. For longer events like endurance or three-day eventing, the extra gut fill is balanced by the hydration and energy benefits.

[36:15]

If you are going to alter the diet pre-competition, you must practice this beforehand. Don’t feed one diet for three months of training and then suddenly swap out 4 kg of hay for soy hulls and beet pulp right before the first competition. Give the horse time to adapt and the hindgut time to adjust — changes should always be gradual. For most riders, a balanced, season-long diet that’s a hybrid approach is the best strategy.

[37:10]

This brings us to feeding energy from fat, especially for endurance. What you can’t get from forage, you can add with fat. Reasons include: reduced heat production (important in endurance), reduced bulk needed to meet calorie needs, some behavioral benefits, and specific health benefits depending on fat type. For example, DHA can improve joint health, focus, and, in racehorses, may help with exercise-induced pulmonary hemorrhage.

[37:52]

In one study, horses were fed a 12% fat diet (90% of that added corn oil) — essentially 1 L of oil per day. Higher fat takes longer to adapt to, but horses can fully adapt to 15% dietary fat. Compared to a 3% fat control diet, over a 67 km ride in 8–10 hours, high-fat-fed horses performed better and had higher glucose levels. Adapted horses have enhanced lipid oxidation, spare glucose, and perform better. Fat supplementation can even improve sprint performance, so it’s not just for endurance.

[38:54]

For competitive riders, a higher-fat diet isn’t just buying a “10% fat” fiber feed — it means adding significant oil to the ration to boost energy for endurance rides. Concerns about fat decreasing fiber digestibility aren’t supported in horses; most fat is absorbed in the small intestine and has little effect on fiber fermentation. Studies show digestibility remains the same between 4% and 9% dietary fat.

[39:25]

Just to show example diets — I know this slide is very number-heavy and hard to see — the one on the bottom is a 10% fat diet, and the one on the top is a 5% fat diet. This shows what a weight-optimized, energy-optimized diet might look like. The top is a more traditional type of diet, using oats as a simple grain example. A couple of hundred mL of oil are added, and the horse is eating 11 kg of hay (basically free-choice) with a good mineral/vitamin supplement to balance everything out. There’s nothing wrong with this diet; it looks fine.

[40:06]

If we move that diet to a 10% fat diet, we can drop the oats down to very little and feed essentially 900 mL–1 L of oil. The hay is reduced to 7 kg, replaced with 2 kg beet pulp and 2 kg soy hulls. This reduces some water-holding capacity overall, but more importantly, it reduces the total weight of the diet. For a more competitive rider, this may be the type of diet to consider: using more non-forage fiber sources as energy and a much higher fat content to optimize weight and improve performance.

[40:42]

You can see what this does to the NSC (starch + sugar). In the top diet, with almost 3 kg of oats, NSC is close to 20%. In the bottom diet, NSC drops to almost 10%. This creates a high-performance diet that could even be fed to a metabolic horse (not at this quantity), because with the right forage quality, ingredients, and enough fat, starch and sugars can be kept very low while still performing well in endurance.

[41:18]

Now looking at protein nutrition: amino acid requirements in horses are poorly defined. Essentially, we have a lysine requirement, and from that we extrapolate using comparative physiology from other species. At best, these are estimates. This is an area that really needs more research.

[41:46]

Reducing protein in the total diet can improve performance. Feeding excess protein increases the horse’s water requirement, because excess nitrogen (as urea or ammonia) must be excreted in the urine. Once a horse starts using protein for energy, the nitrogen is toxic and must be removed. Excess protein also generates extra heat, upsets acid–base balance, and, at high speeds, can add respiratory stress. Ammonia concentrations can build up, even in well-ventilated shelters, and the water retained adds extra weight.

[42:43]

A tightly balanced amino acid or protein diet at the lower end of requirements appears to be advantageous, but there’s not enough research to make confident recommendations. One study brought crude protein down to 7.5% of the total diet and improved performance, but for 99% of horses this would be pushing it. The main takeaway: don’t feed a lot of excess protein.

[43:18]

Owners often say, “My horse is lacking top line, so I need to add more protein.” Generally, that’s not the case. Adding protein doesn’t build more muscle if the horse already meets its protein requirement.

[43:37]

For performance horses, antioxidants are another big consideration. I generally recommend 4–6 mg/day of selenium, which is higher than most recommendations. This relates to an old dairy cow practice: 20+ years ago, cows were given 4,000 IU/day of vitamin E to compensate for selenium deficiency. I think we’re doing the same thing in horses today — recommending very high vitamin E (5,000 IU/day) when the bigger problem is low selenium.

[44:30]

Selenium spares vitamin E. You can’t replace one entirely with the other — there are 32 known selenoproteins in the body — but having adequate selenium reduces vitamin E demand. Concerns about selenium toxicity are overblown; there have been maybe three or four toxicity cases in the U.S., all from plants, and none I know of in Canada. Deficiency is the bigger problem. Ensure horses get enough selenium, ideally from 100% organic selenium yeast, which is safer.

[45:17]

If you go to a high-fat diet (up to 10% fat), increase vitamin E to account for extra oxidative stress. A rough rule: for every 100 mL of vegetable oil added, add another 100 IU of vitamin E — unless you’re using an all-natural, single-isomer form, in which case 2,000 IU/day is likely plenty. Vitamin C is also popular, but I don’t like high daily doses because they can shut down endogenous production. Low daily amounts are fine; high doses should be reserved for stress periods (hard training days or events).

[46:20]

Moving to thermoregulation: electrolyte supplementation is discussed almost entirely in terms of heat regulation. Horses have the highest sweating rate of any known mammal, and their sweat is highly concentrated in electrolytes. Work at the University of Guelph (Mike Lindinger, Gayle Ecker) measured heat storage and accumulation in horses during exercise. They found that horses have a higher body mass-to-surface area ratio than humans, so they store more heat and have less surface area to lose it from. Their sweat rate and electrolyte loss per liter are much higher than in humans.

[47:32]

When a horse becomes dehydrated, it will often stop drinking — almost the opposite of humans. That’s why it’s vital, especially in endurance, to maintain electrolyte and salt intake to keep horses hydrated. Sweat losses result in large sodium, potassium, and chloride losses. There’s extensive research on sweat composition going back to the 1800s; we’ve long known what horses sweat and in what quantities. Calcium, magnesium, and phosphorus losses are relatively low; iron and zinc losses are very small. Electrolytes shouldn’t include iron or zinc — older formulations sometimes did, but only to classify the product as a “mineral/vitamin supplement” for regulatory purposes.

[48:45]

We’ve talked about thermoregulation, electrolyte, and water balance. You’re all aware of the basics — I’m just putting some numbers to it. If you go off a factorial basis of electrolyte replacement: if your horse is doing an hour of decent heavy work per day, they’ll probably sweat 5–10 liters per hour. Under extreme environmental temperatures, that can go up to 15 liters per hour.

[49:09]

We know there’s 3.1 grams of sodium per liter of sweat. Do the math: that’s 21 grams of sodium lost in sweat per hour. Add to that an ounce of salt needed just for maintenance, and the total can reach 55–70 grams of salt per day for a horse working an hour a day and sweating a decent amount.

[49:33]

If you provide too much salt, it can negatively impact acid–base balance. Short term, the effect isn’t huge, but it’s there. You can use sodium bicarbonate to buffer some of the salt, or as an option for horses that don’t like salt (sometimes due to mouth sores or burns). However, endurance riders should not use sodium bicarbonate during events — unlike high-speed performance horses that tend toward acidosis, endurance horses are more prone to alkalosis. For endurance, use salts and chlorides.

[50:21]

This came up in one of the questions, so I’ll address it here. I’ve posted about it on your Facebook page a few years ago — the ongoing debate about Perform ’n’ Win versus the electrolyte we make. Honestly, they’re very similar. I make no qualms about it — I was there doing research with Mike and Gayle when the formulation for Perform ’n’ Win was already complete. They published the exact formula, and I posted that article in ACTRA. If you want to make your own electrolyte, go ahead — the formula’s there (you’ll just have to convert millimoles to grams per liter).

[51:05]

Electrolyte solutions aren’t hard to make, and there are lots of formulas out there. Commercial products are prepared based on sweat composition. The only difference between ours and Perform ’n’ Win is that ours has slightly higher salt and potassium concentrations.

[51:30]

People sometimes ask, “How can Perform ’n’ Win be lower in sugar than yours?” They’ll point to the ingredient list from Buckeye’s website where salt is listed first, assuming it’s the most abundant ingredient. But in Ohio, there’s no requirement to list ingredients by abundance — they can list them in any order. A little basic math shows salt is not the first ingredient in Perform ’n’ Win.

[52:13]

The formulation for Perform ’n’ Win is great — you’re not going to go wrong using it. But here’s the usage difference: ours is 50% more concentrated, so you can use less. Looking at sodium concentration in sweat, if your horse is sweating 5–10 liters per hour, that’s 15–30 grams of sodium lost per hour. To replace 50% of that loss, you’d need 6–12 scoops per hour of Perform ’n’ Win, or 4–8 scoops per hour of ours (because it’s more concentrated in salt and other electrolytes).

[53:07]

Hopefully that answers any questions about the two electrolytes. You can make them at home — they’re not hard. For most people, light salt and plain salt mixed together is sufficient. To make them more palatable, mix with applesauce or another sugar source, dilute, and mix into water so it’s not a hypertonic solution.

[53:31]

Most of you probably already know this, but pastes aren’t ideal — giving a really hypertonic solution is not great. Ideally, give an isotonic solution (same concentration as body fluids). I know that’s not always possible during rides. If you do syringe in a hypertonic solution, the horse must have access to water immediately afterwards, so they can drink and dilute it. If you put a lot of salt into a horse’s stomach without water, it will actually pull water from the body into the stomach to dilute the salt, which is counterproductive.

[54:16]

Alright, and then there are a few things on trailering. I think there were some questions on this and on preparing. It is a significant source of stress, particularly for naïve horses. If your horse has not been trailered very much, it would be worthwhile before you go to an event to get the horse on the trailer and just drive it around. It is extremely stressful for a horse to be driven in a trailer, and particularly in the first hour they show high catabolism of tissue, especially skeletal muscle, depletion of ions and cations from sweating, and a large depletion of glycogen and energy reserves. Hypoglycemia and dehydration can also occur from trailering.

Horses are flight animals, and getting in the trailer can be a scary experience, so it has negative consequences. The best way to adapt them is to take them on short trips, make it a positive experience, and get them accustomed to it. The second best thing is to ensure that before you put the horse on the trailer, it is well-hydrated with electrolytes and has feed in the stomach — don’t withhold feed — so there is a reservoir there for them to draw on.

Somebody mentioned that when they trailer their horse, the horse stops eating. Horses will stop eating if you don’t provide water. Some horses may not eat hay on the trailer, but if there’s no water available, they will eventually stop eating. Water intake and feed intake go hand in hand — you can’t have one without the other.

[55:57]

That’s the presentation on feeding a performance horse. To summarize: allow the horse’s intrinsic behaviours — grazing, socializing — provide adequate nutrition, but not too much, exercise your horse a lot, and offer free-choice loose salt. The endurance crowd tends to be pragmatic about loose salt, but some people still think salt blocks or salt on a rope are a good idea. They’re not — horses won’t consume enough that way. It doesn’t need to be fancy salt; feed-grade salt is all they need.

If you have a forage analysis, you can send it to us. We’ll set your diet up in our feed formulation software at madbarnfeed.com. You can see how your diet is balanced, track performance, weight gain or loss, and keep those diets over time.

[58:14]

Question: Iron and copper — I balance against high-iron water, but if I travel for competition I might have lower iron levels in the water for a few days to a week. Should I worry?
Answer: No — mineral balance is a long-term game. Short-term changes aren’t a big deal.

Question: How long to see an effect when adding supplements like biotin, zinc, and copper?
Answer: It depends on what you’re assessing. For hoof health, you might see new growth at the top within 3–4 weeks, but it can take 6+ months for a big change in overall hoof quality. The degree of deficiency matters — gross deficiencies correct quickly, mild deficiencies may not be as noticeable. This is why it’s best to keep the diet balanced all the time.

Question: Thoughts on copper for hoof, frog, and skin health, and on copper sulfate vs. chelated forms?
Answer: We generally classify minerals as inorganic or organic (chelated). From an absorption standpoint, there’s not a huge difference, but we use 100% chelated because of quality control and to avoid contaminants found in some inorganic sources. At high enough levels, inorganics like zinc oxide or copper sulfate can mildly inhibit digestive enzymes. Copper sulfate can also be used topically for thrush.

[1:01:37]

Question: Is there any benefit to feeding magnesium to reduce spooking?
Answer: If magnesium helps, the horse was likely deficient to begin with. Magnesium can help balance high potassium intake. If you’re feeding 25–35 g/day, you’re unlikely to see a benefit from feeding more. Many diets are below that range.

Question: Where should I send hay for analysis?
Answer: Any accredited lab is fine. Our blog post “Understanding Forage Analysis” lists labs and links to submission forms. If you’re sampling hay, add the trace mineral package (wet chemistry) — it’s usually about $20 extra, bringing the total to around $50, and is worth it.

[1:04:38]

Question: Palatability issues with products like AminoTrace?
Answer: Our products are concentrated and don’t contain added sugars or molasses, so some horses may take time to accept them. AminoTrace can be more difficult because of its high copper and zinc. In feeding trials, horses that initially refused it ate it within 20 days when fed consistently without constantly changing what it’s mixed with. A trick is to hand-feed a tablespoon of oats with molasses a few times so the horse anticipates a treat, then add a few pellets of the supplement. If they spit it out, repeat the process — most horses will accept it within a couple of tries.

[1:07:58]

Question: Is Omneity sufficient for a 7-month-old horse?
Answer: Yes, but feeding rate should be increased by about 25% above the label’s per-body-weight recommendation, as young horses have higher nutrient demands per unit of body weight than mature horses.

[1:09:06]

Question: Do you need to rebalance a diet if you add Visceral+?
Answer: No — Visceral+ contains a bit of magnesium, but it’s not providing significant nutrition that would require rebalancing the diet.

[1:09:36]

Question: How does AminoTrace+ help with insulin resistance (IR)?
Answer: Proper nutrition supports all physiological processes. IR often develops from long-term overconsumption of calories or starch/sugar, sometimes combined with chronic subclinical deficiencies in selenium, copper, or zinc. AminoTrace+ helps by balancing the diet, including higher copper and zinc to counteract excess iron. Managing IR also requires restricting calories slightly below the horse’s needs and increasing exercise. In many cases, IR can be reversed by reducing body fat and improving fitness.

[1:11:15]

No, the magnesium in Visceral+ does not get too high. Bringing that back to the earlier question, the next question was about comparing Omneity and AminoTrace versus Equalizer — benefits for an older horse, very easy keeper, with concern about weight and fat distribution. Bloodwork sent to Guelph was all normal for Cushing’s, IR, and laminitis.

Equalizer and Omneity/AminoTrace are all essentially doing the same thing — providing a concentrated mineral and vitamin source to balance the diet. Equalizer is what’s called a ration balancer, fed at about 1.0–1.1 kg per day. Ours are about five times more concentrated, so a bag of Equalizer lasts 25 days at label rate, while ours would last 125 days. The concept is the same, but our formulation is different.

• We use 100% organic trace minerals — no inorganic sources.
• We include B-vitamins, yeast, and enzymes at nutritionally relevant levels, not just for “label dressing.”
• We include full doses (e.g., 20 mg biotin), which most ration balancers do not.
• No added iron — iron is already abundant in most diets and can be excessive. You won’t find iron oxide or ferrous sulfate on our ingredient lists, but you will in many ration balancers.
• No added sugars or starch to improve palatability at the expense of health.

By leaving out bulk fillers, we focus on high-quality, nutrient-dense ingredients, often at a lower daily cost than large-inclusion ration balancers.

[1:15:25]

Question: Is there a need for additional amino acids for older horses?
Answer: Only proper diet and forage analysis can determine that. In 90% of cases, Omneity with a bit of flax is sufficient, as most hays have enough protein to meet requirements. Exceptions include very mature, low-quality hay, in which case protein supplementation is needed. This could be through high-protein ration balancers, our mineral/vitamin supplement plus a protein source (flax, soy, canola, distillers grains), or targeted essential amino acids (like the Three Amigos) if minimizing protein while optimizing amino acid balance. Forage analysis is the only way to know for sure.

[1:17:07]

Question: Best electrolyte protocol for endurance horses using Mad Barn electrolytes?
Answer: It depends on many variables: footing, terrain, temperature, conditioning level, horse fitness, carried weight, etc. Use our provided guidelines as a benchmark, then adjust based on your horse’s drinking, urination, and recovery. Fit horses sweat less, so requirements vary.

[1:18:11]

Audience comment: Many riders using Perform ’n Win found that in heat during a ride, 1 oz per hour worked well.
Scott: With our electrolyte, you’d feed about one-third less — roughly half a scoop compared to one scoop of Perform ’n Win — as ours is 50% more concentrated. This matches your experience switching over.

[1:20:31]

Question: Opinion on dosing individual electrolytes on top of Performance XL electrolyte during competition (e.g., adding extra phosphorus or other components)?
Answer: If needed, yes. For example, Dr. Henderson’s on-site blood sampling at rides suggested adding some calcium (e.g., calcium borogluconate) could be beneficial, though it’s unclear whether the benefit was from calcium, glucose, or both. If you experiment, involve others to help measure outcomes (e.g., heart rate recovery) and repeat trials to confirm results. Phosphorus isn’t usually a priority — always take a holistic view of the total diet and electrolyte intake.

[1:22:55]

Question: Ulcers — should you investigate, treat, and what are the chances they will reappear?

Scott: This could be a two-hour talk on its own. For endurance horses, assume they have ulcers and manage accordingly, even if they show no symptoms. Horses in high conditioning are susceptible. The only way to know for sure is to scope, but ulcer severity doesn’t always match symptoms. I don’t recommend antacids due to rebound acid production; instead, use coating agents to protect the gut lining. Oil is a cheap option — it floats on the stomach contents and coats the lining.

If you use omeprazole, taper off to avoid acid overproduction and follow with protective measures to prevent recurrence. I wouldn’t scope unless necessary for research — fasting for scoping can actually cause ulcers. Instead, feed a higher-fat diet, alfalfa cubes, and other protective feeds.

[1:26:33]

Comment: Please do a talk on ulcers another time.
Scott: We have tested a liquid version of Visceral+ for easier dosing during rides. We discontinued the paste version due to issues with hardness and separation.

[1:27:02]

Question: Winter vs. conditioning vs. competition season feeding; trailer support.

• Trailer support: Hydrate and feed well before loading. Leave earlier for inexperienced horses to allow recovery upon arrival.
• Seasonal feeding: Feed according to workload. In winter/off-season: hay, balanced mineral/vitamin, and a cup of flax is often enough. Increase density or intake during conditioning. For casual competition, maintain a balanced ration and hydration; advanced competitors may tailor body weight and energy strategies.

[1:28:26]

Question: Mild leaky gut/fecal water syndrome.

Scott: This seems more common this year, possibly due to hay growing conditions. It may occur with both very rich and very poor forage. For rich hay, avoid more fermentable feeds; for poor hay, add fermentable fiber (flax, psyllium, beet pulp). Mechanically processed feeds (pellets, cubes) can help. Transfaunation (healthy manure from another horse) or additives like activated charcoal or bentonite may also help. High copper/zinc plus probiotics, in some cases, act like an antibiotic to stabilize gut flora.

[1:32:01]

Question: Feeding a senior horse for longevity, top line, and teeth.

Scott: A balanced diet and exercise are key. For older horses, boost protein, antioxidants, and omega-3s. There’s no “magic” feed — fresh air, exercise, water, salt, good forage, and balanced minerals/vitamins are the basics.

[1:32:33]

Question: Does soaking impact vitamin E or other supplements?

Scott: Short soaks won’t significantly degrade vitamin E. Light, temperature, and humidity degrade nutrients over time, but water exposure for a short period is fine. Ground flax is similar — oxidation takes time; ground flax can be fed up to a week later if stored properly. Soaking AminoTrace+ or other supplements is fine.

[1:35:00]

Question: Trailering support for a horse that doesn’t eat when traveling and has a large manure pile afterward.

Scott: Likely cortisol/adrenaline from stress increases gut motility. Hydration is key — horses often won’t eat without water access. Acclimatization to trailering can reduce stress responses.

[1:36:12]

Question: Best forage type — grass mix or alfalfa?

Scott: Lean toward grass hay. Some alfalfa is fine for buffering in performance horses, but keep the majority grass. Choose maturity based on workload — less mature for high performance, more mature for maintenance/weight loss. Straw is fine for overweight horses (up to 20% forage replacement), ensuring adequate salt/water intake.

[1:37:30]

Question: Feeding haylage.

Scott: Haylage is fine if fermented properly and wrapped to exclude oxygen. Watch for botulism risk — vaccinate if feeding a lot. Commercial haylage is often cut higher to reduce contamination risk; farm haylage may have higher risk if cut lower.

[1:39:11]

Question: Does beet pulp plus extra magnesium reduce magnesium uptake?

Scott: Possibly a minor effect, but not enough to worry about. Focus on big-picture nutrition rather than small interaction minutiae. Magnesium oxide is cost-effective; alternatives like magnesium citrate absorb slightly better but are much more expensive.

[1:41:32]

Closing: Thanks for the questions and discussion. I try not to push products — my goal is improving horse health and performance. I’m available by email or phone for further questions, and I look forward to collaborating on electrolyte supplementation research in the future.