KlinoMont® - Zeolite - Bentonite - Mixture

Why mix zeolite and bentonite? Because they complement each other perfectly! More than the sum of their parts!

70% zeolite clinoptilolite ø 6 µm, micronised in an air stream with 30% bentonite montmorillonite, ø 10 µm, hot-ground in a ball mill and dried in the process.

If anything belongs together, it's these two minerals! The somewhat ‘rougher’ zeolite as a crystalline mineral and the soft, gentle bentonite as a layered clay mineral, which is able to form a protective film on the mucous membranes and bind mycotoxins even better than zeolite. As a mixture, they are an excellent third option in this area. Professionally mixed in a ratio of 70:30, there is no need to allow the bentonite to swell, as the particles are so finely mixed that virtually no lumps can form.

Unfortunately, however, the supply of geogenically activated bentonite from the Aegean Sea was exhausted in 2023, and bentonite of this quality and natural geogenesis could no longer be found anywhere in Europe. After using bentonite from Fort Benton for over a year, which met these criteria, we were still not as satisfied with it as we had been with our previous supply from the Aegean Sea. That is why we searched outside the Aegean Sea and finally found what we were looking for in Sardinia. A bentonite naturally activated by geogenesis, better grinding than in the USA, better silicon-aluminium ratio, more than 90% montmorillonite content and significantly faster swelling. This makes it much easier to handle and much more similar to the original bentonite from the Aegean Sea.

The mixture of zeolite clinoptilolite and bentonite montmorillonite, 70:30, combines the advantages of both minerals. This results in more than the sum of both parts. It offers the advantage of two completely different materials (layered clay mineral and rock mineral), but both are aluminosilicates and ion exchangers with exceptionally strong adsorption capacity. Since adsorption always takes place on the surface, the ultra-fine micronisation of both minerals is a great advantage. Of course, both minerals are free of nanoparticles or other additives. Like zeolite clinoptilolite, bentonite montmorillonite is an aluminosilicate, but it is often underestimated. It has some properties that zeolite does not have. One of the most important is that bentonite-montmorillonite, due to its strong swelling capacity and its huge active surface area, forms a protective gel film on the mucous membranes, such as the oral mucosa, oesophagus, gastric mucosa and intestines. Its specific surface area can reach a size of 500-700 m² per gram. This creates a selective protective shield against toxins, heavy metals and other harmful substances, preventing them from entering the bloodstream. The metabolism and the organism are relieved and strengthened. KlinoMont® also has a very strong mycotoxin adsorption capacity. There is another important point to note.

 Our zeolite-bentonite mixture is so well mixed in a professional mixing plant that almost no bentonite lumps should form when stirred into water. This is a very important feature of this mixture, considering that pure bentonite-montmorillonite has to soak in water for hours before it dissolves.

Zeolite / KlinoMont® and horses

Horses do not have it easy with what grows in the pastures these days and what they are fed as hay. The grass toxins that are used today to increase hay yields and the resistance of the grass are good for the grass, but very bad for horses.

 Their sensitive digestive tract means that even a little too much carbohydrate immediately upsets the balance in the caecum, the environment becomes too acidic and the bacteria that digest carbohydrates multiply almost explosively.

There are also bacteria that digest raw fibre, which break down the fibres in order to access the nutrients they contain, as well as bacteria that digest carbohydrates. Ideally, the two should always be in balance, because this balances the pH value in the environment. However, if too many carbohydrates enter the caecum, these bacteria multiply extremely rapidly, creating an acidic environment due to the lactic acid they excrete. This is hostile to the raw fibre-digesting bacteria, in which the endotoxins are stored, which are released when these bacteria die. This acidic environment damages the intestinal walls, allowing the endotoxins and lactic acid to migrate through the intestinal walls into the extracellular matrix and eventually end up in the blood, where they can gradually cause hyperacidity throughout the entire organism. In horses, this very often leads to hoof problems. Initial signs such as foul-smelling faeces, diarrhoea, faecal water, flatulence, infections or allergies can indicate such an overload of the intestinal flora. The detoxification metabolism becomes completely overwhelmed and the immune system is weakened.

This is where aluminosilicates come in handy, zeolite and bentonite as a mixture, both alkaline ion exchangers with a pH value between 8.5 and 10. They bind harmful substances and, in ion exchange, release colloidal minerals to the weakened body. In addition, they both bind mycotoxins, which is particularly important for grass toxins.

KlinoMont® is very gentle on horses because, thanks to airflow micronisation, it is not only very fine but also contains almost no zeolite particles larger than 20 µm. The 30% bentonite with the largest particles of approx. 38 µm is sufficient in the mixing ratio to gradually coat the digestive tract completely with a protective gel film without sedimenting in the caecum.

 In line with the motto ‘the more, the better’, horses used to be given quite coarse zeolite in quantities of 100 g/day, as with cows (which are not so easily affected), which resulted in the poor horses suffering from colic caused by coarse zeolite sedimenting in the caecum. Even a healthy large horse does not necessarily need more than 10-20 g/day of KlinoMont®, and in acute cases, no more than 30 g per day. We have heard from many customers that these amounts are completely sufficient. KlinoMont® is very powerful in this respect. It should therefore also be noted that chemical medications can be completely neutralised without a time interval, especially very harsh, metal-containing medications.

Tip: The easiest way is to mix KlinoMont® 1 X 1 with water and then mix the paste into the feed; for dry feed mixtures, simply mix in the powder. It is also good to mix it into the horses' drinking water while stirring.

Bentonite – Montmorillonite is a layered clay mineral that was formed by the weathering of volcanic ash over 10 million years ago. Bentonite was named after the first site where it was found, near Fort Benton (USA). However, its extraordinary properties, such as its enormous swelling capacity and adsorption capacity, are determined by the clay mineral montmorillonite it contains. Its name comes from the site where it was found, Montmorillon in southern France.

Our bentonite is a natural calcium-sodium bentonite with a high proportion (over 90%) of montmorillonite, a hydrated aluminium hydrosilicate. It is naturally activated in geogenesis and is hot-ground in a ball mill to ø 10 µm and dried in the process.

The zeolite in the zeolite-bentonite mixture is our proven 6µm natural zeolite clinoptilolite and, like many high-quality zeolites, comes from the Romanian Carpathian belt, where it is selected and mined according to our specifications. Micronised and thus highly activated, it is provided as a service by the manufacturer of spiral jet mills (a gentler further development of Dr. Lelas' tribomechanical activation). These companies are true specialists, because micronisation in an air stream is a science in itself. The zeolite is ground in this grinding plant because this allows the full benefits of its electrical charge, high cation exchange capacity (CEC) and large specific surface area to be exploited. These are responsible for the power and quantity of pollutants that can be bound. It is ground to ø 6µm (microns) in a tangential air flow through particle/particle collision and is highly activated in the process. This is what makes this grinding process so special: no grinding bodies such as rollers or similar are used, only high-speed air. This activation cannot be achieved with any other grinding process. The zeolite particles ‘rub’ against each other in the air flow at approx. 300 km/h until they have reached the required size. In addition, the control in the classifier ensures that the particles are discharged in exactly the right size so that no nanoparticles are produced. Spiral jet mills grind the zeolite very gently and, above all, preserve the existing crystalline lattice structure of the zeolite.