What should I feed if my horse is prone to tying up?

What can cause tying up and feed to help reduce the risk?

Tying up or Equine Rhabdomyolysis (ERS) is a condition that causes mild to severe cramping of the horse’s muscles.  In many cases, but not all, tying up can be linked to an underlying muscle condition such as Polysaccharide Storage Myopathy (PSSM) or Recurrent Exertional Rhabdomolysis (RER).

In all cases of tying up it is important to maximise forage intake and limit the horse’s intake of non-structural carbohydrates (e.g. starch and sugar).  Feeding a balanced diet with optimum levels of vitamins and minerals, including antioxidants and electrolytes is also important.

Horses prone to tying up will require careful management and a specialist low starch, high oil and fibre based feed such as those in our Horse Care Range. All our Horse Care Range products have a low starch content at less than 15 %. Horse Care Ultra Cubes are one of the lowest starch content complete feeds available on the market at 4 %  starch which is the ideal choice for horses that have tied up before.

Connolly’s Red Mills Define & Shine is also a low-starch conditioning pellet at 15.5 % starch so it can be used in these horses that are prone to “tying up” if they need to put on condition and gain muscle definition. It also contains Vitamin E, a powerful antioxidant to support muscle growth and repair.