In both Chinese and Ayurvedic medicine, a variety of foods and herbs are used throughout the year to balance the body system. Specific foods, herbs, and spices are used depending on the season.
In traditional Chinese medicine, fall is associated with the “Metal Element.” It is characterized by expansion, contraction, and transformation. The metal element is associated with lungs and the large intestine as well as the skin, nose, and throat. During autumn, the lungs are most easily out of balance and the body system is susceptible to colds and immune system deficiencies; the large intestine can become dry, thus slowing the digestive process.
In Ayurvedic medicine, autumn it is the time of Vata (known as the cool wind) that increases dryness in the body system, which can produce anxiety, constipation, dry skin, and cracking joints.
Specific foods for autumn
There are specific foods that support a balancing of the metal element, and the balancing of Vata.
Increase oil in the diet: the best oils are warming oils like sunflower or flax seed oil or camelina oil. Hemp oil is also a good choice as it is neutral (can be used in all seasons). Ghee, which is clarified butter, and found in most health food stores, is a warming food, and horses love it. You don’t need much: 1 tablespoon of ghee once or twice per day is an optimal dose.
Pears are a moistening food. Almonds reinforce the strength of the lungs. You don’t need to feed a lot: a handful of sliced almonds or a chopped pear (with seeds removed) once a day can support the body’s need to overcome dryness during the autumn season.
Spices: Turmeric and ginger are very warming. They help overcome the cool and dryness of autumn. A ¼ teaspoon of dried turmeric, or ginger powder in the feed can assist in balancing the seasonal affects of coolness and dryness.
Grains: Oats, rice bran, amaranth, and quinoa are especially beneficial as protective foods in autumn. Traditional Chinese medicine points to these grains as being supportive for both the lungs and the digestive system.
Kale and carrots: Both of these foods are warming and supportive. Feed ¼ cup of chopped kale per day, and or 1–2 carrots. If your horse is metabolic, soak the carrots to remove some sugars or only feed half a carrot per day.
Yeast: A warming food that can help overcome sluggishness in the intestines, Saccharomyces cerevisiae, is highly recommended for horses. Studies indicate it appears to limit the extent of undesirable changes in the intestinal system. Good choices include brewer’s yeast, nutritional yeast, or an active dry yeast probiotic with a high CFU count.
market carrots
Other warming foods
Pumpkins: Either cooked or fed raw, many horses will eat the rind as well as the meat. Additionally, pumpkin seeds are very beneficial because they provide the amino acid Arginine, which the body uses as a substrate for Nitric Oxide, the master circulatory molecule in the body.
Tangerines are part of the lung yin supporting foods for persistant coughs.
Apples help reduce lung dryness associated with dry skin, as well as itchiness.
If you feed a wet feed, autumn is a good time to use warm, room-temperature, or hot water to mix with the feed. Autumn is the time that the body needs both moisture and warming elements to balance the dryness of the season.
For the easy keepers and metabolic horses
In Ayurveda the body type associated with Insulin Resistance and easy keepers is called Kapha. This body type is associated with heavy, cool, and moist properties. To support Kapha horses during the autumn, favor small amounts of oil such as camelina or hemp. You can feed small amounts of carrots, kale, apples, tangerines, and pears. Pick one fruit and vegetable per day. This is a good time of year to add some cinnamon for the warming element as well as turmeric and or ginger. Pumpkin seeds (1–4 tablespoons per day) is fine for Kapha horses, as are small amounts of sliced almonds or almond powder.
Ashwaganda
This is an important herb for autumn as it is balancing to the body system. It is a powerful adaptogenic tonic that supports the body’s ability to adapt to stress, promotes a healthy immune response, and maintains homeostasis. It is considered a Rasayana plant, or one that is rejuvenating and that nourishes and strengthens. It’s an excellent herb for all horses, especially easy keepers and metabolic horses, as well as horses under stress.
Foods to avoid
Avoid feeding the following foods year round:
Soy - Soy can act as an endocrine disruptor, due to the phytoestrogens in it. Soy is higher in phytoestrogens than just about any other food source. It is considered “goitrogenic,” or thyroid suppressing. Also, in most forms it has been genetically modified. thus exposed to higher amounts of the herbicide Glyphosate.
Refined sugars — Avoid white sugar, corn syrup, high fructose corn syrup, sucrose, dextrose, and molasses, which can be up to 20 percent free fructose and 38 percent sucrose, and often sulfured meaning sulfur dioxide is added as a preservative. These refined sugars are metabolized differently than starches. Although the calories may be the same, the metabolic consequences are quite different. Fructose in refined sugars is metabolized by the liver and in sufficient quantity the liver will convert much of it to fat, which can lead insulin resistance, and possibly Equine Cushings disease.
Processed foods — Much has been written on the human health challenges that result from a processed food diet. Real (clean) food does not contain preservatives, artificial colors, artificial flavors, or texturants. Much of the food we, and our animals, consume, has become so over-processed that the nutrients have been processed out, requiring fortification in the forms of vitamins, some made from petroleum and coal tar and inorganic forms of minerals (carbonates, oxides).
Corn — Most of corn in livestock feeds is genetically modified and bio-engineered to withstand greater and greater amounts of the herbicide glyphosate. Residues from glyphosate are showing up in many foods grown with glyphosate including but not limited to sunflower seeds, corn, soy, and hays.
Corn by-products — This final category includes maltodextrin and distillers dried grains. In the US, Maltodextrin is commonly made from genetically modified corn. In Europe it is commonly made from wheat. It is made through a process called “starch hydrolysis,” which is also used to make dextrose, corn syrup, and high fructose corn syrup. Maltodextrin has a high glycemic index, around 130, so it’s not a good choice for the easy keeper or metabolic horse. Dried distillers grains, despite the name, are not the by-product of a craft brewery. Dried distillers grains are the leftover mash from ethanol production. Made from genetically modified corn, this mash is injected with antibiotics to increase the yield. The leftover mash after ethanol extraction is sold to the feed industry.
Countering Autumn’s dryness with foods
Autumn is drying and cooling, affecting the lungs and GI tract. You can add some Chaffhaye, a chopped, non-GMO alfalfa hay mixed with yeast, which makes it a very moist forage that is easy to digest and can counter-balance the dryness of hay bales. Feeding horses the Chaffhaye in ground feeders once a day in the autumn may help support balance in this season of “Metal and Cool Wind.”
Tigger Montague’s background is extensive in nutrition, including 30 years in the human and equine supplement industry with a focus on Ayurvedic Medicine. A dog owner all her life and Grand Prix dressage rider, she has spent seven years researching and testing products for BioStar Whole Food Supplements. Info:www.biostarus.com/