The yard next door to me has an 8 acre mares field there are only 7 mares now and 2 of those come in during the day the others are staying out, they are all fat and one went down with laminitis last weekMe too, the amount of people that are shocked that their horses are ill when they’ve gone onto summer grazing obese is baffling.
How can you expect them to come out of winter looking “well” and be fine to leave on summer grazing
Having retirees, this is what I find so good about the track, but having them together, even though they now have slightly different management needs, is crucial. On their own their movement is much reduced.
Our fields are huge (not sure on acreage) but they’re massive. Most I’ve ever seen out is 8, we have far too much grass for the amount of horses. Thankfully a lot of liveries have made wise choices and are limiting grazing, though some that haven’t have had repercussions unfortunately. Think we have 4 maybe 5 on the yard with laminitis now it’s scaryThe yard next door to me has an 8 acre mares field there are only 7 mares now and 2 of those come in during the day the others are staying out, they are all fat and one went down with laminitis last week
A vet this morning said he nearly pts a pony with laminitis and colic last night the two life changing conditions and through the roof.So obviously we are all very aware of the grass and how rich it is this year. A lot of horses coming down with laminitis, even those you wouldn’t “typically” worry about. Vets are seeing 3-5 cases a day in my area some days which is very concerning.
So my question is how are you managing your grazing? especially those with native types. Spoke with a vet yesterday after helping my friend get her mare out of the field (she couldn’t move, took 8 people an hour to get her on a box to get back to the yard) and the vet said the worst thing you can do is give them time off at this point of the year. I try to ride every day especially in summer, to keep him fit and keep his weight down but despite this he is looking porky because of the abundance of grass.
My worry is, bringing him in during the day off the grass will encourage him to stuff his face overnight when he does go out. I don’t want to leave him stood with nothing during the time he’s in because I don’t want him to get ulcers. I’ve also considered muzzling him for the time he’s out grazing too.
I’ve already lost one horse to laminitis (mid winter, EMS was the cause not grass/obesity) and I’m so worried this year. My thinking is bring in around 6am and turn out around 4pm, hun being in will also make it easier to exercise him before he goes back out. I guess my post is just asking how different people are managing successfully
Gosh that’s scary, I couldn’t believe it when the vet I spoke to said how many cases he’d had
I’m similar. No grass at all and feels like concrete. I’m not too bothered because mine don’t need it. I put loads of hay outI must be stuck in some sort of parallel universe as my grass has stopped growing. The ground is hard with huge cracks in.
Mine are on a 2 acre track and I move the fence a bit each day, closing off what they’ve eaten. Is still really bare and short where it’s been rested. None of mine are remotely fat and still having a lot of hay.
I prefer to see ribs in march. Not hatrack obviously, in case that needed saying, but I would prefer to be able to see the definition of some ribs. There’s a period of about 3 weeks in march at coat change time where mine looks a little bit crap - if I’ve done my job right. The easiest way to achieve this is to reduce rug weights throughout winter.
Definitely. Far too many over fed and over rugged that cop for it in summer. I won’t be making the mistake of fully clipping this winter, therefore no need to rug. He’ll have his chest off if he gets sweaty and that’s it, mine only gets a balanced and calmer anyway
We have sheep on ours all year round, does this benefit grazing for the horses? As in, do the sheep graze off the goodness/sugars at all?
Not really sure, they do help with worm control though and they do graze it right down if that is what is needed.
One thing I have found out about sheep since moving yards, they like to just die
I have a little native who was unclipped and unrugged through most of winter (rain sheet if I was riding). Even through that minus 14 spell in Dec.
Seemed to just grow a thicker coat.I'm going to sound like a fool here but I didn't realise you needed to worry about laminitis on the islands. I always thought that yours was the dream grazing for good doers.
Thats what's happened next door there were about 10 mares out there previously but after winter 1 was pts and the others moved, so now they have less horses on a very big field and too much grass, I can't believe some horses are on it continuously and looking fat.
He'll be more upset if he gets laminitis and has to be stuck in his stable 24/7.
Definitely, I've had a few people comment how much better my cob looks now & that he looked a bit poor a couple of months ago. Trying to explain its my management plan is hard work.
Not at all foolish
. In shetland it is brilliant grazing for ponies but here in Orkney we have quite a bit of decent grazing for cattle and it’s much flatter than the shetland isles. There’s some good horse grazing here but mostly it’s been farmed for beef cattle and sheep.