I suggest checking out this article:

Tying Up (aka Monday Morning Disease)

It's a bit lengthy but explains tying up and gives some advice on what to do to help solve the problem.

 

In regards to a horse who doesn't much enjoy eating, have you tried beet pulp? Some horses detest it, and I'm not sure if your horse would eat any more of it than regular feed, but it's definitely good for the thin horse. You may want to talk to an equine nutritionist; they will definitely have great ideas and can creat a specialised meal plan/diet for your horses that will help optimize their health and peformance.

 

Best of luck :)

-- Edited by Barnmouser Ash on Wednesday 13th of April 2011 11:17:14 PM

Hi LocustHill, I'll give you my suggestions for your horse that ties-up

Not sure at what level your horse ties-up (every ride? change in weather etc?), but my suggestion is to reduce any starchy/sugary meals and to make sure that the horse has access to fresh clean water ALWAYS -- as much as he/she will ever want in a day. As Barb mentioned, a dehydrated horse is more likely to tie-up (just like humans get cramps when we are dehydrated). But there is another reason why I mention lots and lots of water, a horse that ties-up, and one that is prone to this on a regular basis has a hard time to maintain muscle as the body attacks it at an alarming rate and breaks it down, which can be very taxing on the renal system (horses that tie-up often are prone to kidney failure due to the high amount of myoglobin - iron and oxygen binding protein - in their system - if you ever see dark urine while your horse is tying-up, call your vet right away!). So you want to keep the horse "flushed out".

Which brings me to my next suggestion, I had a horse that was highly prone to tying-up, to the point where his body visibly had trouble maintaining muscle, so I added a protein powder to his diet AND salt, because his body was already attaking his muscle a part quicker than he could maintain it, it was vital that he drank a lot of water (the addition of salt helped to encourage this) -- the amount of protein powder that he got was very minimal, and it did wonders to help him keep a healthy muscle mass.

Turnout is another key point, to help keep the muscles stretched, so if you can/feel comfortable with 24/7 turnout, I would do this. Before riding/regular exercise (you want to keep your horse properly conditioned) I would do gentle stretches of the legs, and make sure that the horse is 110% cooled out after a ride/exercise before putting it in a stall (you can encourage the horse to drink while cooling out - a few gulps at a time of cold water won't hurt a hot horse).

I would also clear everything with your vet and possibly talk to a equine nutritionist (that isn't biased to a product) before making changes to your horse's diet. It sounds complicated, but once you get a routine down, it runs like clock work, luckily the horse that I had who tied-up was otherwise an easy keeper, so his diet looked like:

- Free choice quality hay (this should be your basis of the diet, if you're going to add protein to the diet, get a hay sample done, quality hay is generally high in protein to begin with)
- Beet pulp (with lots of water, like soup)
- Protein, salt and a vitamin/mineral supplement for grass hay
- Water, water water

Note: you can add baking soda to the horse's diet if you'll be working it more than usual (horse show etc.), to help reduce lactic acid within the muscle, and it may or may not help to keep a tying-up episode at bay, new research points to the fact that lactic acid may be a player in tying-up, but does not cause it as first thought (proper diet and conditioning are much bigger contributors).

Hope this helps! If you're up for more reading, I've also wrote 2-part fact sheet on Equine Exertional Rhabdomyolysis (tying-up), you can get to the 2nd part of the article by clicking the "next part" link at the bottom.

Have the horse('s tail muscle) biopsied.   If a horse ties up AND is not keeping weight on chances are it has EPSM.  Talk to your vet.  

sounds like EPSM (can be totally controlled by diet) to me, I put the Clydesdale in my avatar on a high fat diet, free choice hay, and vegetable oil. He is 400-500lb heavier and it is all in muscle he is not fat at all.  Vegetable oil added to some Phase V, and alfalfa pellets daily. (you have to add and increase the oil gradually) I soak it all in water to make a nice mash, and I warm it in the winter.  He loves it :)

check out this website for feeding schedule, EPSM used to be mostly found in draft horses but they are finding it more frequently in all breeds

http://www.ruralheritage.com/vet_clinic/epsm.htm

-- Edited by IrideaClyde on Thursday 11th of August 2011 09:58:16 AM

First, what I learned over 40 years ago, was that one reason for azoturia (at one time called Monday morning disease) came about because the horse was fed normally on its day off, then worked hard the next day. I remember a hypothesis that the horse had too much protein for the kidneys to process, and a faint memory about bilirubin (sp?) flooding the kidneys from muscle break-down.

Second, I bought a book Christmas Eve, "Dressage--An Approach to Competition" by Kate Hamilton. She has a this to say about azoturia on page 50 "For horses who have had muscular problems in the back, and those who have a tendency to recurrent azoturia, a piece of apparatur in panel form is available to warm up muscles before you start exercising. It is laid across the back for ten to twenty minutes before work begins." She does not mention the brand, but possibly the Back to Track people can help you with their products.
On page 51 she writes about the need to take a blanket out to where you work and covering the horse IMMEDIATELY when work stops and to keep the croup covered when sponging off under the tack until the horse is cooled out completely.

Personally I'd try cutting out alfalfa if you are feeding it in any form. If your vet is worried about Tattoo's muscle mass the horse has more than adequate protein for his work level. I would probably try to figure out a way to get the protein down to 9-10% of his ration. I think that most competition horses are fed WAY too much protein. I would also try keeping the croup warm and covered except for sharp, fast training or a race and cover the croup as soon as the supreme effort is over.

I wish I had more to offer. May you find the perfect solution soon.

Oh yeah, and he is blanketed double all the rest of the time, and is kept warm with multiple coolers after work, we towel, massage and generally rub them dry (we don't like drafts, and we are very careful how we cool out our horses-- no rough wash and throw them in the stall like most stb race people .)  As you can see I am stumped, but will persivere until the money runs out... Tattoo is 'hoping' that Che can kick it in gear soon as we hope to have him racing in the near future... or Tattoo's future is bleak!

 

oh well better days ahead.

deb

Like Barbara, I haven't so much had a horse tye up, but I sure seem to have muscle cramps and stiffness. I have found magnesium and hydration to be the most help. I actually got the idea from suggestions for horses, tried a higher magnesium supplement than just what I was getting from a normal diet and have had a pretty good improvement in cramps,stiffness, and post-exercise pain. I sure wish I'd known about it twenty years ago. It might jive with the acid/base theory mentioned in the above article. You might have to research a bit as to how much to supplement a horse, it is possible to overdo magnesium, just as it is for calcium, the two work together in about 300 biological activities in muscles and bone.

-- Edited by Marlene on Monday 26th of December 2011 08:54:35 PM

Hi

We have found a product called Shine by shurgain to help a lot for horses that can't have sugar (I have an IR- not Cushings horse, and Tattoo a tie-up Acidosis horse on it).  My IR horse Che gets fat easily- Shine is his main food since he can't have sugars, on this he seems to just keep normal weight- Tattoo can't gain weight on most feeds- and we feed him this in addition to his other foods.  It is a flax product with mineral additives that they seem to love and does not adversly affect the IR or the tie-up problems.  We have stopped using beet pulp on both horses, after 2 years on it I found that they loved it-- but like a vet/nutritionist that my husband read info from said-- horses don't seem to digest it properly, after my experience with both horses having issues with it, and reading this I stopped using it, and many of the issues cleared up.  I would say if beet plup is mashed, dashed and dried up into pellets it isn't so hard for them to digest, but the water factor which is the biggest reason to feed it, goes out the window.  This vet had said that the wieght that the horses seem to gain is more water weight with bloating... I would agree with this to a large degree especially with my IR horse, he is a stud, and looks like a VERY pregenet mare when he was on beet pulp.  Tattoo actually tied up more when pressed to race on it, and it got to the point that when we were to race we would take them off of it for the day before.

On another note.  We tried one last thing on tattoo's tie-up back in January-- the Equiwinner Patch, to me this looks like 'magic' so I was reluctant to try it (more money that I don't have-- everyone wants to spend your money for you to no advantage for the horse-- I would spend any amount to get my horses right-- if the product would just WORK!), anyway- we used the patch on Tattoo, no pain, no chemical, drugs or other negative thing-- it wonders never cease- it worked!!!!!!  Tattoo the very day before had tied up so badly that my husband thought he would really die this time!, he jogged once around the track and had to be pulled up-- the next day we put the patch on him, and I thought one of two things-- if I BELIEVE in this I have nothing to loose, so I BELIEVED it would work-- and it did!!!!!!!!!!! he jogged 2 miles but was sweating all over, so Joe brought him in sure that he was going to tie up in the barn, he didn't! In the past Tattoo would sweat pathchy not this all over sweat.  Everyday for the (suposed to be 10 days) tweleve days we had patches for, he sweat under the patch profusly whether he was just standing in the stall or working, and when he jogged he sweat normally.  He still had his acidosis problem to deal with, which is why he ties up in the first place, but the actual tie up was solved.  Now I am not saying that this will work for all horses, Tattoo fits the poster boy for chronic tie-up due to acidosis and shows low on his phosphourus, which the transferance cell to cell of mag. phosphours etc. is what is his problem, and if it is tie up for this than the patch 'unlocks' the horses own ability to process it's chemical balances between cells.  The patch is like a small battery that tells the horses to 'unlock' it's own system.  For us it was the answer, Tattoo is starting back to racing as of yesterday, and although he will never be the healthiest horse, and has a lot of health issues, tie-up for him is solved-- the patch is worn once a year, or for chronic cases every 3 months, so far we are past the three months and have not had to go back, but you can bet your botom dollar that I will be ordering them again if I even thing Tattoo is heading down the wrong road.   And this fall he will be once again wearing the patch before his tie-up season gets the better of him...

Anyway, if you have a tie-up horse, and he is hard to keep weight on, has dehydration issues, hard to get to eat, and although he looks like an ulcer horse, he isn't showing ulcers-- ulcer medicine does not work-- than you could look at acidosis... learned that the hard way with Tattoo, for this he is on Equi-Shure, and we did finally get the Catasol back.

Good luck,

deb