CAUSES OF HORSE’S ESOPHAGEAL OBSTRUCTION
Esophageal obstruction or “strangulation” in horses is caused by food getting stuck in the esophagus. Urgent action by a veterinarian is vital.
Since horses are unable to vomit or belch (soft palate), they may suffocate and urgent veterinary action is vital.
The causes are very often due to feeding at irregular times, which results in “greedy” behavior in the horse during meals, with insufficient chewing and therefore poor salivation. Lack of water in the summer can also be an aggravating factor for horses in the paddock that are brought in at night and receive their ration without having taken the time to hydrate.
This can also be observed in horses fed outside the stable and in rivalry phenomena between “dominant and dominated” in which the dominated animal, worried about not being able to finish its ration, will accelerate its food intake.
These problems also arise in the case of rapid transitions from water-rich rations (pasture) to dry rations (feed + dry forage); the best solution in this case is to provide hay before the feed in order to encourage your horse to chew its food and therefore to salivate well.
NERVOUS HORSES ARE MORE PRONE TO THESE PROBLEMS
This phenomenon is exacerbated by a lack of water but also by an inadequate functioning of the salivary glands and a bad dentition (an annual visit to the equine dentist is essential).
The size and hardness of the pellets are not to blame in this situation as horses’ teeth are efficient enough to crush conventional pellets.
It is true that flake feeds have an advantage over pellets because they allow horses to chew their food longer.
Royal Horse has formulated its feeds by prohibiting or limiting in its specifications certain raw materials that tend to harden the pellet and hardness tests are done regularly to control throughout the year that our pellets remain in the standard that we impose to avoid this problem. It is the same for the size and the diameter.
