No. Even though I had to restrict Shaun's grazing, I couldn't restrict his food intake. I had to make sure that he had unlimited hay so that he could eat at his leisure. For horses with problems such as Shaun's, it does no good to allow them to get hungry. The gut has to be kept moving at all times and restricting their food intake can have a detrimental and even serious affect.

However, if your horse is perhaps very overweight and you have to restrict food, perhaps you could try soaking your hay to get all of the sugar out of it and that way you can feed more of it. I would personally stay clear of haylage for horses with the same problems as Shaun, but this is just my own opinion. I sometimes give Shaun a little haylage as a treat, but I believe the best forage, apart from grass, is a good quality hay.

If your horse does not have a problem with impaction colic, then you could perhaps feed straw in between the hay and grass so that your horse always has something to nibble on - but talk to your vet about this first.

The important thing with this problem is to keep the gut moving. Allowing the horse to get hungry can lead to problems. Discuss things with your vet and work out what is best for your own particular horse.

Let's not forget that a horse is designed to graze at will, and if given the freedom to do so will graze for 17 hours per day, and often more. A greedy horse may never lift its head, but most horses take reasonably lengthy breaks from time to time throughout each day.

But not all horses get troubled by gas build-up, whether they are greedy or not, and whether they are fat or otherwise.

So, On With Shaun's Story

Every day brought anxiety when I would be ever alert for the tell-tale signs of stomach pain. With Shaun it started off, always, with him pawing the ground with a foreleg. That was all I needed to see to know that he had the onset of yet another colic attack.

Many horses take gas build-up, some even become very bloated, uncomfortable and depressed by it - but they don't all take "colic" as such.

When Shaun took an attack I always called the vet. Sometimes I would have to call him out more than once a day and he would always have to administer anti-spasmodic drugs. Shaun would then have to "fast" for some hours following an episode of colic.

I was demented with worry. I knew I had to find something to "prevent" this gas build-up but where could I find it? I thought that if there was something available to help then surely my vet would have recommended it. But nobody had ever come up with a suggestion of what I could do, apart from restricting his grazing. This wasn't the best remedy for my horse, but until such times as I could find something to help him, it was about all I could do.

However, I was armed with determination and after many months of searching across the globe I came across a marvellous product called Activated Charcoal.