Need to get my horse to drink after endurance rides

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little_legs

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I've managed over the last year to teach him to pee out at events, he would always cross his legs till he got home, but now he pees all the time, and is very relaxed about it.

Now I need to teach him to drink, Ive tried most things and Im open to all ideas...........


Thanks in advance for any suggestions


Jane
 
Water with flavourings in like mint apple orange banana sugarbeet or try pure apple juice at home and gradually water it down until you reach the point where he will drink it. If they fail you could try soaking oats and draining off the water as a lot of horses will love that and as well as getting them to drink if you buy or are sent a very poor horse that does not want to eat its also a good way to get nutrition into then.
 
I take beet water and bob carrots in, use horse quencher, very wet feeds and offer a choice of different flavoured drinks ie, apple juice, cordial .
 
A bit of apple juice in the water. Works with my lad for a bit, until he twigs there's no apple, and gets thick and spits the rest of the water at you. I generally get about half a bucket into him though.
Horse Quencher looks good L, will be trying to get my hands on some for the summer, might be more successful than apple juice as there will be something for him to eat too, just to keep him happy.
 
horsequencher is the only thing I've ever used to get my horse to drink when out. Make it up when you get there so it has time to infuse and then touch wood have never had any trouble getting him to drink.
 
My mare won't drink when at events. She won't have electrolytes either. When she has done XC I sponge her mouth with a wet sponge. I also pour a whole bucket of water over her haylage so that she gets some liquid that way.. If its a long journey I will pour more over on the way home. I give her apples and carrots too. When home, i use a supplement called Blood Salts which is the only supplement that she will take!
 
Give the horse quencher a go. We've used mollasses water with success, too.

This article (and the others in the series) is good:
http://shady-acres.com/susan/metabolicpull1.shtml

Basically, if they're not drinking then they're already dehydrated. If you can keep them eating, particularly fibrous stuff, they are less likely to get dehydrated in the first place and are more likely to keep drinking.

H used to not drink, and we got away with it up to 65km but we failed our first attempt at 80km. So I knew I had to get it cracked. We tried several of the ideas in Susan's article and they worked. Basically, I 'pre hydrated' in that he had very wet, sloppy, fibrous feeds with a little salt added in the week preceeding the ride. I also started offering mollasses water in the field, too. Hay in the trailer was soaked. I made absolutely sure that we weren't starting off with a deficit and that he had plenty of fibre on board. I then made sure that he ate along the trail - snatches of grass as we rode along, and carrots at the crew points. The first time we tried this, we actually force fed him carrots at the first crew point (he was 'on the job' so wasn't interested). At the next crew point, he started drinking like a fish and we weren't even 10 miles in - a completely unheard of result.
 
omg Thank you so much for all the replies.

Believe it or not I have tried most of these thing, Ive even tried the horsequencher. But Im not giving up.

I tried apple bobbing in sugar beet last night, that was funny as he got very cross that he had to get wet to get the apples, I ended up helping him, but he kind of got the hang of it. So Im going to do it after every ride.

EstherYoung thank you for the article Im going to give it a good read, and I like the idea and had never thought about the planning of the water intake the week before an event.

He does always get wet hay, as has a cough anyway, and I tend to chuck a bucket of water at it when we get back to the trailer after a ride.

Last year I cracked peeing and this year I will crack water intake !

EstherYoung I think you do the sport more seriously than me, I just do it for the riding club and we just run 32k, but I have to say we have had great fun. Which area of the country do you ride in?


Jane
 
Jane, we're in Yorkshire. H (the bay in my sig) and me got up to doing 80kms quite successfully, but I'm not serious in any way shape or form. H is 26 now so we just do the do the odd little social ride these days. It's a very addictive sport though, at any level, and the brill thing is that you can just take what you want from it at any particular point in time. Spud (the grey in my sig) and me are hopefully doing a 15km this weekend and I'm insanely excited about it :)

Hopefully when my rising 3yo is a bit older we'll get out to some longer stuff again but that is a long long way off yet.
 
Try over-ripe pears, if your horse likes pears. Used to chuck bits into the back of my mare's mouth which were too small and squashy for her to choke on. Somehow the juice dribbling down her throat seemed to remind her she was thirsty and she would then take water.
 
A friend with a non-drinking horse has been using this at shows and is pleased with the result:

http://www.horseandhound.co.uk/tradenews/7544/309884.html

I have just looked at the UK suppliers page and they don't seem to be carrying it anymore but perhaps worth calling around. It seems a bit off the wall but there has been very good press and anecdotal reporting on it.

Agree re the "if they're not drinking they are already dehydrated" statement - it's the same in people. The thirst reflex can actually shut down after a certain point, which is why competition horses are sometimes given IV fluids to kickstart the system again. When they did all the horse cooling studies in advance of the LA Olympics they found one of the least effective methods of rehydrating performance horses was the old standard "few sips of water" method as it shuts down the reflex before the body is fully satisfied.

Warming the water a bit by leaving it in the sun in another thing can help some horses, as can bringing a jug from home to get them started.
 
TarrSteps said:
A friend with a non-drinking horse has been using this at shows and is pleased with the result:

http://www.horseandhound.co.uk/tradenews/7544/309884.html

I have just looked at the UK suppliers page and they don't seem to be carrying it anymore but perhaps worth calling around. It seems a bit off the wall but there has been very good press and anecdotal reporting on it.

Agree re the "if they're not drinking they are already dehydrated" statement - it's the same in people. The thirst reflex can actually shut down after a certain point, which is why competition horses are sometimes given IV fluids to kickstart the system again. When they did all the horse cooling studies in advance of the LA Olympics they found one of the least effective methods of rehydrating performance horses was the old standard "few sips of water" method as it shuts down the reflex before the body is fully satisfied.

Warming the water a bit by leaving it in the sun in another thing can help some horses, as can bringing a jug from home to get them started.
Click to expand...

Yes a bit off the wall, but I can see the logic in this bucket. I have a 'silver' lozenge in my drinkers - similar thing - it has anti bacterial properties and it claims to keep the water fresh for longer in troughs.
 
Perhaps you and I are not the ultimate arbitrators of "off the wall" . . ? :D ;)

Anyway, my friend was recommended it by her sj trainer and it seems that quite a few show facilities/trainers in the US are using them for horses away from home, so it's definitely an interesting idea. They aren't insane money, either.
 
Interesting read about the bucket, I must admit I did chuckle when i saw it thinking yeah right ! But Im open minded ! Do you know who stocks it in England?


Going re attempt the apple bobbing tonight !


Jane
 
Performance Rider did but I don't see it on their site now. (They are on facebook though so perhaps worth a pm if you play in that sandbox.) It might be worth an email to the company asking who their UK stockists are.
 
Day 2 of apple bobbing, and he actually tried it himself eventually without me having to point out the bits of apple to him, hes so funny as hes so cross he has to fish for his treat !


Going to investigate the bucket today and see if I can get hold of one.



Jane
 
have you tried lukewarm water, or water out of the field trough even if it looks a bit dirty flies bits of mud grass etc.
 
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