| Body condition |
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 Body proportions will change when a horse grows fatter. Overweight horses will be lighter on a given chest girth value than thinner hordes. test it out! You shold provide information about the condition of your horse when you calculate from chest girth values. The body condition function is not active for young horses. You may adjust the body condition of young horses by changing training intensity, or by changing the daily body weight gain. Please observe that there is a danger that young horses, which have become too thin, are given too much feed. This leads to a rapid compensatory growth, easily observer in the body weight graph. This is increasing the risk for developing skeletal disorders including osteochondrosis, stiff joints, painful of swollen epiphyseal growth zones, and inflammation in the carpal joints. We recommend that a thin young horse be given ample time to regain body condition. Watch your young horse carefully, and increase energy intake to about 10% above the calculated requirements for weight, growth rate and activity. Be sure to give a thins horse good access to free movement when it is supposed to regain body condition to strengthen skeleton and joints. |