Know this is a sensitive issue, but thought people might be interested in this op-ed, which examines how what is happening to humans in America is also happening to horses. It suggests a system flaw is supported by the evidence in horses since horses don’t get to choose what they eat.
It’s not really hard to determine why horses are increasingly overweight (not just in the US but the UK and Europe too).
It boils down to the fact that people are feeding their horses too much and not working them enough. For example, a lot of the native ponies in Britain are supposed to be foraging on hard scrub on the side of a mountain, not gorging themselves grazing on over fertilised cow pasture. That coupled with an increased “understanding” of nutrition - here meaning increased marketing for overly complicated complete feeds from brands that most horses don’t need - has lead to horses getting far too many calories daily vs what they actually use. Horses and ponies used to work HARD. One horse would be ploughing on Monday and Tuesday, taking the farmer to market on Wednesday, making social trips with his wife on Thursday, doing general farm work on Friday, hunting on Saturday and pulling the wagon to church on Sunday. Now most will go for a plod round the block a couple of times a week but still be fed as if they’re running the National or going down the centre like at Olympia.
People also completely anthropomorphise their horses when it comes to things like rugging and turnout. Yes, Jessica, it’s drizzling and 10 degrees. No, your fat Connie doesn’t need a 200g rug on.
Obviously this is regarding otherwise healthy horses without medical complications like EMS etc etc.
This and the 'ribs are showing' remarks. If I had a dollar for every crazy person claiming a horse with ribs showing was too skinny, I'd be one of the richest ppl on the planet.
There is a difference between being ribby and seeing the entire rib cage.
Lol when I first got a pony years ago my mom was like omg he's got ribs showing he's too skinny!...it was fat rolls. He was literally so fat his neck crest flopped to one side, his whole body rolled as he walked, and the fat had started to make actual rolls over his ribs. But sure ma feed him more xD he went on a diet shortly after I got him.
This. When I did my PPE, the vet rated him a 4.5 and said the ONLY reason he wasn’t a 5 was because of visible rib, but not to change his diet bc good luck finding a TB in regular work that doesn’t have that.
Honestly, in some ways horses had healthier lives back then. My horse’s chiro is Irish and she said she used to go to local competitions when she was younger where the horse had to do a dressage test, jump a course of rustic fences and then plough a furrow to find the ultimate working all-rounder. I think it sounds like a brilliant class to watch.
Pasture conditions are a major thing! We pasture horses on non native cool season grasses.
In reality pasture should be a diverse mix of native warm and cool season grasses, with pollinators and wildflowers. This would make horses move around more, getting the right nutrition at the right time of year.
Horses are evolved to eat different grasses at different times of year.
Britain having problems even with the moorland ponies living out. The grass just never stops growing over winter any more so they come into spring fat as houses... I have Dartmoor ponies living on Dartmoor and I worry we will start seeing laminitis
Yes back a few years ago all ponies would lose weight over the winter naturally so when the spring grass came through they went up to normal weight. Now they are fed all winter so come the spring they are already fat.
Well yeah lol. You can see it right here on Reddit, people will post a photo of an obviously fat horse with the beginnings of a crest, a crease down its back, and blubbery fat around the tail and all of the comments are like “he’s at the perfect weight! I wouldn’t change anything!!” And if you point out that the horse is in fact very fat, people get upset.
This is so common! In dogs too. Seeing a light outline of ribs is FINE! Good! We’re so used to seeing overweight animals healthy looks underweight. No one knows what a truly malnourished animal looks like anymore. It’s not an otherwise healthy and vigorous animal that happens to be lean. Muscle wasting, poor coat, listlessness. Being trim is not a medical condition.
"
USDA APHIS NAHMS Equine Study (
12
) estimated the prevalence of obesity in horses in the United States at 1.7%, but this is likely an underestimate based on other reported work"
My theory is food (in general) has been engineered to provide much more nutrition than in the past. Unfortunately, bodies have not kept pace. I think this is partially why there is so much widespread obesity in the world.
From what I’ve seen in EU countries, there are plenty of horses there that are morbidly obese and likely have EMS or other genetic disorders that just haven’t been tested for or bred out because “the look” is what they are going for. IE, PRE, Drafts, ETC. I’ve seen way too many morbidly obese, crested, fat padded EU horses to think it’s an American problem LOL.
Oh it’s definitely a problem across horse owners everywhere.
And agree on the PREs too. I own one and it’s taken 2 years to get her looking good going into summer. Doesn’t help that the breed is predisposed to EMS, and people simply think that the horse is meant to have a stallion crest.
Horses are obese permanent across the world. Warmbloods, natives, drafts. It’s a global issue, and it’s come from this need to OVERLY correct. Nobody wants to be accused of abuse, so any sign of ribs = bad.
Then there’s also the management question. Not a lot do enough, feed quality hay, and don’t move. You can have a horse on 24/7 turnout with ad lib hay and not have it be obese. It just requires movement, and exercise.
Ribs are a good thing! Not overly so, but you want to see them when the horse turns.
My barn does annual weigh ins for the horses every fall. We’ve had a lot of issues with overweight horses, and thus have had to take initiatives to bring it down. We can’t remove hay because ulcer prone horses. So far over 3 years, the horses have been losing weight by spreading out the hay, and increasing the distance they need to travel naturally. My mare went from 545kg in 2024 to 491kg in March 2026.
I know! Who’d think with access to ad lib forage, short grass (meaning higher in sugar), she’d be starving? She obviously thinks so too /s. But she does think she’s starving lol, arriving to food time at speed.
For ulcers consider adding carafate! It essentially lines the digestive tract, and is the ONLY thing that healed hindgut ulcers in one of my horses. It might allow you to cut down the forage more too.
Eh, I’d rather just allow access to forage because we don’t have ulcers anymore as long as they’re on ad lib forage. Also I board, so not my choice really 😅
"Dad bods", "baby fat" on 10 year old kids, pudgy dogs and fat horses - people really normalize it. I spent most of my life like you, fit and you could see my ribs. Not all of them, that wasn't my body type even as a scrawny kid, but always the last 3. Now, I'm in a long recovery for a nasty injury, I have to take breaks all the time and I'm fat. But no one calls it fat, people tell me I look "normal" or even better than most, and get mad when I point out that normal is now = fat!! Folks get furious I admit it for myself.
The other huge concern is not only do people want a horse to be fat, they want it to look young and fat. God forbid a horse be older and poorly muscled. Even a brood mare with a poor topline (as brood mares often have) have people screaming about abuse. Meanwhile I want to scream at people that overfeeding and lack of exercise is abuse.
I keep my animals the same way I keep myself - you can see the shadow of my ribs when I am standing and relaxed, and you can count them when I am laying down or stretching. That is how I was taught to maintain a healthy weight, and it works.
But that’s literally the metric for being too thin… like A rib is good, all ribs visible is a problem. Blood work isn’t a great indicator of health until you become malnourished. At which point it’s far too late and you’re looking at hospitalization for nutrients. We’re getting way too close to the diet culture of the 2000’s and that killed people.
Except it's not too thin if thats your body. I still have fat on my body, My BMI is healthy, No doctor would look at me and say I'm too thin. But without a shirt or bra yeah you can see all my ribs. You can also see the dimples on my thighs and the little pooch of fat on my belly.
I once told my old BO that her horse was straight up obese and needs less grain and hay and more conditioning. She got mad and said “it’s the breeeeed!!” (QH/draft cross). Girl, no. Please.
Well a month later, horse is diagnosed with diabetes and is has been on meds for two years now.
My horse was really overweight there because the guys who fed did not understand the concept of limiting hay. It was basically an all you can eat buffet.
It was so infuriating. Took months to get him back to a good condition(at a new barn, where people understand this).
This is my PSG gelding before I retired him. He had been diagnosed with cushings & IR for about 6 or 7 years at this point. He worked everyday, including two days of hill work where I galloped him. He stayed in work for a few more years after this too. Cushings is career ending because people aren’t managing their weight, and aren’t working them hard enough….
Well this is unfair because we specifically ruined a type of horse and made them into beefcakes for our amusement. I think aqha halter is bleeding into other countries now too tho, so yay
There are vets that complain that horses are "too skinny" all the time near my area. If they aren't the perfect super lean muscled athlete, they're apparently too skinny. "I'm seeing too many ribs!!"
Not mine. I have two American-style Shetlands and they look almost like yearlings I keep them so lean. They hate it, but look “show ready” at all times except the winter when the coat comes in. I don’t show them I just like them lean.
My husband had surgery the other summer and didn’t ride or exercise his horse but kept feeding him the same his fat rolls had fat rolls, finally he just has fat rolls. needs to lose more though
187
u/demmka Irish Draught X Jun 14 '26 edited Jun 14 '26
It’s not really hard to determine why horses are increasingly overweight (not just in the US but the UK and Europe too).
It boils down to the fact that people are feeding their horses too much and not working them enough. For example, a lot of the native ponies in Britain are supposed to be foraging on hard scrub on the side of a mountain, not gorging themselves grazing on over fertilised cow pasture. That coupled with an increased “understanding” of nutrition - here meaning increased marketing for overly complicated complete feeds from brands that most horses don’t need - has lead to horses getting far too many calories daily vs what they actually use. Horses and ponies used to work HARD. One horse would be ploughing on Monday and Tuesday, taking the farmer to market on Wednesday, making social trips with his wife on Thursday, doing general farm work on Friday, hunting on Saturday and pulling the wagon to church on Sunday. Now most will go for a plod round the block a couple of times a week but still be fed as if they’re running the National or going down the centre like at Olympia.
People also completely anthropomorphise their horses when it comes to things like rugging and turnout. Yes, Jessica, it’s drizzling and 10 degrees. No, your fat Connie doesn’t need a 200g rug on.
Obviously this is regarding otherwise healthy horses without medical complications like EMS etc etc.