What do these three pictures have in common?

They are all from upcoming Purina presentations at the Equine Science Society Symposium in Mescalero, New Mexico!  We have 4 accepted research abstracts on a wide variety of topics, ranging from salt and water intake, how feed additives affect manure stock-piling, and protein supplementation in exercising horses.  Each research abstract will be presented as part of the symposium as a data-sharing PowerPoint presentation, describing the research hypotheses, methodologies, results and implications.  If you would like a sneak peak of the research and other topics being presented, the abstracts and full papers have already been published and uploaded to the Journal of Equine Veterinary Science website at: http://www.j-evs.com/

More information about the meeting can be found at http://www.equinescience.org/2013/

Also, we will be sure to blog about the meeting itself and provide insight into all the new and exciting equine research being presented.  The meeting covers everything from nutrition, exercise physiology, reproduction, teaching & extension and more!

2013 Rolex Kentucky Three Day Event

Looking at the Kentucky Horse Park’s schedule of events, there’s always something going on at the park; shows, demonstrations, and competitions of all shapes and kinds, not the least of which is the Rolex Kentucky Three Day Event – easily one of my favorite events of the year!

Once again, Purina Animal Nutrition was proud to be a sponsor of the annual event. To kick of the festivities, we were treated to a course walk by Olympian and Purina Ambassador Kyle Carter on Thursday afternoon. Kyle took us on a tour of the cross country course with great insights into the strategy and approaches for each obstacle. While some obstacles have a few options to take depending on the rider’s objective, all of them are a challenge in and of themselves. Just walking the course is a huge effort so you can imagine what that translates to on horseback.

I’m not an eventer myself, but I’ve developed an immense amount of respect for what it takes to get a horse to compete at this level.  To go from calm focus on dressage day to watching them gallop through the lanes on cross country day is certainly a sight to behold only to see them come back on Sunday and jump through the stadium course with what looks like ease. Of course there’s nothing easy about a four star level event and it takes a monumental team effort to get there.

Feeding for Shine

Everyone wants their horse to look so good that he/she turns heads. Good breeding, correct conformation, and a strong topline are important, but the traditional hallmark of a beautiful horse is a shiny coat. Even horses without perfect confirmation are eye-catching when they have a shiny coat. A good example is my own horse Roman pictured below….he is an aged 15.3 OTTB with a club foot and a Roman nose, but in spite of all that I think he looks gorgeous (OK, I may be a tiny bit biased, but he does have a very shiny coat).

My horse Roman (photo credit Eve Wheeler)

Even though we can’t control confirmation flaws, we do have some level of control over the appearance of a horse’s coat. Good nutrition shows on the outside, and feeding a balanced diet that meets nutrient requirements is an essential first step to having a horse with a shiny coat.

The Challenge of Spring

Most of us associate the challenges of spring on a horse farm/ranch with all of the seasonal changes that take place.  The challenges many of us face can include; getting foals on the ground safely, getting mares bred back for the foal crop of the coming year, starting back up with cutting grass or making hay, trying to keep a close watch on horses on pasture eating that lush spring grass, the list goes on and on! One of these challenges brought me to realize a strong correlation from a discussion we had the previous week about feeding horses properly. We had an additional challenge last week when a group of severe storms came through our area. Strong winds and a tornado were reported right here at the farm. Luckily no people or horses at the Purina Animal Nutrition Center were hurt, but we did lose some trees and fence. One of the trees was a favorite of mine, it has been in countless advertisements and pictures of the farm. The picture below was from a couple of years ago after a light snow.

A substantial oak that had survived who knows how many storms and from all appearances looked rock solid and healthy. When the wind came last week we were left with the image below.

New from Purina Animal Nutrition!

It’s hard to believe we’ve actually done it! Years and years of research, countless ultrasounds, timely breedings, sleepness nights, foal after foal being born….and we have finally figured out how to feed broodmares and combine our breeding expertise in order to guarantee the sex of a foal. We are proud to present Purina Strategy Colt and Purina Strategy Filly! Start using these feeds now to rebreed your mares and get exactly the number of colts and fillies you want on the ground next year. By using these feeds and timing your breeding precisely as we specify, you will have a 90%+ chance of getting the gender of foal you plan for. No more waiting 11 months to find out, no more trying to sex the embryo at certain dates, no more disappointment when you wished for a colt and a filly pops out (no offense to the fillies), we have a feed for you too!

We have been working on this technology at our Purina Animal Nutrition Center for many years. Our statistics show that if we combine an exact percentage of protein, carbohydrates and essential fatty acids, and then inseminate mares on a precisely determined date and time via ultrasound, there is a 91.23 ± 4.5% chance of influencing the sex of the foal. This percentage is statistically significant with a P-value of 0.0496. This is a very strong statistical value and we are now preparing all of our data for peer review publication. We will let you know when the final paper is accepted and ready for print.

In the meantime, some additional statistics include:

40.0% percent of people in the US play April Fool’s Day pranks on their friends, family and/or coworkers. When these pranks are played, it makes 7.0% of people feel paranoid and another 11.0% annoyed. I, on the other hand, think they are great fun! Did I get you? I hope so. Happy April Fool’s Day!

Horses, A Family Affair!

It should be pretty apparent if you have been following our blog by now that everyone in the horse group at Purina Animal Nutrition is passionate about horses and interacting with them. If you are involved with horses you know that it is far more complex than your average job or hobby, it is more of a lifestyle. Dr. Gordon posted a couple of weeks ago about our first foal of the year, we are now up to six on the ground and three more to go. As the manager of our research herd and faclility, one of my responsibilities is getting foals on the ground safe and sound. We use several tools to help us out. We have a special camera system and a birth alarm which are the most frequently used. We make every effort possible to be present at birth just in case the foal or mare needs some help. This past Friday I had just picked my children up from school when the birth alarm was activated, I had only been away from work for about an hour. I raced back to the farm and made it in time for my children to witness seeing their first foal being born. What a great experience, they are still talking about it 6 days later! It can be tough splitting time between the barn and family, but I feel it is important to instill in my kids the passion, time, and committment it takes if you want to spend time with these great creatures. I had lots of help bedding a fresh stall for the new foal and mare.

Then we had to get a chance to say hello for the first time before moving to our clean stall.

Being able to experience these things while at work is a chance not many people get. It is just one of the reasons we all work here, and carry so much passion for the horse with us every day. Raising these foals to become future research horses and eventually someones personal horse is a lot of responsibility, but it is one we take seriously. When someone buys a horse from us for their own personal use I know someday it will be a family treasure that hopefully they can use for their own family experience someday! We still have at least a couple of late nights left to go to get the rest of our foals on the ground, but I know I will miss getting those late calls to  get to the barn once we have everybody safe on the ground!

"Winter" Season in Florida

While many parts of the country are weathering spring storms and waiting for mud to vacate, the winter show circuits are in full swing in Florida. Well, winter according to the calendar anyways; you’ll be hard pressed to find a shaggy coat or heavy turnout anywhere in sight so I’ll use the term loosely. I was lucky enough to pack up the sunscreen, leave the snow behind myself and spend some time spectating and catching up with our national ambassadors.

First stop was Wellington and the Palm Beach International Equestrian Center. Our show jumpers keep pretty full schedules throughout their stints there. I stopped by to watch the Thursday grand prix class and see Beezie Madden, Laura Kraut and Todd Minikus in action. It was a big class with 86 entries and a 28 pair jumpoff. There were dozens of international riders also in the class and several Olympians that competed in London last year; as usual the competition in Wellington never disappoints. The jumpoff was chalk full of talent and blistering paces and while we didn’t come away with a Team Purina win, Laura and Cedric held their own with a very respectable fifth place finish from a clear round in 31.468 seconds.