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Horse INKlings
Volume 2 Issue 4
Wednesday June 20, 2001
Welcome to the
fourth issue of Horse INKlings for 2001. Its aim is to provide
interesting, entertaining and useful information about the horses with whom we
share our lives. Please let me know what you think.
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SOMETHING TO THINK ABOUT
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"A horse is worth more than riches."
-- Spanish proverb
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FOR WHAT IT'S WORTH
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Keeping horses at home has advantages and disadvantages. I have kept my horses in boarding stables and at home and can speak from both sides. When you interact with your horse every day, when you're the one who brings the food, when you can watch your horse just being a horse, you share a deeper understanding. At the stable, you only see your horse for a couple of hours a day and in a very structured environment. I find my approach to my horse is more businesslike at a stable because we're there to ride and train. At home, everything is more relaxed. Sometimes so relaxed I never get around to riding!
When you're looking after your own horse, you can't, on a whim, decide to stay downtown after work and go to a movie. If your horse is unwell, you are the one who has to recognize that something is wrong. You have to decide when to call the veterinarian. You have to be there for the farrier. In other words, the full weight of responsibility
for a delicate life is on your shoulders.
Some people are very blasé about the whole thing. They've been very lucky and never had to deal with a horse emergency. Perhaps they don't know enough about horses to realize what could happen or don't care anyway. But most of us are very aware of the responsibility, especially if we've dealt with a colicking horse at 11 o'clock at night. I always advise new horse owners to start by boarding their horse at a good stable where they'll have support.
Veterinarians and farriers are vital allies in looking after our horses and it's important to build an ongoing relationship. A late night emergency call should not be the first contact with a veterinarian. While it might seem cheaper at the time to do innoculations ourselves, booking an annual veterinary visit has long term benefits. Horses' hooves need trimming and, if the horse is
shod, shoes reset every six to eight weeks. Rather than waiting until the hooves look long, or crack, or a shoe falls off, isn't it better to set up a regular schedule with a farrier and stick to it?
Typically in a boarding stable, routine veterinary and farrier care is provided for many horses at once. For example, a farrier might spend a whole morning at one barn, basically setting up his portable blacksmith's shop and attending to the hooves of one horse after another. Contrast that with going to an acreage for a single horse. (Keeping horses alone is another issue.) Hopefully the owner has the horse waiting in a barn or corral. Sometimes, an inconsiderate owner waits until the farrier arrives before going out into the pasture to catch the horse, who is perhaps standing knee deep in a slough. In the worst case scenario, the owner has forgotten about the appointment and the farrier has made the trip for nothing.
If you keep your horse in an acreage subdivision as many of us do, why not coordinate routine veterinary and farrier visits with neighbouring horse owners? Your vet or farrier will appreciate being able to make several calls in the same area instead of wasting time travelling. A good relationship with these professionals makes looking after a horse much easier.
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GROANER TIME
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Q) What did one horse say to the other horse?
A) The pace is familiar but I can't remember the mane.
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HORSE TRIVIA
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The main bone inside the hoof, the coffin bone, resembles a hard sponge. It is full of little holes to allow blood vessels and nerves to pass through the bone to the lining of the hoof wall.
SOURCE: The Illustrated Veterinary Encyclopedia for Horsemenfrom Equine Research Inc.
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THIS MONTH'S FEATURED BOOK
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This issue, forgive me if I talk about my own book,
How to Find the Perfect Place for Your Pony: 101 Questions to Ask about Boarding
Stables.
Finding the right boarding stable is a challenge faced by most riders at some stage in their careers. For example, most of my students keep their horses at home and ride outside. Living in an area with harsh winters, many come to the point where they'd like to ride through the winter in an indoor arena. For novice horse owners, or longtime horse people new to the world of boarding stables, knowing what to look for is not as simple as it seems.
How to Find the Perfect Place for Your Pony guides the reader through the process of finding and assessing a boarding stable. First, it will help you choose the type of boarding arrangement that is best for you and your horse. Next it helps you check out the barn, riding facilities, and horse-care routines. Finally, it guides you to think about other less obvious aspects that can seriously affect the quality of a boarding experience.
For the reader who doesn't yet own a horse, the second edition published this June also includes a chapter on buying a first horse.
As an e-book in pdf format, it’s meant to be read on your computer monitor and includes clickable links to glossary words and addresses on the World Wide Web. After using the free Acrobat Reader to open the file, you can change the size of print to suit yourself, skip around pages and go directly to web sites with a simple click of the mouse. Or if you prefer, you can print out a copy and put it in a three ring binder.
For more information, click
here.
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