In today's vigorous competition, we're asking much more of horses than ever before. When horses are transformed into these man-made machines, nutrition can account for the complete success or demise of the operating system. Perfecting nutrition for the performance horse can be pinpointed to a fine art, so much so that what two pages in Barrel Horse News can offer won't be a scratch on the surface. This overview of nutrition is meant to knock on the door of your current education level, and spark interest in the vast amount that's left to learn on the subject; every expert will tell you that nobody knows it all. Above all, it's meant to benefit your barrel horse, whose well-being should take first priority when evaluating your current feed program. After all, if you've got your goals and dreams placed at the top of the World, you can't expect your horse to keep up when he's eating the same thing as the neighbor's horse here on Earth.

Charmayne James, 11-time World Champion Barrel Racer, is quick to attribute the lasting success of her great horse Scamper to his well-thought-out feed program. When she and Scamper lived in New Mexico, the family's feedlot had a nutritionist develop rations for the animals. As it always will be, green grass is the best feed your horse could receive. But many people don't have access to such a thing or the room to facilitate it, and therefore must compensate for Mother Nature through different sources of nutrition. With all the different feed types and supplements on the shelves today, it's hard to know what you should be feeding. If you question something, James advises you to contact a nutritionist.

"The equine world has let feed companies dictate how they feed," James said. "We take the word of the companies rather than having a professional tell us how to feed. Nutritionists know how everything works once it's ingested, even more so than a vet. "Everything a horse ingests affects the mechanics of its working order as a whole. For a horse to perform on an intense level, each organ and mechanism within every body system must function at optimal levels. For you to get a better understanding of what goes where, and what it does when it gets there, James enlisted the help of Dr. Richard Godbee, Ph.D., PAS, an equine nutritionist from Minden, Nev. An adjunct professor in the Department of Animal Biotechnology at the University of Nevada Reno, Dr. Godbee is the vice president of research and development for a leading regional horse feed company.

GETTING A GRASP OF THE BASICS -The slowly evolving feed.
Dr. Godbee said the majority of the feed industry is tradition-bound. Although he said some companies have done well to pioneer new products, for the most part, horse feeds have catered more to the owner than the horse. Take, for instance, the seemingly important role that molasses has continued to play in feed. Unnecessarily so, said James and Dr. Godbee. "Molasses is for the owner's sake," Dr. Godbee said. "The absolute sugar content may be less than it used to, but for the most part, it's there to keep dust down and so all our supplements will stick - things we can do with oil. "As far as the extra energy people may think it's providing their horses, James put it logically: "It's just like after you've had lots of sweets and sugar; you feel great for about an hour, but then you're ready for a nap. "Feeds are made in a way that's most cost-effective for the company," she added. "They end up cutting corners."

Don't forget to feed the individual. An important key to remember is that each horse is an individual. One horse may get fat just looking at a bale of hay, while another horse may still be thin on 10 pounds of feed per day and the recommended weight in hay. "The poundage will change from horse to horse," James said. Nutrient requirements also differ from one horse to the next. When asked to perform more, some horses may need increased levels of one vitamin or mineral more so than any other, whereas this may not the case for the horse in the next stall. "You have to know your horse," James added. "You might notice that a horse is benefited by adding a specific supplement, but is still not 100 percent because other things might be coming into play. It's important to know if the horse is sore or has teeth problems, for example. Even though a certain supplement could be helping the horse, you might not be fixing the problem."

The building blocks. Before each ration is narrowed down, the six nutrient needs of a horse should be understood: water, energy, protein, major minerals, trace minerals and vitamins. The sources for these nutrients are pasture and/or hay, concentrates and supplements. You should have a general understanding of all the nutrients. Also, before devising your own horse's ration, the principle of nutrient "requirement" needs to be understood. A requirement represents a range of dietary nutrient concentrations that results in adequate function - with "adequate" being the key word. Ideally, your horse is receiving an amount of each nutrient that is in a range to support optimal performance. However, on either side of that range is deficiency and toxicity.

Even seemingly fit and healthy horses may be suffering from some sort of deficiency. As James said, it comes down to knowing your horse. And, on the other end of the spectrum, there is such a thing as feeding your horse to death. "Overfeeding is as much malnutrition as deficiency," said Dr. Godbee. He explained that, while some nutrients such as certain vitamins and minerals are maintained in the body, others that aren't being utilized by the horse get passed through. "All you have then is expensive urine," he said. And, the nutrients that are maintained can possibly reach levels of toxicity.

Dr. Godbee also stressed the importance of following label directions on feeds and supplements. If the instructions say to feed 2 ounces per day, you're not necessarily going to get twice the benefit by upping the dosage to 4 ounces per day. "People see that Martha Josey is feeding one thing, Charmayne another and Janet Stover something else," Dr. Godbee continued. "They reason that if they feed all three products, they'll be getting triple the benefits. Find one product that has the science behind it. There are a lot of really good supplements on the market, but there are also a lot of knock-offs. "With the exception of glucosamine and other choice extras such as antioxidants that should be included in a performance horse's diet, a horse's daily ration should, for the most part, take care of the animal's nutrient needs. "If you are adding four or five supplements, you need to find another feed," he said.

According to the UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine's Book of Horses: A Complete Medical Reference Guide for Horses and Foals, although protein, mineral and vitamin needs are increased by performance, the increases are not greater than the rise in energy needs. Feeding supplements of these nutrients is expensive, rarely necessary, and benefits mainly the manufacturers of the supplements; the money often would be better spent on better-quality feed.

ENERGY IN SAFE MEASURES. Energy is required in the greatest amount for all horses, so it is important to formulate feeds based on the energy content. Without adequate energy, a working horse is never going to reach its full potential. But, as James said, you can't just feed for top performance; there needs to be proper balance all the way around. "It takes both the right amount of exercise and the right feed; you can't just go at it halfway and expect full results," she said. Horses use energy for their basic body functions, to digest and utilize food, to maintain body temperature, and for growth, reproduction and activity. There is large individual variation among horses in the amount of energy needed to maintain normal body condition. Nutrient needs vary with energy requirements, and the risk of nutrition-related problems is greatest during periods when nutrient requirements are high. At her clinics and at barrel races, James said she commonly finds that most barrel horses are underweight, and most likely not receiving the minerals, fat or high-quality forage they need. Source Energy is contained in the carbohydrate, protein and fat portions of the diet.

Carbohydrates. Carbohydrates have long been the chief source of energy in horse feeds. This, said James and Dr. Godbee, is one of the key factors that needs to be changed in the way performance horses are fed. As we have all learned through the rising popularity of "low-carb" and "no-carb" diets for humans, carbohydrates are a group of compounds that include starches and sugars, which can measure up to too much of a good thing. The energy in carbohydrates is not as condensed as with other sources. Therefore, a significant increase in feed volume must be made to meet a horse's energy needs when feeding a carbohydrate-based feed. Horses' digestive systems are not designed to digest large amounts of carbohydrates. Fiber in the form of roughage is what stimulates the intestines and keeps the digestive system moving and healthy, the reason why it's so important to feed your horse plenty of high-quality forage.

"Horses secrete 1,000 times more gastric acid than humans," James explained. "When you start feeding large amounts of starch, their system has to work overtime to digest it all. That's what initiates problems like gastric ulcers, tying up and colic. "Dr. Godbee said that oats are still considered the "traditional" feed for horses, even with their shortcomings. "I don't feed oats because you have to feed a lot to get adequate energy," James added. "Also, oats are not totally 'available' to the horse, so a lot of the nutrients get passed right through the system."

"Horse owners are slower to accept change in the way they feed 'grain' to the horse," Dr. Godbee said. "The prevalence of ulcers in performance horses can be attributed in many ways to the feed management of the horse - large amounts of grain with little roughage." "People might buy hay that's not quite as good and give more grain to make up for it," James added. "It would be better if they had better-quality forage and fed less grain.

"James said that her World Champion barrel horse Cruiser would get body-sore on a high-concentrate diet. With Dr. Godbee's help, James found that by raising the fat content of her gelding's feed with rice bran and oil, he was getting the energy he needed with a smaller volume of grain. In turn, the body soreness ceased.

"Feeds containing high levels of fat and soluble fiber seem to be better for performance horses, and possibly even the growing horse," Dr. Godbee said. Soluble fiber feeds have about the same energy content as oats, but are very safe because they're not sources of starch and don't increase a horse's chance of grain-overload founder. Some soluble fibers include beet pulp, soy bean hulls and alfalfa leaf meal.

Fat. As much as we humans might try to steer clear of it, for performance horses, fat is good. Fat is energy, and the most condensed form of energy at that. It contains 2.25 times the energy content per gram of either carbohydrates or protein and is a much safer way to increase the energy a horse receives. The higher the energy content, the fewer pounds of feed required to meet energy needs. And, unlike carbohydrates, fat does not increase the chance of grain-overload founder. Fat also provides essential fatty acids - including omega 3 and omega 6 - needed for a variety of body functions. Dr. Godbee said it's important that omega 3 and 6 be contained in the fat source you choose.

The crude fat content in a feed is a good indicator of the feed's energy content. Most carbohydrate-based feeds, without added fat, contain between 2 and 4 percent crude fat. For performance horses, the minimum amount of crude fat they should be receiving is 6 percent. A good source of fat is soybean oil, which contains about 50 percent omega 6 and around 6 to 8 percent omega 3. Canola oil and corn oil are also good sources of fat. "Corn oil is excellent because horses like it, but it's not high in omega 3," Dr. Godbee said. He cited rice bran as being another good energy source, having 15 to 20 percent fat. Also, flax oil is excellent, as it is highest in omega 3, but has the drawback of being quite costly.

On average, a 50-pound bag of high-quality feed contains three pounds of oil, or 6 percent. To increase fat content to an adequate level, between one-half and one cup of oil should be added to your horse's diet. Protein Too much importance is often placed on the level of crude protein in a product. "Many times, the level of crude protein is confused with the amount of energy the feed contains," Dr. Godbee said. "Sometimes the feed is purchased on the amount of crude protein, with little attention paid to other nutrients."

Although all horses require a minimum amount of protein per day for essential amino acids and nitrogen needed for maintenance, depending on what class they fall in, it's most important to get energy in the horse, not protein. Most commercial feeds contain from 10 to 16 percent crude protein. The higher-protein feeds are usually designed for young horses and broodmares in late gestation or early lactation. Feeds containing 12 to 14 percent crude protein are designed for performance horses, and a 10-to-11 percent feed for mature horses doing little work. Most of the premium performance feeds (high-energy feeds) contain slightly more protein because of the higher energy density and, thus, a lower intake amount. "It is of interest to note, exercise does not increase the percentage of crude protein the horse requires," said Dr. Godbee. "Work requires additional energy.

Excessive amounts of protein are not beneficial because amino acids that are not actively required for making body protein are broken down and not stored; the result is an increase in urine volume in order to excrete the excess nitrogen.

STAYING HEALTHY THROUGH IT ALL. Whether the source be hauling, competition or change in environment, stress causes health concerns in life - horse or human. There are many compounds that we can add - and need to add - to a performance horse's diet to ensure a continued healthy immune system.

"There are certain things that need to get in these performance horses," Dr. Godbee said of such things as essential fatty acids and antioxidants. Increasing amounts of the previously discussed omega 3 and 6 fatty acids in feed has been shown to reduce inflammation and pain associated with certain musculoskeletal problems. According to Dr. Godbee, the optimum ration seems be between 2.5 and 3.5 to 1. Antioxidents reduce the formation of free radicals (negatively charged ions as a result of metabolism) and the tissue damage associated with them. Certain vitamins and some plant extracts contain high levels of antioxidants, one of the better-known being vitamin E. Also well-known to have antioxidant properties are Ester C and ascorbic acid, which premium feeds contain in higher levels.

Another new group of compounds finding their way into equine nutrition and supplements are called adaptogens. It has been found that adaptogens help improve energy utilization by improving glucose transport across the cell membrane, increase oxygen utilization and improve fat utilization and gaseous exchange in the lungs."A stimulatory effect of the adaptogens on the immune system has also been reported," added Dr. Godbee, "with improved stress resistance to confinement, travel and environmental factors.

"Sources containing adaptogenic qualities include the popular juice from the Noni fruit as well as Siberian ginseng, Chinese gold root and magnolia vine, all adaptogenic herbs. Dr. Godbee also noted that the Noni juice has very strong antioxidant properties as well, and stimulates the appetite. "This is one of a developing group of natural products that holds promise of helping horses in many exciting and new ways," Dr. Godbee said. "Look for these things in products.

"James' final word of advice is to stick to the basics and understand the importance of each nutrient requirement. Always keep your horse's complete system a top priority.