Erosions and gastric ulcers may be present in horses at any age and under different conditions of rearing and handling. In tropical regions, horses can feed on fruits rich in soluble carbohydrates, such as mangoes, but little is known about how these foods interact with their digestive systems. To test the hypothesis that the ingestion of ripe mangoes with peels could cause disturbances in the digestive processes of horses, an experiment was developed to monitor animals that had free access to ripe mangoes in their pasture areas. Horses (purebred Arabians, n = 5; ~340 kg, ~13 years) were evaluated by video gastroscopy and blood analysis. A controlled postprandial glucose curve for mango intake was also performed. Gastroscopies were performed at intervals of 15 days, starting in December, just before the beginning of the harvest, until the beginning of February, and days after the end of the harvest. Blood collection was performed on the same day between November and February for blood analysis. The results were submitted to ANOVA and Tukey’s test, with a significance level of p < 0.05. Gastroscopies indicated that four out of five horses had erosions and ulcers in the squamous region between 15 and 30 days after the start of the season. Biochemical tests indicated a reduction in plasma proteins during the harvest period, and the postprandial glucose curve showed concentrations above 200 mg/dL between 30 and 180 min after ingestion of 5.37 kg mangoes. The animals were not treated and recovered after 15 days of harvest and without ripe mangoes on the ground. It is concluded that the indiscriminate ingestion of mangoes favors the appearance of lesions in the gastric squamous region, to varying degrees, and that animals recover naturally after an average of 15 days from the end of the season when the animals return to their regular feeding with hay and grass pasture.
Keywords: equine; gastric ulcers; soluble carbohydrates; tropical nutrition.