Blog Hop: Supplements

I'm late to the supplements blog hop party, but I've wanted to write about it for a little while because it's something I'm agonizing over right now.

Tristan has been on various regimens in the past, and here's what he's getting right now.

1/2 quart of Blue Seal Carb Guard, AM & PM

Basically nothing, basically cardboard. He's been on this since his Cushings diagnosis. It does the job of making him feel like he's getting grain, serving as a vehicle for his meds, and giving him at least some very, very basic nutrition that he's not getting out of hay or grass.

1 gram of pergolide, AM, ~$0.50 per day

Cushings meds. Non-negotiable. They keep him alive (or, at least, from progressing in a nasty degenerative condition). He's held quite well on 1 gram, but we test regularly and keep a close eye on him. I expect that this will increase at some point in the (hopefully distant) future. I've toyed with the idea of Prascend, the name brand tablet version, but can't talk myself into it since he does just fine on the compounded powder.

200mg of cetirizine, AM & PM, ~$3.00 per day

Summer allergy meds. Not cheap. But they prevent the hives, and they are seasonal - roughly 2.5 months out of the year. So this is more like an annual expense of $500 or so than an ongoing monthly cost.

6mL Pentosan, IM, every 4 weeks, ~$15 per dose

Tris does fantastically well on this, and I have zero intentions of changing it. It's far cheaper than Adequan or joint injections, and I can feel the difference in our rides in the week after he gets a dose. I'm actually considering moving him to every 3 weeks.

In general nutrition terms, he's also out on grass and eats about 4 flakes of hay a day.

Now, the part I'm thinking through hard.

Right now, he's on SmartVite Perform Senior, 2 scoops or about 100mg a day, and 10,000 mg of MSM a day, also through SmartPak.

As anyone who has ever fed SmartPaks knows, they are convenient and terrific...and expensive. Tristan's run me about $45 per month, and I am staring down the gullet of several thousand dollars in vet bills between his hijinks and then the dog's.

If I saw a clear, obvious, discernable benefit from the supplements I would not be having this conversation. I'd find a way to make it work.

But I'm not entirely sure he's eating them. I think he's powderizing the supplements and picking out his grain. He's definitely leaving a lot of mashed up formerly-pellet powder in his grain bucket. I need to do some definitive tests to be sure it's the supplements and not the grain he's leaving behind - and vice versa - but he's done this before with other supplements.

If he's truly not eating them, then I have two options: just cancel them and let him be on what he's eating now, or find something else that he will eat.

He's on the SmartVite because I wanted, essentially, a multivitamin. Time on grass is limited in Vermont, and he gets so little grain he's certainly not getting the full benefit of whatever might be in that. I wanted to cover up any gaps he might have in his nutritional profile with the feed-through equivalent of a band-aid, which I admit is a bit lazy of me.

But do I really need to do that? Is there something I could be doing better? Is he really not even eating the supplements and I'm spending $$ on powder that gets dumped from his grain bucket? I'm a bit nervous about dropping the idea of a vitamin supplement out of his diet entirely.

Anyone have consoling thoughts for me? Suggestions of other vitamin supplements or ration balancers?