Sand Colic

If your horses live in a sandy area they will eat sand. If they are unable to pass the sand the result can be serious.

 

Sand Colic

If your horses live in a sandy area or a dirt paddock they will inadvertently eat sand. Sand Colic typically will not present a significant problem when your horses are on irrigated pastures.

While the consumption of sand is amplified if you are feeding directly off the ground, it also happens when horses pull their food out of the feeders before eating. The dirt is simply taken-in as the horse eats. As expected, the finer the dirt the more that is consumed. If your horses are lucky enough to live on irrigated pastures, Sand Colic is infrequent and typically does not present a significant problem. However, if you have your horse in a dirt paddock or sandy pasture they will inadvertently eat sand. The dirt and sand is simply undigested as the horse eats.

Sand will usually move through the stomach and small intestine quickly causing little problem. Once the sand reaches the cecum, the blind pouch forming the beginning of the large intestine, its movement slows and the sand tends to settle to the lowest portions of the large intestine.

If your horse is unable to pass the sand the result can be serious. As the sand moves around within the large intestine it irritates and erodes the lining.

Common symptoms that your horse may have a problem:

• Restlessness manifested by pawing, repeated getting up and lying down and rolling over
• Kicking at the belly
• Looking at the flank
• May adopt a dog-setting posture
• Lying down and getting up carefully
• Appears lifeless, drooping head, depressed
• Weight loss
• Unable to gain weight regardless of change in diet
• Decreased appetite
• Watery diarrhea

As the sand accumulates in the large intestine, it acts like sand paper causing the intestinal lining to be wear away.

The results may include:

• an inability to absorb water
• loss of the ability to digest nutrients
• discomfort and pain

Your horse may experience any one or any combination as a result of sand the digestive tract.

 

American Association of Equine Practitioners, Veterinary Rounds

Question: What do you recommend to help prevent sand colic? We have friends who give a wheat bran and mineral oil mash once a month, and other friends who give their horses psyllium once a month. I've talked to just enough people, and read just enough articles to get myself confused. Hope you can help.

Answer: The primary way to prevent sand colic is to keep the horses from ingesting sand. Ideally this means making sure pastures have sufficient grass to prevent the horses from having to graze close to the ground or exposed sand. Hay and grain should be fed off the ground or in a container so that horses that spill or spread their feed will not eat hay or grain contaminated by sandy soil. Unfortunately there is no easy way to prevent sand accumulation by dosing with a particular laxative. Use of mineral oil appears to have minimal effect on preventing sand accumulation. Similarly there is no evidence that bran fed intermittently or regularly helps to prevent sand from accumulating in the colon. Use of psyllium has been recommended as a feed additive both daily and at regular intervals, but using this every day may allow more rapid the digestion of the psyllium, thereby making it ineffective as a laxative. If used at 2-3 week intervals the dosage needs to be sufficient to help increase the water content of the feed material in the intestine. This is difficult to accomplish with just one dose administered in the feed. Sand accumulation in the colon can be diagnosed with an abdominal radiograph. An ultrasound examination is also effective in finding sand in the ventral colons.

The easiest method to check to see if your horse may have ingested sand is to dissolve 5 or 6 fecal balls of fresh manure in a bucket of water. Break the manure apart slowly allowing the sand settling to the bottom.

More then one half teaspoon of sand per 5-6 fecal balls is significant. Horses will pass varying amounts of sand at different times, therefore repeated the technique with different passing of manure. This technique can give you an indication that your horse is has a sand problem.  Another indicator that you have a sand problem is to have your veterinarian to listen to the horse’s abdomen with a stethoscope. Sand inside a horse’s intestines sounds like waves on the beach.  Depending on how active the intestine’s motility (spontaneous motion) is, it may be impossible to hear much sand movement. The fecees test and listening to the horse's gut are indicators and may prove inconclusive.

When you suspect a sand problem call your vet.

The best way to treat sand problems is to PREVENT them. While it is difficult to prevent horses from ingesting any sand.

To reduce the amount of sand ingested:

• use rubber mats under feeders (where the horses pull their hay out)
• use large feeders which can’t be overturned
• feed in stall on top of shavings or straw
• feed on old dry manure (make sure the horse is regularly de-wormed).