Oct 16, 2023
Ashley On - Hempseed as Horse Feed with Kristine Ely, PhD.
Hempseed has always been legal in the US for human consumption and anyone in the US can simply go to their local supermarket and pick up some hempseed oil or hemp hearts in order to fortify their nutrition. Yet, for some reason, we are not allowed to feed it to our horses or to our dogs to aid nutrition or reduce inflammation.
Whether or not horses and dogs are allowed to eat hempseed may seem like a trivial pursuit for some, but those who are interested in a future where hemp can eliminate plastic, paper and toxic building materials are very interested in this topic.
While hemp is exponentially faster than trees at reducing CO2 from the air (and in some locations can be grown 2-3 times per year!), today hemp stalks are too expensive to be used as a replacement for petroleum and wood based products. However, if the associated hempseed is able to be fed to the farm animals, the economics of using hemp stalk as a more sustainable option to replace plastics drastically shift.
Dr. Kristine Ely from Virginia Tech has done research showing that not only is hempseed oil safe for horses, but horses who were fed hempseed oil:
(a) had NO cannabinoids (THC, CBD, etc.) contamination present in their blood
(b) DID have significant increases of γ-Linolenic acid (GLA), a unique fatty acid that is uncommon in horse's diets and which increases the horse's production of anti-inflammatory eicosanoids
(c) had NO other inflammatory biomarkers influenced by treatment