Is Your Horse's Feed Room Costing You More Than It Should?

That $60 tub on your supplement shelf might be exactly what your horse needs...or it might be giving you more of something you're already paying for. Horse feed isn't cheap, and neither are supplements. Add up a commercial feed, a hoof supplement, amino acids, vitamin E, something for joints and maybe a digestive product, and the monthly feed bill can start looking quite different from where it began.

Most feeding programs don't become complicated overnight, they build slowly. A hoof supplement gets added after a bad season of growth, amino acids go in when the topline isn't quite where we'd like it, vitamin E gets added when the horse starts working harder, and another product might come along after a recommendation from a trainer, friend or someone at the barn. There may be a perfectly good reason for every one of those products, but every once in a while it's worth stepping back and looking at where your feed money is actually going.

The goal isn't to create the cheapest possible feeding program. Good nutrition is definitely worth investing in, and sometimes spending more on the right product makes far more sense than spending less on something that isn't meeting the horse's needs. What we really want to know is whether the money being spent is actually contributing something useful to the horse's complete diet.

How Much Overlap Is in Your Feed Room?

Let's say your horse receives a fortified performance feed, a hoof supplement, an amino acid product and a vitamin and mineral supplement. From the front of the bags and tubs, those products all appear to have different jobs. One is the horse's main feed, one supports the feet, one has been added for muscle and another is there to provide vitamins and minerals.

Turn the labels around, though, and you may find more overlap than you expected. Depending on the products, the performance feed may already provide essential amino acids, vitamin E, copper, zinc and selenium. The hoof supplement may also provide amino acids, copper and zinc, while the vitamin and mineral supplement could provide some of those nutrients again.

This doesn't instantly mean there's anything wrong with the feeding program. But there can be very good reasons for providing additional amounts of certain nutrients. The important part is knowing that the overlap exists and understanding why the additional supplementation is there. At $40, $60 or $100 a month per supplement, it's worth knowing whether you're intentionally providing additional nutrition or simply paying for the same nutrients in several different products.

Look at Cost Per Day, Not Just the Price of the Bag

Price tags can be pretty misleading when we're comparing feeds and supplements. Imagine one bag of feed costs $45 and another costs $65. At first glance, the $45 bag seems like the obvious budget-friendly choice, but what if the first product needs to be fed at five pounds per day while the second is designed to be fed at a much lower daily amount?

This is why cost per day is often much more useful than cost per bag. Traditional fortified feeds, ration balancers and concentrated vitamin and mineral products can have very different feeding rates, so comparing the price of the bags without considering how long they last doesn't tell us what it actually costs to feed the horse.

The same applies to supplements. A $90 tub that lasts three months costs about $1 per day, while a $50 tub that lasts one month costs considerably more over the same period. Of course, that doesn't make the $90 product the better choice. We still need to compare what the products provide and whether either one is appropriate for the horse. Once we know what we're looking for, though, cost per day gives us a much better way to compare our options.

What Do You Know About the Biggest Part of the Diet?

One thing I find interesting is how precise we can become about supplements. An owner may know that their horse receives exactly 30 grams of a particular product each day. They know the brand, how big the scoop is and exactly what it's supposed to support. Then we get to the forage and it's simply, "Oh, it's just grass hay."

Except that same horse might be eating 20 pounds of that hay every day.

Forage should form the foundation of most equine diets, which means hay and pasture can contribute a large proportion of the horse's daily energy, protein and minerals, along with vitamins to varying degrees. Yet the largest part of the ration is often the part we know the least about. Two hays that look quite similar can have different nutrient profiles depending on plant species, maturity, soil, growing conditions, harvest timing and storage.

This is where spending money on information can sometimes save money on products. Yes, a forage analysis has an upfront cost, but it gives us information about the part of the diet the horse is eating in pounds rather than grams. We may discover the forage is already providing quite a lot of something we've been supplementing, or we may find an area that genuinely needs more attention. Either way, we now have a better reason for deciding where the feed budget should go.

Are You Paying to Fix the Right Problem?

Topline is a good example of why it's worth investigating before buying another product. When a horse isn't developing topline as well as we'd like, an amino acid supplement is an understandable place to look. Muscle development requires adequate dietary protein and essential amino acids, including lysine, so there may be a very good reason to consider one.

Before spending another $50 or $80 each month, though, it's worth looking at what the horse is already receiving. Most horse owners are familiar with the crude protein percentage printed on the feed bag, but that number doesn't tell us the complete story about protein quality. Horses require essential amino acids (including lysine, methionine and threonine), and two diets with the same crude protein percentage can provide very different amino acid profiles. This means simply choosing the feed with the higher protein percentage isn't necessarily the answer.

Maybe the horse would benefit from additional amino acids. If the complete ration is already providing adequate protein and essential amino acids, however, we also need to look at the rest of the picture. Is the horse consuming enough energy? What is the workload and training program like? Could age, dental health, pain or another health concern be influencing muscle development?

This isn't about talking ourselves out of using an amino acid supplement. It's about knowing what we're asking that supplement to accomplish. The same applies to other products. If we're spending money on a hoof supplement, vitamin E or another targeted nutrient, we should have some idea of what the horse is already receiving and why additional supplementation makes sense.

How Much Feed Is Actually Going Into the Bucket?

Another detail that can completely change the nutritional picture is the amount of feed being given. Two owners might tell you they use exactly the same commercial feed, but one feeds the manufacturer's recommended amount while the other gives a small scoop twice a day because the horse gains weight easily. Although the bag is the same, those horses aren't necessarily receiving the same nutritional program.

Many fortified feeds are formulated to provide their intended vitamin and mineral fortification when fed according to the manufacturer's recommended feeding directions. If substantially less is fed, the horse also receives less of that fortification. This is particularly relevant for easy keepers that may maintain weight very well on a small amount of concentrate and simply don't need the additional calories that would come with feeding several pounds of a traditional fortified feed every day.

The answer isn't to feed more just to reach the recommended feeding rate. Instead, it may be worth considering whether the overall feeding program is structured appropriately for that horse. In some situations, a more concentrated source of the nutrients the horse needs may fit the ration better.

This is why knowing the name of the feed only tells us part of the story. We also need to know how much is actually being fed. The same principle applies when we see nutrients such as vitamin E, lysine, copper or zinc listed on a feed tag. A product containing 1,000 IU of vitamin E might sound impressive, but that number only becomes meaningful when we know how much the horse actually consumes from the complete diet and how that compares with the horse's requirements. The same applies to minerals and amino acids: seeing a nutrient on the label tells us it's there, but not whether the total daily intake is appropriate for that horse.

When Was the Last Time You Looked at Why You're Feeding It?

Most supplement shelves have at least one product that's been there for a long time. It was probably added for a good reason. Maybe the horse's feet were struggling, the workload increased, the horse moved somewhere without much pasture or there was another specific reason for starting it.

The problem is that feeding programs change. The horse may now be eating different hay, receiving a different commercial feed, doing a different workload or living under different management. The original reason for adding the supplement may still be completely relevant, but it's worth checking rather than assuming that because the product made sense two years ago, it automatically still makes sense today.

This can be worthwhile financially too. A $60 per month supplement costs $720 over the course of a year. If it's filling a genuine need, that may be money very well spent. If it no longer has a clear role because the rest of the feeding program has changed, that's worth knowing too. So the goal isn't fewer supplements, some horses have very good reasons for receiving several targeted products. What we're really looking for is a feeding program where we understand why each product is there.

Sometimes Spending More Can Actually Save Money

Saving money on horse nutrition doesn't always mean choosing the cheapest feed or cutting supplements. Sometimes spending a little more in the right place can prevent us from spending considerably more in the wrong ones. Forage analysis is one example. A feed or ration balancer that better matches the horse may be another. A targeted supplement that fills a known nutritional gap may provide much better value than several cheaper products that have accumulated over time without anyone looking at how they fit together.

This is also why I don't think a good feeding program should be judged by how many supplements it contains. A horse receiving several carefully chosen supplements may have a very well designed program, while a horse receiving none could still have nutritional gaps. What matters is whether the complete ration is meeting the needs of the individual horse. Good equine nutrition isn't about spending the most money, and it isn't about spending the least. It's about knowing where that money is actually making a difference.

Take Another Look at Your Feed Room

The next time you're in the feed room, take a few minutes to look at what's actually there. Check the labels on the products you're feeding and see where nutrients overlap. Compare the recommended feeding rate on the commercial feed with the amount that actually goes into the bucket. Think about when each supplement was added, what you were trying to accomplish at the time and whether that reason still applies.

Then look beyond the feed bucket. What do you actually know about the forage? Has the hay changed since the feeding program was originally put together? Has the horse's workload, body condition, life stage or management changed? You may go through all of this and find that every product has a very good reason to be there. You might discover you're buying the same nutrient from several different sources, find a supplement that no longer has a clear purpose or realize there's an area of the diet that hasn't been addressed at all.

Remember this...a supplement can only supplement what's already there — it can't replace a balanced diet. The goal isn't to walk out of the feed store spending as little as possible. It's to understand what you're paying for and why you're feeding it. Because when every bag, scoop and supplement has a purpose, you're not just creating a more economical feeding program. You're creating one that makes more sense for the horse standing in front of you.

Want to learn how to look beyond the feed label and evaluate what a horse's complete diet is actually providing? 

The LCAO Equine Nutrition Advisor Certificate teaches you how to evaluate forage, feeds and supplements, identify nutritional gaps and build balanced, evidence-based feeding programs around the individual horse.