A week following the Dec. 23 release of information about the University of Kentucky’s pasture monitoring related to mare reproductive loss syndrome (MRLS), Jimmy Henning, PhD, extension forage specialist at the University of Kentucky (UK) discussed some of the findings. There are some “real positive things” contained in the report, he said; the most important was that “we know a lot more about what is normal” in Kentucky pastures.

“For example, we know we can have cyanide in white clover, but it’s not that much, and it’s not a real problem,” he said. “We know the mineral content (of forages) during weather changes.”

The testing won’t end with one season, and monitoring will continue in 2003, he added.

One of the things that agronomists learned is that the grasses normally found in Kentucky are not changed that much by weather, and that horse managers have done a good job managing pastures. So, while weather has an indirect effect on MRLS, it’s more coincidental due to the presence of Eastern tent caterpillars (ETC) in pastures than the weather itself. “If there were no Eastern tent caterpillars and the same weather, there would be no problems,” he said