VITAMIN B12
VITAMIN B12 is manufactured by the bacteria in the horse's hind gut and is essential for all kinds of metabolic processes. It is not supplied in the diet – we have seen claims that it is present in anything thing from forage to yeasts but it is not produced by plants (or indeed yeasts or animals). B12 can be found in plants but it's a fair assessment that a positive test is a result of bacterial production of B12 in the plant source. Similarly, yeasts do not naturally supply B12 despite a lot of marketing claims, unless they are enriched (or contaminated!) A competent, normally functioning gut with a healthy microbial population will supply all of the B12 a horse needs. However, when we are considering horses with a compromised hind gut, whether through illness, stress or chronic conditions such as acidosis, it made sense to us that a dietary supply of B12 may be a wise precaution. We therefore add the highly bioavailable cyanocobalamin form of Vitamin B12 to the products we make for stressed, gutty and otherwise gut-challenged horses.
We use VITAMIN B12 in the following products:
