Body Condition Scoring: Hands-On Help for Your Horse

Learn how to evaluate your horse’s body condition score and how the skill could help his health in the long run.
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It’s common for two people can look at the same horse and view it with two different eyes. One person might regard a horse as fat, but to the other he might appear to be just right. One person might describe a horse as “ribby,” but in the eyes of another the animal appears lean and fit. But rather judging a horse’s weigh subjectively, horse owners have a better option at their disposal: body condition scoring.

Since the mid-1980’s, veterinarians and equine nutritionists have employed this system to measure fat coverage in horses as a more objective way to assess a horse’s weight. Don Henneke, PhD, developed the Henneke Body Condition Scoring (BSC) system during his graduate study at Texas A & M University, and the system remains the most reliable tool in determining a horse’s body condition. If done on a regular basis, it is an excellent way to monitor a horse’s nutritional well-being over time.

The Henneke Scoring System

Henneke’s BCS system is a 9-point scale designed to describe the amount of fat and muscle a horse is carrying. A score of 1 is considered to be a poor or emaciated horse with no body fat, while a 9 is extremely fat or obese.

“The 1 to 9 scale is scientifically published and accepted, and has been in use for many years since Dr. Henneke developed it,” says Gayle Ecker, director of the University of Guelph’s Equine Guelph, in Ontario, Canada. “While (the scale) is generally included in most courses on horse care and nutrition, there are many horse owners that have not been exposed to this system of assessment and fewer still that have had structured training on it

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