There is a growing awareness among horse owners about the importance of horses being turned out together. Horses are herd animals. They need social contact. So what is the reality for today’s domesticated horses? What are people’s horse husbandry practices around turnout? Horse Talk – horse husbandry: the science of breeding, rearing, and caring for horses. Although…
Have you ever watched horses together in a field or paddock? How do they interact when confined in a small space? Is their behaviour different when they’re out in a big field together? Let’s look at different horse paddock sizes to get an idea of how much space horses need. For paddocks used only for…
Spring is here, and for some lucky horses this means spending time in a pasture eating grass. It is tempting to turn horses out into spring pastures at the first sight of green grass, especially after a long winter. However, spring grazing should be introduced slowly. How do you go about introducing horses to spring grass?…
Have you heard the expression, “No feet, no horse.”? It means no matter how beautiful or how perfect the rest of a horse may be, without good feet they can’t perform and they can’t exercise. In fact, they can’t really do much of anything. Hooves that are allowed to grow too long not only look bad, they affect the internal…
Water is one of the most important parts of a horse’s diet, and watering horses in winter can be especially challenging. How do horse owners keep fresh thawed water available to horses when temperatures drop below freezing? 1. What is the freezing temperature of water in °C and °F? 2. If the temperature is 10°F…
Have you ever had the job of feeding hay to a barn full of horses? A common method of feeding hay to horses is to simply toss flakes of hay on the ground. The horses lower their heads and don’t stop eating until it’s all gone—or trampled into the ground. If you’ve ever mucked out a stall or…
This post will show you how to properly measure a horse for a bridle. A snaffle bridle is the simplest kind of bridle for young riders. It is made up of the following different parts: cheek piece 1 (attaches to the crownpiece) crown piece 1a (attaches to the cheekpiece) browband 2 noseband 3 throat latch…
Horses evolved to graze all day long, but that’s just not practical or even possible for many barns. No matter what a horse’s situation, she should eat 1 to 2% of her body weight in forage per day. How much is that? How do you know how much hay to feed a horse? Let’s take a look.…
Horses in the wild are known to graze for up to 16 hours a day! A horse’s digestive system is designed to deal with large amounts of forage, either grass or hay, eaten slowly over a long period of time. Hay makes up the largest part of a horse’s diet, so it is important to make…
Imagine you want to build a new pasture on your farm for your horses. The first step is to measure out the section you want to fence. One sunny day a friend comes by to help and the two of you measure the dimensions for the new field as shown below. 1. Calculate the perimeter…