Feed Recomendations?

Hi!
I'm looking for suggestions on what to feed my 3 year old Standardbred mare. She is worked for a 1/2 hour to a full hour 5 days a week on the lunge line to strengthen her muscles. She is currently on 1 qt of beet pulp (shredded and soaked) as well as 1 cup of oats and a 1/4 cup of canola oil. However, I'm worried this is not enough to keep weight on her while she's being worked on a daily basis. Keep in mind (not sure if this site has US posters) that I am in Ontario and may not be able to get some of the US branded feeds. Any suggestions would help, don't want her to start losing weight before show season!

Welcome to the forum
To really help you we need to know a bit more. How much hay/ pasture is she getting, the weight of beetpulp, dry and oats will help. In what condition is the horse(pic).

My mare gets unlimited round bales in the winter, and summer. Where I'm from, we don't have much pasture so we buy horse graded quality hay. She gets 1 qt of beet pulp, dry (before it is soaked) not sure the exact weight of what that measures out to. As for oats, she gets one cup = to 8oz. I don't currently have any pictures I can upload of my mare, but she is in average condition right now (not too fat, not too thin - sort of the medium range)

Okay
Free choice hay is very good. In general, the cup of oats, with oil and beetpulp, too. What would be nice, if you can get it, Oscar ration balancer. It'll give her what's missing in vitamins and minerals, plus balance the protein, since she will still grow a bit. I have no clue what is available, but Purina Enrich 32 or Nutrena Empower Balance are two examples and should be available. If not, a general vit/min supplement will do.
I would watch her for potential weight loss or lack of energy and up the beetpulp first if needed.

It's certainly not "Oscar" rationbalancer.......lol. Autocorrect on my phone did that.
" is a ration balancer".....

The soaked beet pulp .. I use 8 dry quarts , after soaking for 2 hrs , feeds 5 horses and the get 3 quarts each (size of my scoop) I did not see what type of hay you feed, so it would be hard to figure what vit / mineral would be missing , if any. Most horses don't need additional supplements . Hay, water and free choice salt .

Ditto what desert said.

Oats are very high in NSC (50%+) and have very little as far as nutrition.

Is the mare an easy keeper? If so, then a RB (ration balancer) would probably work for her. RB's are highly concentrated and made for horses who are easy-med keepers who maintain weight on limited calories. I use Buckeye Gro N Win RB. Triple Crown 30% is a great RB and so is the Glo line by ADM. All three of these brands have fixed formula and not low cost formulas. This means that every bag is the same no matter what and they do not replace ingredients with whatever is the cheapest at the time like brands such as Nutrena and Purina.

If she needs a few more calories to hold weight while on the RB, you can add extra calories in the form of alfalfa pellets, rice bran pellets, beet pulp, etc.

A doet low in NSC (starch+sugar) is also important. High NSC diets have been proven to cause issues when used long term. Issues such as ulcers, hindgust acidosis, laminitis, founder, IR, obesity, poor hoof health, etc. When choosing a feed, I choose one that has an NSC level lower than 15%. Whole grains such as oats, corn, barley, etc are very high in NSC. Read the label. Stay away from feeds with these ingredients. Distilled grains are ok as the distilling process cooks out more of the starch and sugar.

If she is a med-hard keeper and it's holding weight on a RB, then a different feed such as Triple Crown Lite, Triple Crown Sr or Buckeye Safe N Easy may be more cost efficient for you.

Follow the feeding instructions for your horses age/weight. This is very important. The directions are there for a reason.

Hope this helped.

ha ha! Frustrating tho - I just had to explain to someone what an inbred computer was!

Op I agree that what you're feeding now, plus a rationbalancer of some kind for nutrition would be good if the horse is ok weight. Id probly lose the oats, or feed that much in few more feeds if/when she needs extra and would ensure the oil was omega 3 such as cold pressed linseed or such.

As per info in thread about feeding seldom used horse, I wouldnt be doing much in the way of lunging or riding of a 3yo tho

How Do I start a question??? HELP PLEASE IM NEW HERE!!!!

I agree with you 100% !!!!!