Equimins specialises in producing natural horse supplies, products and supplements for the major areas associated with caring for a horse. All products are proudly made in the UK and excellent specification quality products are of paramount importance. Using this blog we want to share some of the knowledge we have gained through nearly 30 years of experience. 
What are Probiotics?
This question often comes up in the course of discussions with customers when talking about overall nutrition.
There is sometimes confusion about exactly what Probiotics are.
Question
Are probiotics and prebiotics important for health?
Is it important to include probiotics and prebiotics in a healthy diet?
Answer
Horses don’t necessarily need probiotics — a type of “good” bacteria — to be healthy. However, these microorganisms do help with digestion and offer protection from harmful bacteria, just as the existing “good” bacteria in the body already do.
Prebiotics are nondigestible carbohydrates that act as food for probiotics. When probiotics and prebiotics are combined, they form a synbiotic. Fermented dairy products, such as yogurt, are considered synbiotic because they contain live bacteria and the fuel they need to thrive.
Probiotics are found in foods such as yogurt, but you would need to feed your horse a bucketful to get the same amount of live bacteria as you get in a dose of Equimins Inner Balance Probiotics. Prebiotics are found in things like garlic, honey, artichokes, by-products from sugar beet etc.
The problem with antibiotics is that they not only kill off pathogenic infection, they kill off the good bacteria too, so after antibiotic treatment, horses will recover much faster by receiving prebiotics and probiotics to help rebuild the immune system.
They can also be used to treat loose droppings and stomach disorders.
Very often certain strains of live yeast are referred to as probiotics but they are not the same as Lactobacillus Acidophilus and Bifido bacterium that we know as probiotics. Equimins do use a particular strain of saccharomyces cerivisae live yeast in selected supplements as this greatly assists the digestion of fibre in the hind gut and again keeps the gut healthy. Our Advance Concentrate Complete contains all of these ingredients, as does Young Stock supplement, Veteran supplement and Pro-Bio Supplement.
