Baby, It's Cooold Outside!

Wow! If you have been outside at all lately, you know that it's COLD. And I don't mean just a little uncomfortable, I mean freeze-your-nose-hairs cold. Yowza! It has made doing chores a bit tricky, as the Kubota won't start and of course the ever present frozen water buckets. Nonetheless the horses need to get out and they need to have hay - and lots of it! - and water.

There are several ways to keep a horse nice and cozy when it's cold out and here are three of the main ways:

1) offer shelter - if a covered area cannot be offered, a tree will be good, too.
2) blanketing - this is good for thin (malnourished) horses and those horses that shiver and are older who can't produce enough insulation with their own hair.
3) free choice hay - this is by far the best thing for them. By giving them additional hay, their body will work more to digest the hay and will therefore warm the horse from the inside.

I opted for choice #3. Well, kind of. Although, they do not have hay in front of them all the time, I did give them more hay at lunch and an extra flake for dinner. it woudl be great to have some beet pulp or forage extender to mix with hot water as a nice mash for dinner, but we don't have any and there is no hot water in the barn.

At any rate, things are good at WBF. We are looking forward to seeing everyone on Saturday for our first Adopt-a-Horse session. Be on the lookout for a new helper, Amanda. She has been riding for a couple of years and is a welcome addition to the farm! Welcome, Amanda!