Teach Me Tuesday: Supplements

I give the whole supplement industry a healthy dose of side eye with an occasional addition of mare glare.

I mean, it's completely unregulated and as a general rule IF (a big if) the stuff you think you're paying for is even in the bucket, the odds of there being any research whatsoever that said ingredient is even bio-available to the horse in that particular form is something like zero. Don't even get me started on the other vagaries like assuming you have the correct ingredient in the supplement in the correct dose and it is bio-available to the horse, HOW THE HELL DOES IT GET TO THE JOINT? Like. Do horses actually eat glucosamine and then the body is like "hey don't need this here but let's fedex it to the right hock STAT?" Or you know. Does it just get peed out. Because that seems more obvious.

he's clearly suffering

And if you need hyaluronic acid in a joint, does feeding an HA supplement help at all or do you need to feed things that make HA or (light bulb) would you be money ahead just injecting in the first place?

Cough. So yeah. Not a supplement feeder here.

But I started Courage on cheap ass feedstore magnesium a month or so ago.

And I'm not saying I believe in it.

But he has been turning right pretty reliably and seems less sore through his shoulders and is more more tractable about certain things, which is interesting.

Possibly just correlations. Still interesting.

So tell me. Where do you stand on supplements? What do you feed and why?