This post is for Ichobod, my 28-year-old gelding
who has been a wonderful teacher for me
and many others in many amazing ways.

Elderly Animals: Photographs by Isa Leshko from Mark & Angela Walley on Vimeo.

Photographer Isa Leshko discusses her series entitled Elderly Animals. Learn more about Isa and her work at http://www.IsaLeshko.com. Learn more about the filmmakers at http://www.WalleyFilms.com.

See a gallery of photos from the “Elderly Animals” project and learn more about the artist.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=xcEMghqgjcg

So, knowing my horses’ propensity for turning themselves into mud, I plan wet-weather turnouts based on my ability to stick around long enough to clean off that mud once it has dried. Sure, much of it will simply fall off. But what about the stubborn stuff that coats the parts where the horse was able to really grind it in? Is there more than an aesthetic reason you need to clean off your horse’s coat? There is.

While it may not matter if your four-legged friend looks like he’s taking a spa mud-pack treatment on a sunny afternoon, as the temperatures drop into night that stuck-down coat can cause problems. Even if the dirt has dried, just having it on the hair will still interfere with his natural ability to keep warm.

The horse’s own winter heating system is quite ingenious. It relies on millions of tiny muscles that cause each hair of that thick winter coat to stand up, creating a space that holds an insulating layer of warm air close to the horse’s body. Ever seen a horse standing contentedly with snow or ice piled on his back? That’s because the lofted coat is doing its job, keeping the warmth in instead of allowing to dissipate, which would melt the snow and leave the horse wet and likely to get cold.

Because the hairs have to be able to stand up to provide this insulating function, a horse left caked with mud – or a long-haired horse put away after a ride without the sweat being brushed out of his coat – is at risk of getting cold.

So, if your horse is a dedicated mud-bather like mine are, be sure he gets brushed and fluffed after his fun so he’ll stay warm and cozy on these winter nights.

Thank you Mother Nature for refreshing our desert so nicely without causing me to cancel any lessons on my busiest teaching day!

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A couple of decades ago, when I was still a very traditional horse owner and mainstream trainer/instructor, I was all about making the semi-annual routine simple and financially accessible for everyone. Five-way shots? Sure. Eight-way? Even better. Vaccinate horses when they’re cooled out and calm, give them a day off in case they feel a little lethargic and then right on with the training routine.

That protocol worked just fine for me and for my horses. I only ever had one horse show a a negative reaction in all the years I vaccinated for myself and my clients, and that was a small bump that cleared up in a couple of days.

So, when a veterinarian I knew well and trusted suggested to me that maybe horses were being over-vaccinated and all those shots weren’t necessary, I was skeptical. I was, however, just starting to learn a bit about more holistic approaches to horse-keeping, so the topic stuck in my head and rattled around while I was learning about herbs and bodywork and vibrational medicine and homeopathy.

Many years later, I worked with a group of horses that did have a problem with shot reactions following fall shots with a Ft. Dodge multi-vaccine. By that time I had a completely different outlook on the issue. It was completely unacceptable to me that after routine fall shots fully a third of the herd had hard, hot swellings on their necks, stiff necks and clearly felt lousy.

Turned out these horses  had a history of reactions at both the spring and fall shot times. Now, another vet had warned me off Ft. Dodge products, so I knew that was a possible cause. But multiple horses with big sore lumps on their necks twice a year seemed excessive to me, even though the administering vet just shrugged it off and suggested the whole herd be given bute before the next routine vaccinations.

Well, that made no sense to me at all. So, as soon as all the bumps had been iced and gently exercised away, the whole herd got dosed with the homeopathic remedy Thuja Occidentalis. They also got thuja the day before and day of their next vaccinations. Same vet. Same vaccines. Zero reactions. Same protocol all the rest of the time I interacted with that group of horses and never another swollen or sore neck at shot time.

Am I 100-percent certain there was a direct correlation between using the homeopathic remedy and the different outcome? Nope. But I’m sure enough that I’ve used the same protocol again. My own horses only get a few select vaccines every few years, but they always get a dose of thuja just before.

Am I saying you should change your vaccination practice or schedule. Nope. I’m not a vet and I can’t give that kind of advice even if I thought it was my place to do so.

All I’m doing is providing some information that might rattle around in your head as you’re making decisions for the health and welfare of your own horses.

Want to learn more about vaccine issues and using homeopathic remedies to keep your horse healthy and happy? Madalyn Ward, DVM, has articles and a very informative forum you can read.

Wondering what remedies to keep on hand for emergencies? Here’s a good article describing 10 useful homeopathic remedies for your barn med kit.

This program has a lot of color and plenty of shots of horses and and their people. I was lucky to have access to some great photos generously provided by Michael Stoklos. Here’s a preview – the back cover – with two of my River Valley Ranch friends featured. (Along with a few unidentified cows in the background!)

Want to see some great horses and riders in action? Head to Sonoita on the 15th and 16th and cheer on the eventers. Cross country will run Saturday afternoon, Oct. 15.

• Never climb over or stand on a gate because your weight will make it “fall” – sag so that it doesn’t swing properly or, in some cases, latch properly.
• Likewise, don’t leave a gate standing open for the same reason; close and latch it so its own weight doesn’t bend the hinges and create a permanent sag.

Heavy wooden corral gates you have to lift to move and over-stretched wire gates weren’t just an annoyance when I was growing up. Sometimes they were impossible. And there are times when you really need to be able to open or close a gate quickly, generally either to stop cattle getting through or to let only the right cattle through.

In cow country, you often have to pass through gates to get where you’re going, both on your own property and when you’re visiting neighbors. Get out, open the gate, drive through, get out, close the gate. In all kinds of weather. I always identified with the stories of challenging gates in the stories of James Herriot, who memorialized his adversarial relationship with the gates on one farm in particular.

You  learn pretty quickly one very basic rule about gates: If a gate is closed when you get to it, close it behind you. If  it’s open, leave it open.

There is nothing quite as frustrating as spending all morning gathering a bunch of cows out of the brush next to the river and finally getting them headed toward home only to find someone has closed the one gate you need to get through – and that you left open for that very purpose. Especially when it’s one of those tightly stretched barbed-wire gates you have to struggle and strain to open and close.

There you are, with this unruly bunch of cattle – the sneaky, wild ones who hid out successfully when you were clearing out the herd for the day-long drive to summer pasture. Now you have to try to ease up through the bunch, get off your horse, open the gate, remount, ease back around the now-spread-out bunch and herd the  animals through before that one crafty old cow sees a chance to turn and run like a deer back for the cover of the  willow thickets.

Whomever closed that formerly-open gate – little brother on dirt bike being the prime suspect – will get an earful. As will that same little brother when you find out that the back gate to the corral you finally manage drive the cows into (the gate you closed before you went in search of said cows) has been opened in the meantime so the whole bunch runs out into another 200-acre pasture. Hence, the rule.

This is actually a perimeter fence (you can see the electric tape that encloses a pasture a few feet behind this fence), but imagine this fence is actually meant to enclose horses. Then, perhaps, the all-too-common flaw will become apparent.

Gates and fences are equally important focuses for horse people. Ever turned out a horse into a pen, releasing the halter just as you looked up and realized the gate on the other side of the enclosure was wide open? And that your horse had seen the same thing just a split second before you did?

I’m constantly amazed at what people will use for fencing horse enclosures. Horse-shopping clients and I once looked at a young Arab gelding at a backyard “barn” where part of the “fence” around the dry-lot pen was, I kid you not, a bed spring propped up on end.

On the ranch, of course, the fences were all barbed wire – essential to keep the cattle in, but certainly not ideal for horses. I was lucky not to have had any horse badly injured in those fences, though I have doctored many, many superficial wire cuts. I attribute that to the fact that the ranch fences were all very well maintained, a year-round effort. A well-stretched wire fence is much less dangerous than one where the wire is left slack either because it has come unstapled from posts or because the posts have rotted and don’t hold fast.

I have a definite phobia of running horses in pens or pastures fenced with T-posts, even if they’re capped. I’ve just heard one too many stories about horses impaling themselves on those to ever feel comfortable with my horses corralled that way.

But, even when people have obviously chosen safe and appropriate materials to construct horse fencing, there is one maddeningly common construction mistake I see much too often. It’s a matter of good sense and most people, after you point it out, can see the logic and the importance. Can you figure out from the photo what it is?

I’ll give you a hint: Surprisingly, most of the general articles I looked at (and some I linked to above) fail to mention this issue at all. But here’s one that does include this important instruction about how to build a functional fence to enclose horses (or pretty much any animals).