After more than 25 years of working with horses and developing equine nutrition products, one thing has remained constant: our understanding of the horse and its digestive system. The horse has not changed nearly as much as the environment in which we keep it.

Modern horses may live in stalls, paddocks or dry lots. Hay may be provided at scheduled times instead of being available throughout much of the day. Horses may also receive concentrates, commercial feeds and other supplements. Modern horse management has many advantages, but the horse's digestive system is still designed around forage, frequent intake and a large population of microorganisms in the hindgut.

That has always been the foundation of our approach to BioEquine. Our formulation changed this year as ingredients have become unavailable, better sources have become available and we have been able to refine the product. But the underlying philosophy has not changed. We have always believed that every ingredient in a horse supplement should have a purpose, should complement the forage-based diet and should address the horse's digestive and nutritional needs as a whole rather than focusing on one isolated issue.

The Horse's Digestive System Was Designed for Forage

A horse living naturally spends much of its day moving through its environment and consuming forage. Rather than eating a few large meals ,it is adapted to consuming forage over long periods of time. Chewing forage produces saliva, which contains bicarbonate and other buffering components that help protect the stomach from its continuously produced acid.

This is important because the horse's stomach produces hydrochloric acid continuously. It does not simply turn acid production on when the horse eats and off when the stomach is empty. Forage intake and chewing therefore play an important role in the natural protection of the stomach.

After the stomach, digestion continues through the small intestine and then into the hindgut, where the cecum and colon contain a large population of microorganisms responsible for fermenting fibre. This microbial population is an essential part of how the forage-based horse gets energy from its diet.

The Hindgut Is More Than a Passageway

The cecum and colon are home to a complex microbial population. These microorganisms ferment fibre that the horse cannot digest with its own enzymes. When the hindgut environment is stable, this microbial population can do the job it is designed to do. When the environment changes significantly, the microbial population can change as well.

Hindgut acidosis is one example. When excessive starch or other rapidly fermentable carbohydrates reach the hindgut, fermentation can shift, acids can accumulate and pH can fall. This can negatively affect microorganisms that are important to fibre digestion.

That is one reason we have always considered the microbial side of digestion when developing BioEquine. Yeast and MOS are included as part of that approach, along with probiotics. Each has a different role, which is why we do not consider a single probiotic or single ingredient to be the complete answer to digestive health.

The Modern Horse Eats Different Forage

Hay is the foundation of the modern forage-based horse's diet, but hay is different from the diverse forage environment a horse would encounter naturally. Hay is grown, harvested at a particular stage of maturity, dried and stored. Its nutritional profile can vary according to the plants being grown, soil conditions, weather, maturity and agricultural practices.

A horse living on pasture also experiences changing plants and forage throughout the seasons. Most horses eating hay are receiving a much more consistent and limited selection of forage. That does not mean hay is poor nutrition. It means it is different nutrition.

The same applies to the soil. Plants obtain nutrients from the soil, and soil conditions and repeated harvesting can influence the nutritional profile of forage. We cannot completely recreate a natural grazing environment in modern horse management. What we can do is recognize the difference and provide consistent nutritional support alongside the forage being fed.

That is the basis of our hay-balancer approach.

Why We Use a Hay-Balancer Approach

BioEquine was designed to complement a forage-based diet, not replace forage. We also do not believe a horse needs a separate product for every individual nutritional concern.

The digestive system works as a connected process. What happens in the stomach affects what moves into the small intestine. What is not digested there reaches the hindgut. What reaches the hindgut affects fermentation and the microbial population. Those microbes, in turn, play an important role in fibre digestion.

That is why we have always approached BioEquine as a comprehensive digestive and nutritional supplement rather than a product built around one isolated problem.

Four Purposeful Avenues of Support

BioEquine is built around four complementary avenues of support.

Zeolite and its useful properties: Zeolite has a porous structure, a high surface area and the ability to adsorb certain substances. It also has cation-exchange properties that make it useful in nutritional and digestive applications. We chose zeolite because of these qualities and because it fits our basic philosophy: an ingredient should be included for a reason.

Vitamin and mineral support: Forage provides many of the nutrients a horse needs, but forage is not nutritionally identical from one source to another. BioEquine provides additional vitamin and mineral support alongside the forage-based diet. We do not add nutrients simply because they are common on supplement labels. Each component should have a purpose within the overall formulation.

Yeast and MOS/prebiotic support: Yeast and MOS are part of our focus on the digestive and microbial environment. MOS, or mannan-oligosaccharides, are components derived from yeast cell walls and are used in animal nutrition as part of digestive and microbial support. They have a different role from live probiotic organisms, which is why we consider them a separate avenue of support.

Probiotic support: Probiotics provide another avenue of support for the microbial side of digestion. But probiotics are not the entire answer. The microorganisms in the hindgut also depend on the environment in which they live and the material available for fermentation. That is why probiotics are one part of BioEquine rather than the entire formulation.

The Formula Can Change Without the Philosophy Changing

BioEquine has never been built around one ingredient or one nutritional trend. The four avenues of support have always been central to our approach: base material, vitamin and mineral support, yeast and MOS/prebiotic support, and probiotic support.

The individual ingredients can change as better sources become available or existing ingredients become unavailable. That is exactly what happened with the 2026 reformulation.

But we did not change our understanding of the horse. We refined the ingredients while maintaining the same four avenues that have always been at the centre of BioEquine.

The formula can change without the philosophy changing.

What More Than 25 Years Has Confirmed

For more than 25 years, we have continued to see the importance of understanding the horse as a forage-based animal with a digestive system designed around frequent intake, fibre digestion and microbial fermentation.

Today's horses may live in very different environments from horses living naturally. Feeding schedules, housing, hay production and available ingredients have all changed. The horse's basic digestive design has not.

That is why BioEquine continues to be built around the same simple principles: forage should remain the foundation, digestive health should be considered as a whole, and every ingredient should have a purpose.

We do not need to chase every new nutritional trend. We need to continue selecting purposeful ingredients and making them work together in a formulation designed for the forage-based horse.

Four purposeful avenues of support, working together for the forage-based horse.