Conference noted::equitation

    Two of my appy broodmares have the same problem when they have
    foals on them...One mare we wean when the baby is 3 months and
    the other we wean when 4 months..The babies will do fine if they
    are on a worming schedule and a good feeding program..2 of these
    babies went on to win a World and National Championships..And of
    course for our Moms we then put them on a feeding schedule and as
    as their bag dries up we then add grain..etc..In a few weeks they
    are back to normal and since they have already been bred back they
    now ready for the next 11 months .First time Moms will sometime experience
    this also...Is this your mares first baby?
    
    Louise
    
    

    I agree with the previous reply.  Foals will pull mares down.  When we
    wean we take all the grain away until her bag is really drying up,
    giving her all the hay she wants and water.  Then we start to add the
    grain back on a slow basis.  The mares pop back usually within a couple
    of months.
    
    Good luck
    
    Kathie
    

    Yes. this is lady frist...
    
    	I have moved her to my parents house which is fields of grass
    	and plenty of water.  Should I put anything on her bag...?
    	
    She is doing fine I called my parents aleast 4 times yesterday
    and they said she is doing great.. 
    
    	The baby is another thing all together she is inside and
    	is not happy about the situation at all.. how long till 
    	she settles down...? I didn't want to get her a play mate
    	because I figured she would get a attached to the play mate.
    
    	What other things can I do keep the baby entertained..?

    The best thing for a weanling is the company of another weanling.  If
    you know of someone who is going to wean their foal in the near future,
    try to get two of them turned out together somewhere.  Sure they get
    attached to the other foal, but they run and play together and learn
    what its like to be horses!  Plus they get a ton of exersize.  When
    I weaned my filly, I took her to my friends house, she had a colt that
    was 7 days older.  We then took both mares to another barn so there
    wouldn't be any calling etc.  It took the foals a couple of hours to
    get used to each other and not having their mothers, but they were
    fine.  They stayed together almost 3 months, and would have been 
    together all winter had my filly not gotten an eye infection that
    needed medication 6 times a day.  

    We did the same as the previous folks did.  Worked out better even
    though we did have other horses around at the same time.  The foal
    really does need the exercise and since they are social animals they do
    need companionship.
    
    They teach each other a lot.  After a couple of months we put them in a
    field with the oldsters.  They certainly taught them a lot.
    
    Good luck
    

    
    the only thing I have available to me is some ponies but, 
    I am afraid that she might get kicked.
    
    	suggestions...

    Where do you live?  I am not too sure about ponies...  She may get
    kicked no matter who she is with.  Usually it starts with a warning,
    which most of them pay attention to.  Part of her frustration will be
    that she only know socialization with her mother.  It definitely won't
    be the same with another horse.  When they are both weanlings they are
    both in the same position which makes them look to each other...no "who
    is top dog".
    
    The socialization is the big thing and they usually look after
    themselves....you would be surprised.  We have had about 10 foals and
    depending on what we had available at the time dictated how we weaned
    them.  The last one was alone so we put her with the two oldsters and a
    small 5 year old we had.  She chumed up with the younger one...no
    squabbles.  You will find that they are usually very submissive at this
    age and do what I call "gumming" to their companions.
    
    Good luck....
    
    Kathie

    I would suggest that if she is the only baby around leave her by
    herself that way you don't have to worry about her getting kicked
    or hurt...If she is in a barn just make sure you take her out and
    excerise her everday. You then become her best buddy and surprisingly
    then how she will respond to you...After weaning it usually only takes
    a few days for the baby to settle down..They can sure make you nervous
    until then...
    
    Louise                      

    I'd like to add two things:
    
    1. Most people don't realize how much extra nutrition a mare needs when
    she is nursing a foal. Most recommendations I have seen suggest that a
    mare needs TWICE as much feed when nursing compared to when she is not
    nursing or pregnant. Depending on the mare, that could mean 12 pounds
    or quarts of grain and 30 pounds of good quality high nutrition hay.
    The hay might be grass mixed with either clover or alfalfa. Some people
    use straight alfalfa but we don't like to use it. So if your mare
    wasn't getting quite enough feed, nursing would pull her down over 4
    months
    
    2. In the past when we had foals, we made it a practice to introduce
    them to the rest of the herd WHILE they were still with their dam. The
    mare is very protective of the foal and keeps it from harm. Then when
    weaning time came around we would simply remove Mom from the herd. The
    foal already knew its herdmates so there was no trouble. This worked
    well for 1 foal situations. We would typically introduce the foal to
    the herd at the age of 3 to 3 weeks. We put Mom and Baby out in the
    pasture first then introduced the others 1 at a time. It worked for us.
    You might try something like that next time...or even now...find a
    quiet older horse; introduce them; then the others

    
    	I have been giving Lady vitimins and extra food from when
    	I got her in April.  The orginal owner couldn't tell me how
    	much she was getting.. I figure he just left all his horses out
    	in the pasture (he had over 100 achers)  Lady weighs less than
    	a 1000 pds.. 
    
    	Update..:
    
    	Went riding last night.. this seperation doesn't seem to bother
    	lady at all and I get the use of my parents ring which Lady
    	was in need of.  The baby is doing much better tonight we
    	are going to let her out in the pasture to play while we 
    	cut the grass or work out side.  My husband has been walking
    	her at night but she really needs to get some steam out.
    
    	My father has said she is looking much better already and
    	he feels I made the right decision because she is much perker
    	already.
    
    	Thanks for all the advise... 

    
    I had a wonderful old broodmare that produced milk like a Holstein. 
    Her foals were always fat and healthy but I had a really hard time
    keeping her from looking like a Biafran refugee. 
    
    I ended up giving her essentially free choice grain and hay and pasture. 
    When the foal was 1 month to 5 months old she ate about 25 lbs of 
    16% feed mix per day (the foal had access to that grain also).  
    I also showed her and if she dropped weight it would take months to get 
    her back, so it was easier to keep feeding her.  And if she was in foal
    again, once her weight dropped, it was almost impossible to get her
    back in shape.  She was about 15 2 hands and weighed around 1100 lbs.  
    She produced her last foal when she was 23.
    
    With our mares and foals (I usually had only 2 or 3 mares with foals), 
    they were turned out with one or two of the other horses early on. 
    Then when they were getting along I would add the rest of the group. 
    
    The foals invariably would buddy up with my geldings.  During weaning
    I would turn the foals out with the gelding(s) and turned the mares 
    out together with the rest of the group.  There was very little
    fretting or screaming.  Usually by the time we weaned the mares and
    foals spent very little time together.
    
    Mary Jo

Picking up on Mary Jo wrote:  The baby was probably eating some of what you
were feeding the mare, so the mare probably wasn't getting everything you may
have thought she was getting.