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Attention Deficit Disorder Syndrome in children and adults has been recognized by the medical community as a very real problem. Poor performance at work or school, the inability to focus on a task and see it through; erratic and antisocial behavior all are symptomatic. Although recognized in humans for over 100 years, it has never been reported in other species; yet inexplicable changes in behavior or performance are common in a number of domestic animals, horses included.

How do diet and the management of that diet impact behavior? Simply put, too much of a good thing in too short a time becomes a recipe for disaster. This is true under a variety of conditions, and can be experienced by even pastured horses, but usually it is horses in training or competing in the show pen that are most effected. In the horse, nutrient utilization is heavily dependant upon hind gut breakdown of ingested feed through the action of the bacteria that naturally live there. This breakdown is called fermentation. Feeds that are calorically dense, and chemically made up of carbohydrate in a rapidly fermentable form are the triggering mechanisms. The negative impact of such diets is made worse by rapid consumption over a limited period of time. This causes digestive upset, which becomes a source of nonspecific pain and irritation to the horse. A horse’s reaction to irritation is to move away, but in this situation escape becomes impossible. Such horses react the only way they know how and that is to focus on the source of irritation. It becomes a vicious cycle that is almost impossible to break without a new approach to equine nutritional management.

ReStore™ is an equine specific nutreceutical that has been shown to be effective in maximizing digestive efficiency in the horse. It does this by stimulating the natural digestive process, thus minimizing the risks associated with feeding calorically dense, readily fermentable grain based rations, or any situation where rapid fermentation can lead to problems, such as pastured horses or even horses fed good quality grass hay. By breaking the cycle of feed and irritation, ReStore™ allows your horse to keep his head where you want it to be, in the game, not worrying about how to relieve pain.

The season is rapidly approaching when decisions must be made and money must be spent on breeding next year’s futurity winner. This is the easy part. Getting a mare in foal can be a very frustrating experience. It is also almost always guaranteed to be expensive. However, recent breakthroughs in the physiological chemistry of both the breeding mare and stallion offer new hope in making breeding your mare less like a trip to your local casino.

The key to minimizing risk (both physiological and financial) in equine reproductive management is to understand exactly what is going on and what are the consequences of that action. To begin, equine sex, properly done, is a violent, stressful activity, even when the stallion is not an active participant.  Outside elements such as extenders, and even semen that are inserted into the mare, can be viewed as "foreign material", especially since the uterus of the mare is so immunologically active.  This in and of itself poses problems, but to add insult to injury, if the union of the stallion’s sperm and the mare’s egg is successful, the end result is a parasitic organism (read foal) that is eventually expelled when the mare’s body has had enough.

Successful reproduction, the production of a live foal at birth, involves short-circuiting a series of physiological checks and balances inherent in the mare to ward off infection and deal with immunological challenges. Physiological chemists have discovered that two fatty acids found predominantly in fish oils, docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) and eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA) appear to play a key roll in allowing and maintaining a successful pregnancy. They also report that to work, the DHA and EPA must be available to the mare in a specific ratio that only exists in certain cold water fish oils.

For the past four years, Biovance’s technical team has worked closely with a leading supplier of a DHA/EPA complex to develop a product that is effective in horses. This product is palatable, and “user friendly”. It is also highly biologically available due to a proprietary process used in its manufacture. Finally, it is cost effective. This product, called Target E, will soon be available -- just in time for the breeding season. Look for details on our website and upcoming newsletters.

ReStore™ Field Study Reports

Alice Lancaster - Pahrump, NV - December, 2006 

In the past several years, the practice of breeding mares with cooled shipped semen has increased in popularity. This type of breeding may be very rewarding or very frustrating. We have learned over the years that there are a number of steps a mare owner can take to increase breeding success.

• Mares need to be exposed to 16 hours of continuous light; thus, she needs to be placed in a stall in the evening and exposed to artificial light to extend natural light hours to 16 hours.
• While stalled, light intensity needs to be 200 watts.
• Many barns use timers to turn on/shut off lights automatically. These timers need to be adjusted weekly to accommodate the time change in natural daylight.

• A general physical exam to evaluate the mare’s overall health.
• A rectal ultrasound exam to evaluate her ovaries and uterus and to establish at what stage of her estrus (heat) cycle she is.
• If there have been breeding problems in the past or if there is an abnormality detected on the ultrasound exam, a uterine culture and cytology and/or uterine biopsy may be taken. These additional tests help to further evaluate the overall health of the uterus and to determine the mare’s ability to conceive and maintain a pregnancy to term.