Before you leave, check all lights on your towing vehicle and trailer. Replace any nonfunctioning lights.

You can haul your horse all year long, even in the dead of winter, as long as you do so safely. Here, I’ll first tell you how to ready your rig for winter hauling. Then I’ll go over how to help keep your equine friend comfortable when you haul him in winter conditions. Finally, I’ll give you six ways to ease trailer-loading in snow and ice.

(For my on-the-road hauling guidelines, see “Safe Travels,” The Trail Rider, January/February 2013).

Note: You may wish to sign up for USRider Equestrian Motor Plan, which covers both your towing vehicle and your trailer, and will help you find a safe place for your horse, in an emergency. (USRider is a sister company of The Trail Rider and EquiSearch.com.)

Ready Your Rig

Before you set out with your horse in tow, you need to ready your rig for winter conditions. Here’s how.

Apply reflective decals. Apply extra reflective decals on the back and sides of your trailer, so that other drivers can see your rig in poor conditions. One good source for trailer decals is Caution Horses Safety Products.

Invest in good tires. Invest in quality tires for your entire rig. Check tire pressure before every trip; comply with the manufacturer’s recommendations.

Check all lights. Recruit an assistant to help you check all lights on your towing vehicle and trailer. Replace any nonfunctioning lights.

Carry chains. Keep quality chains handy if snow and ice are significant enough to use them. Check your state’s chain requirements. Generally, if you have to chain up the drive axle of your towing vehicle, you should have chains on the trailer as well.

Top off the fuel tank. And don’t let your fuel tank get below a half-tank. If you’ll be driving in remote areas, carry extra fuel.

Top off the windshield-wiper fluid. And make sure the windshield wipers are working. Place a long-handled windshield scraper in your vehicle.

Comply with local brake laws. Every state has its own laws related to trailer brakes. To find out the laws in your state, consult AAA’s website.

Turn off the Jake brake. Engine brakes are wonderful for towing vehicles — they do a fantastic job slowing the rig to minimize brake wear under dry conditions. But a diesel engine’s compression-release engine brake (also referred to by the brand name Jacob’s brake, or Jake brake) can lead to a jackknife if used in slick road conditions, since they slow your towing vehicle first.

Sync the brakes. Make sure the trailer brakes complement the brakes of your towing vehicle. When you’re on a steep downhill in slick conditions, you might need to slow the trailer with brakes greater than your vehicle’s brakes.

Consult the manufacturer’s instructions. Generally, brakes are best set on dry, flat ground at a slow speed and need to be adjusted for the load. Position the electronic brake so you can manually engage it via the thumb control.

Turn off cruise control. If you get into a slide, the precious second or two that it takes to turn off the cruise control may doom your chances of maintaining control.

Weight your towing vehicle. If you’ll be towing an empty trailer, note that it’ll jackknife more easily than a loaded one. For better control, place concrete blocks or bags of sand into the back of your truck to add weight over the rear axle.

Pack cold-weather gear. For the horses, pack extra hay and at least 10 gallons of water (nonfrozen). For you, carry a cell phone with charger, emergency blankets, jackets, high-energy snack foods, and a thermos of hot drink, in case your towing vehicle or trailer breaks down and you need to wait roadside for help.

In-Trailer Equine Comfort

Here’s how to help keep your horse comfortable while hauling him in the winter.

Invest in quality tires for your entire rig. Check tire pressure before every trip; comply with the manufacturer’s recommendations.

Provide good-quality hay. Even in really cold weather, horses create more heat than you think they do. The best way to keep your horse warm in the trailer is to provide good-quality hay.

Watch over-blanketing. It’s easy to over-blanket your horse. Most trailers are poorly ventilated, so they tend to get very warm with body heat, even in below-freezing temperatures. A light sheet or blanket is sufficient for most horses.

Apply leg protection. Apply leg protection, such as polo wraps or shipping boots. In winter, it’s especially important to protect your horse’s precious lower legs from slips and kicks.

Increase ventilation. Humidity and condensation buildup from your horse’s breath can cause respiratory illness. Improve the indirect ventilation in your trailer to counteract this risk.

Avoid drafts. That said, make sure that there are no direct drafts hitting your horse, especially on his face and eyes. Freezing-cold temperatures with wind can result in damaged corneas from frostbite.

Monitor your horse. On the road, check your horse frequently. If there’s sweat under the blanket, he’s cooking inside. If he’s clipped and lacks natural insulation, carefully monitor him for sweat or shivering.

Trailer-Loading Tips

Here are six ways to ease trailer-loading in snow and ice.

Train your horse. Prior preparation and good training are important to make sure your horse is a good loader; if he rushes in or out, he can easily slip.

Wear good boots. Slipping, falling or breaking a limb is really a downer on your planned trip. Find good-quality boots that will keep your feet warm, protect your feet, and provide good traction.

Lay in supplies. Keep sand/shavings/salt and a broom/shovel in the trailer so that if you must load in icy conditions, you can minimize the chance of injury.

Find traction. Park so that the trailer’s ramp is positioned on the best traction you can find. Dirt is preferred, but snow is better than ice or asphalt.

Check the trailer stalls. Check the inside of the trailer. Frozen urine and manure are slippery. A fall inside the trailer can lead to serious injury and even death.

Create an inviting environment. Put fresh hay in the bags and a little grain in the manger. Open the doors and windows, so there’s plenty of light. The more inviting you make the trailer’s interior, the more likely your horse will feel confident enough to step in.

In the cold, dark days of winter, set your mind to summer rides. One of our favorite summer destinations is the Kersey Lake Trailhead horse camp, located three miles east of Cooke City, Montana.

This horse camp makes for an attractive summer-riding package. First, at 7,500 feet elevation, it has temperatures in the 70s when lower elevations are in the 90s.

Plus — location, location, location! Kersey Lake Trailhead horse camp borders the Absaroka-Beartooth Wilderness Area and is 10 miles from the northeast Yellowstone National Park entrance.

You’ll be surrounded by endless riding opportunities, pristine lakes, vistas that feed the soul, and abundant wildlife.

One highway traverses this area: the Beartooth All-American Highway 212. This highway begins its spectacular route near Red Lodge, Montana. It travels over Beartooth Pass (10,947 feet), and crosses three National Forests before reaching Cooke City, Montana.

(For an Absaroka-Beartooth Wilderness Map, go to www.fs.usda.gov/custer; for a northeastern Yellowstone map, go to www.natgeomaps.com.)

The Horse Camp
The Kersey Lake Trailhead and Horse Camp is located about three miles east of Cooke City. There are four roomy corrals, a big parking area, toilet facilities and no camping fee.

Fragrant pine trees provide welcome shade; mountains unfolding in the distance offer a restful view.

For horses, there are two sources of water: one is from a nearby creek and the other is from a water tap at Colter Forest Service campground, a mile up the road toward Cooke City.

The camp host at the Colter campground is very friendly. When we asked permission to get water, we also asked about the unusual sign at the campground entrance, “No tent camping allowed.”

He said that a few summers ago, two campers were mauled by a grizzly bear, one fatally. Both attacks occurred on the same night in nearby Soda Butte Campground.

The campers had followed safe-food-storage rules, but had food odors on their clothing, which likely attracted the grizzlies to their tents.

The Absaroka-Beartooth Wilderness
The 944,000-acre Absaroka-Beartooth Wilderness Area lies in south-central Montana. This region is considered part of the greater Yellowstone ecosystem.

Our 6-year-old Missouri Fox Trotters, Nate and Cowboy, were ready to leave the corrals and seek adventure. We started by heading over to Russell Lake, which is roughly 6.5 miles from our camp and has a 1,300-foot elevation gain.

Leaving camp, we headed to the right of the Skyline Guest Ranch and Guide Service’s barn and crossed the Broadwater River. For a mile, we followed an old road until we came to an unmarked junction. Here, the road veers left, but we continued straight ahead.

After two miles, the trail begins to climb, leaving sheltering pines and soft soil. The trail was rocky in places. Then shrubby bushes replaced trees, and we saw Kersey Lake—a sparkling blue sapphire.

The majestic Beartooth Mountains were visible in the distance. We stopped our horses and took a few moments to appreciate our magical surroundings.

When we reached the junction to Big Moose Lake, we turned left. At the Fox Lake trail junction, we were roughly 2.5 miles from Russell Lake.

Continuing to Russell Lake, a portion of the trail went through a canyon; gray granite walls towered to our right.

After working our way out of the canyon, we found a 700-foot climb to Russell Lake. Our horses navigated their way up the rocky trail, did the big step up onto the slab rock, and carefully walked across it.

Russell Lake is a worthy destination and a good lunch stop.

The next day, we headed to the Kersey Lake trail. We followed the trail for a while, and then turned right onto another trail that leads to Lily and Vernon lakes, just two miles away.

This is a good trail, but it’s steep in places. You definitely want to check your cinch before heading down!

The first lake, Lily Lake, is small and shallow. Vernon Lake is the destination lake. There’s a comfortable campfire spot, lots of jumping fish, and welcoming hordes of mosquitoes!

Here’s a trade-off to keep in mind: in July, at low elevations, you have hot, humid weather and some mosquitoes; at high elevations, you have less humidity, cooler temperatures, and starving mosquitoes!

Cooke City
To take a break from mountain riding, we decided to head to Cooke City. Like many small Western towns in the 1800s, Cooke City was a thriving mining town.

Present day Cooke City is a rustic, old-fashioned tiny town. It boasts 75 year-round residents and a fascinating grocery store in operation since the late 1800s. There’s no cell-phone service, no newspaper, and no wireless connection.

Nate and Cowboy wanted to check out the town! We parked our trailer at the edge of town, rode them to a bar/café, and tied them to the hitching rail.

Within minutes, our boys were eating carrots that magically appeared from the café’s kitchen.

Republic Ride
While in Cooke City, we rode up to Republic Pass. On the west end of town, there’s a Republic street sign. Turn south, and park at the first large parking area before the bridge.

Ride across the bridge beyond the parking lot. Go left, and follow the road a quarter mile until it dead ends. There, you’ll see remnants of the old Mayflower mine.

Head back to the bridge, turn right, and begin riding up a rough dirt road 1.3 miles to the Republic Pass Trailhead. This dirt road is passable for small rigs only.

Finally, we arrived at the trailhead and began riding toward Republic Pass, which borders Yellowstone National Park.

The soft dirt trail was a joy to ride after so many rocky trails. Even though the trail is continually climbing, it’s a gentle climb, with rolling hills, meadows splashed with wildflowers, and views of Woody’s Ridge.

After six miles, we neared the base of the pass and turned around. From that point on, the trail has a steep climb to the pass, and much of it was still under snow, even in July.

Photos by Kent and Charlene Kent

Seasoned trail riders and equine photojournalists Kent and Charlene Krone enjoy sharing their riding adventures in the United States and Canada.

I keep my tack in cedar closets that I found on Craigslist and converted into tack lockers.
Sarah L. Ritter, via Facebook

I live in a very humid climate, so I recently invested in a Thorowgood synthetic saddle. I love it.
Claire Cash, via Facebook

I keep damp saddle pads and girths out of the tack room and let them dry out before they get in contact with the saddles. I keep my spare tack and saddles that aren’t synthetic or used every day in a trailer tack room. The room doesn’t seem to get damp and sunlight comes in from the windows. It has been successful in keeping mold off my tack for long stretches of time because they seem to be saved from the humidity.
Kim Elder, via Facebook

Use good leather tack, wash and condition religiously after every ride, and store in climate controlled conditions, i.e. an air-conditioned tack room and not the horse trailer.
Kathy Viele, via Facebook

I moved to New Mexico. Because it’s the desert, there is no mold. The only problem is keeping leather oiled up. I regularly oil with glycerin as a finish layer.
Lena Lopatina, New Mexico

Ach, I’ll make it easy. Don’t keep tack in Ireland!
Dianna Robin Dennis, via Facebook

DampRid in the tack boxes and I save all of the little silicon packs from store bought items like shoes, purses, etc., and place them in the bottom of my bridle- and saddlebags.
Tracy Bright, via Facebook

1. Don’t buy poor-quality tack. It’s been processed in a way that seems to make it easier for mold, mildew and dry rot to take hold. This is purely based on my own personal observation, by the way.
2. Don’t be afraid to use lots of soap and water to clean your tack!! You’ve got to get all that sweaty cruddy organic dirty gunk out of your tack, and water will not destroy your leather, so long as you dry it out properly and oil it when it’s about 98 percent dry. Kind of like caring for wicker, I have an opinion that leather needs a certain amount of correctly used clean water every so often. But do not forget to also finish up with a final round; using lots of a nice saddle soap like Fiebing after you get the crud out. And again, dry it slowly with utmost care in the least humid place you can, and again, oil it well.
3. Clean your tack regularly, and use clean rags, clean sponges, and clean water. Dry it off with a soft towel after. I see people use all manner of grungy rags when they clean their leather.
4. Clean with lots of soap and use a boatload of good-quality oil on your tack before you use your recently purchased tack (new or used). When I got my first nice saddle in the mid 80s, my trainer made sure it fit my horse, then sent me off with a couple quarts of Blue Ribbon Saddle Oil and told me to oil it (topside and underside) until it stopped squeaking. It soaked up almost 2 quart of oil, but I had that saddle 25 years and kept it in lots of weird places and it never got moldy. And it never squeaked. And I sold it a couple of years ago for darn near what I paid for it.
5. Keep your tack off the ground, esp. if your tack room has a concrete floor.
6. If it gets impossibly humid, take your tack home with you. I never had to do that with my frequently used tack, despite living in the fairly humid lower Midwest, but anything not in current rotation should be kept in a climate controlled situation.
7. If you notice a little teeny tiny patch of mold... clean it!
Tack should be an investment. If you don’t have the time or inclination to correctly manage your leather tack, go for the Wintec/Biothane.
Julia Jensen, Indiana

Read more answers to this question in the October 2012 issue of Practical Horseman magazine.

Summer’s heat and humidity can be much more than just uncomfortable. They can be deadly. Horses lose their lives every year to heat stroke. Countless others struggle through anything from weakness to colic as a result of inadequate care in hot weather. Don’t let this happen to your horse!

Cool Science
Your horse’s normal body temperature is 98.5 to 101 degrees Fahrenheit. His body temperature rises as he exerts himself. To avoid reaching temperatures that can damage his brain and organs, he must be able to get rid of that heat.

Your horse has several ways to stay cool. Some of the heat is transferred to the air exiting his lungs. The remainder is carried to the skin surface by the bloodstream. Blood vessels very close to the surface of the skin dilate, and dissipate heat through conduction, convection, and evaporation.

Conduction is the transfer of heat from the body to the cooler air.
Convection is the movement of hot air away from the body’s surface, replacing it with cooler air.
Evaporation of sweat is absolutely necessary for efficient heat removal.

Cool Your Hot Horse
Here are six ways you cool your horse as the temperature rises.

Create a breeze. Slow walking creates a bit of a breeze over your horse’s body surface to enhance convective cooling. A fan works even better!

Find cooler air. Shade provides cooler air temperatures, which also enhances convective cooling.

Hose him down. As you hose off your horse, heat is lost due to evaporative cooling. Heat is also lost by conduction, as long as the water temperature is cooler than his body surface.

Myth alert! Note that hosing your hot horse down with cold water doesn’t cause any ill effects. The colder the water, the more conduction heat loss occurs.

Use misting fans. Using misting fans is the most efficient method of all methods. In fact, Olympic horses are kept cool with this method. The mist causes cooling by conduction and evaporation, while the fans’ breeze improves both evaporation and convection.

Offer water. Allowing your hot horse to drink also has cooling effects, as the water temperature and your horse’s interior temperature equalize. Of course, water also helps to keep him hydrated. Severe dehydration can lead to organ damage. Myth alert! There are no health risks associated with letting a hot horse drink cold water. And there’s no such thing as giving your horse “too much” water.

Add electrolytes. Your exercising horse loses electrolytes along with water in his sweat. His cells function like small batteries with different concentrations of electrolytes inside versus outside the cell. There are even differences in concentrations between the structures inside the cells.
Another function of electrolytes, especially sodium, is to “hold” water in your horse’s body. To maintain proper hydration levels, his brain constantly monitors sodium concentration. Thirst is triggered if the concentration of sodium gets too high; salt hunger is triggered if sodium gets too low. (For how to safely replace electrolytes, click here.)

Electrolyte-Replacement Checklist
There’s a place for electrolyte supplements, but they have to be used correctly. Use this checklist to get started.
[ ] Use plain salt to meet your horse’s baseline sodium and chloride needs. Give him 1 ounce per day in winter, 2 ounces per day in summer.
[ ] If your horse is working two hours or less at low sweating rates, or one hour or less at moderate sweating rates, add 1 extra ounce of salt for each hour of low sweating work, 2 ounces for each hour of moderate sweating.
[ ] If your horse is working longer than the times above, feed the extra salt only to meet the needs of the first two hours (or the one hour of moderate sweating), then use an electrolyte replacement for any additional work above that level.
[ ] Crucial! Give your horse as much water as he wants, as often as he wants it!

It was a difficult Games for the U.S. dressage team of Steffen Peters on Ravel, Debbie McDonald on Brentina and Courtney King-Dye on Harmony’s Mythilus. Michael Barisone on Neruda were the alternate pair. After placing fourth in the Special and third in the Freestyle, Peters and Ravel narrowly missed winning an individual bronze medal when they were edged out by Germany’s Heike Kemmer on Bonaparte. Looking back, Peters remains upbeat about his experience with Akiko Yamazaki’s then-10-year-old gelding. “Ravel was the new kid on the block,” he says, “so to be third in the Freestyle was very exciting.”

In the team competition, McDonald and Brentina performed a Grand Prix that was utterly out of character for the legendary Hanoverian mare. The result was an unthinkable 63-percent score and 33rd place. This was McDonald’s second and final Olympics with Brentina. “Obviously, I didn’t plan on going in there and having that happen,” she says. “You learn to deal with it and move on, but it was pretty devastating.”

Then the young King-Dye, in her first Olympic appearance, finished in an excellent seventh place in the Grand Prix and 13th individually. But Mythilus tested positive for the little-known topical anti-inflammatory felbinac, and the U.S. team was disqualified from its fourth-place finish. Though the FEI issued a statement that neither King-Dye “nor anyone on her behalf or related to the U.S. Equestrian Federation had knowingly administered the medication to the horse,” the disqualification was automatic.

Despite what she describes as “Debbie’s heartbreak and my own devastation,” King-Dye says she was captivated by her surroundings in Hong Kong. “From the Jockey Club, we could stand by a dressage ring and see skyscrapers in the distance silhouetted against mountains. It was breathtaking.” There were other great moments, too, such as “just being on a team with my own two personal heroes.” She lists other favorite memories: “Breakfast every morning with the team, walking over squishy sanitizing rugs to get to the barns, hand-walking on paths of perfect footing through the cross-country course and Mythy’s incredibly huge, giving heart.”

July 13, 2012--Well, we made it across the big pond! Everybody arrived safely and we are getting settled into our new routines. The horses all arrived in excellent shape, and I think they are really enjoying the cool weather, after two weeks of near 100 degree heat and humidity in New Jersey. Wizard is fresh and happy and was eager to get to work.

The first day was rest and recover from the trip, for both the horses and the riders. Then we had a light day of long and low and stretching work, and today was our first real schooling session. Wizard feels fantastic and I can honestly say that I think he is going better than he ever has! We are staying in the little countryside town of Hadleigh, about two hours north of London. The barn we are staying at is Linda Keenan’s gorgeous Layham Hall. It is a beautiful facility with great arenas, and miles and miles of scenic rolling hills adjoining it. Wizard is thoroughly enjoying his post-work trail rides through the lush countryside here.

The riders and grooms are all staying at a charming bed and breakfast in town, and I have been biking to and from the barn every day. We have all been having a wonderful time together, with lots of fun dinners out and plenty of laughing going on. Every afternoon we have rider fitness sessions, a.k.a. “bootcamp," led by Steffen Peters. It is not only great exercise, but also great fun and a good team building experience. Everyone, even the grooms and veterinary staff, participates. If nothing else, we are all laughing so hard the whole time that we get a good ab workout!

Anne Gribbons, our team coach, arrived yesterday and tomorrow we start official training sessions with her. So far, we have been lucky enough to be able to ride outside every day, but the weather is supposed to turn a bit wetter here soon so we may be moving to the indoor for tomorrow’s training sessions.

Arizona Young Rider Brandi Roenick, who trains with Steffen Peters and won the Young Rider Championships at the Festival of Champions, made this video of clips of the U.S. team riders. I hope you enjoy it!

For more from Adrienne's coach, Olympian Debbie McDonald, check out Riding Through, a book that details Debbie's system for dressage success.

Read more about Adrienne's Olympic experience in the Olympic dressage coverage.

One of our clients got Parry the London Olympic flag for his birthday. It now flies over the other Olympic flag and under the good ol' USA flag!

Photo courtesy Debbie McDonald

July 9, 2012--After the grueling two weeks of trials I made my way back home to Hailey, Idaho, a place I haven't seen since last November. I haven't even seen my husband or my kids more than a couple of times. I guess they aren't really kids anymore, but in my mind they always will be! It was truly breath-taking to fly into our valley, where everything is still very green with full rivers and lakes. We live in heaven, and are so blessed with the beauty and wonderful people.

The town was full of buzz about Adrienne and Wizard making it to the Olympics! In a small town when something makes it into the local paper, everyone knows about it. They also are very familiar with River Grove Farm and the Thomas family, and know this is not their first time doing this. In fact, this will be the third Olympic Games in a row for the family with two different riders on two different horses. Both started as young horses, home grown and trained in Hailey, Idaho. It truly is amazing to see Parry at 91 years old still excited about this. It was pretty emotional.

I tried to fit as much in as possible in the ten days I was home. I took hikes with my puppies, and went to lunch and dinner with our amazing clients who have put their lives on hold while Adrienne and I are traveling the world. I flew back to N.J. on the July 3 and was shocked at the humidity and heat. So we are up very early and out of the barn by no later than 9:30 a.m. We had a fun barbecue at the barn with the team and grooms on the 4th of July.

I have been very happy with Wizard's schooling, and we are hoping that we are timing everything just right. I am hopeful that he will love the cooler weather in London. We leave on Sunday ahead of the horses and are hoping that plans go the way we want so we are there on the receiving end to greet them. I always worry about the travel, especially after I had a problem with Brentina loading on the plane one time. But Rick, the team vet, will be on the plane and that is a huge peace of mind. We will do our best to keep you all posted! Stay tuned and pray that the team arrives safely!

For more from Debbie, check out her book Riding Through, which details her system for dressage success.

Read more about Debbie's Olympic experience in the Olympic dressage coverage.

You already know how important it is that your horse be fit and in condition so he’s prepared for such outings. But sometimes, even the most prepared horse and rider can find themselves in a challenging situation on the trail.

When you’re far from home — and a veterinarian isn’t close by — it’s crucial that you know steps to take when a crisis arises. That knowledge and your quick action can make all the difference in the outcome.
Here’s how two TTouches can offer help in emergency scenarios.
(For more TTouches for trail emergencies, see The Joy of Riding, The Trail Rider, July/August ’12.)

Tail TTouch
Use it for: Gas colic.
What it does: Activates the acupressure gas point to cause your horse to release gas.
How to perform it: With your index and middle fingers, make deliberate press-and-release circles, moving in one-eighth-inch increments on the acupressure gas point just above your horse’s anus and under the root of his tail.

Lying Leopard TTouches
Use them for: Injury; shock.
What they do: Help reduce pain and prevent swelling in acute injury. How to perform them: The primary connection comes from your partially flattened fingers in this TTouch, not the palm of your hand. Move your horse’s skin in a circle with contact from the first two phalanges of your four fingers. Don’t press with the heel of your hand, as this will flatten your fingers and make it hard to perform circles.

How Much Pressure?

TTouch pressures range on a scale from one to nine. A “one pressure” is the lightest contact you can make with your fingertips to move the skin in a circle-and-a-quarter without sliding over the surface.

Tellington-Jones recommends a “three pressure” for most parts of the horse’s body to reduce tension and promote relaxation. TTouch isn’t a form of massage. The intent is to communicate with the body at the cellular level.

To learn the scale, begin with the “one pressure” as a guideline. To establish this criterion, place your thumb against your cheek. With the tip of your middle finger, push the skin on your eyelid in a circle and a quarter with the lightest possible contact. (Be sure to move the skin rather than just sliding over it.)

Take your finger away, and repeat this movement on your forearm to get a sense of the pressure. Observe how little of an indentation you make in the skin. This is a “one pressure” TTouch.

For a “three pressure,” make several circles on your eyelid as firm as feels safe and comfortable. Repeat the circles on your forearm, noting the depth and pressure of the indentation. It should still be very light.

For a “six pressure,” tip the first joints of your fingers so that your fingernails are pointing directly into the muscle, and apply three times the pressure.

Use enough pressure to be effective, but not so much that your horse doesn’t like it. Listen to what your horse “says” in response to your TTouch intention.

Tellington-Jones has completed six 100-mile Western States Trail Foundation Tevis Cup endurance rides and held a world record in endurance riding by winning the Jim Shoulders 100. She’s been a member of the veterinary team for the United States Endurance Team, and a judge and competitor in North American Trail Ride Conference events.

A horse covering 100 miles on an endurance ride through the California foothills. A pony trailered for two hours to a mid-June gymkhana in Georgia. A retired gelding with Cushing’s disease standing in his field on the first warm day of a Midwestern spring.

What could all of these horses possibly have in common? Sweat, in copious amounts, of course. But, more important, all would likely benefit from electrolyte supplements to replenish the salts they lost in cooling themselves.

Electrolyte supplements are often thought to be needed only by high-level athletes, especially those competing in endurance events, but in reality any horse who sweats for a prolonged period of time can deplete these vital minerals to critical levels. And the consequences in severe cases can range from fatigue and muscle tremors to potentially deadly heat stress and physio-logical exhaustion.

“There’s no argument that electrolytes are essential at some level to every horse who sweats for long periods of time in hot weather,” says Jeanette Mero, DVM, a veterinarian and endurance competitor from Mariposa, California.

The good news is that forages and commercial feeds are high in electrolytes, and the majority of horses are able to easily replenish their routine losses through their regular diets plus access to a mineralized salt block. But in situations where a horse continues sweating for several hours, he may need the added boost of supplemental electrolyte powders, pastes or gels to speed his return to normal.

By understanding what electrolytes are, and the conditions that might deplete them, you’ll be better able to identify the situations where your horse might benefit from a supplement. Then, you’ll be in a position to sort through your options and deliver extra electrolytes safely and efficiently.

Mineral powered
Electrolytes are common minerals that in their solid forms bond readily into salts, such as sodium chloride (better known as common table salt), but when dissolved in water, break down easily into their component elements, called ions, which carry either a positive or negative charge. Their names are familiar: The positive ions are calcium, potassium, sodium and magnesium, and the negative ions are chloride, bicarbonate and phosphate.

The charges those minerals carry enable them to conduct electricity, and that in turn enables them to play a role in most of the electrochemical processes that sustain life: Their electrical charges carry signals across cell membranes and along nerve and muscle cells, powering functions from muscle contractions to digestion. Electrolytes also play a key role in moving fluids in and out of cells, nutrient absorption and regulation of the body’s total fluid balance. In other words, electrolytes make sure the water a horse drinks is delivered to the cells that need it.

When a horse’s electrolyte levels are unbalanced or depleted, any or all of these physiological processes may be disrupted, and critical cellular functions in the muscles, gut and heart begin to slow or shut down. This, combined with the resulting drop in blood volume and pressure, may lead to a potentially deadly metabolic crisis.

And it’s not just the quantity of electrolytes in the body that is important---the balances matter, too. Too much of one mineral or not enough of another can cause or contribute to a number of problems, including synchronous diaphragmatic flutter (“thumps”) and tying up. Fortunately, most of the foods a horse eats, including grass and hay, contain the right minerals in the correct proportions. The only exceptions are sodium and chloride, the two major components of his salt block, and your horse will naturally take only as much as he needs from that.

In addition, the kidneys are very efficient at filtering out excess electrolytes and sending them off to the bladder for elimination. If a horse happens to get too much of something one day, the worst that is likely to happen is a slightly deeper wet spot in the stall. In fact, the only time you really need to worry about your horse’s electrolyte levels is when he’s been engaging in the one physiological process that has the most potential to throw his balances out of whack: sweating---a lot, and for a prolonged period of time.

Sweating it out
A horse’s ability to sweat is essential. As he works, his muscles break down glycogen0 and fat for energy, a metabolic process that generates heat. At first, excess heat radiates into the air as warmed blood from the interior of his body passes through the capillaries

just under his skin. But then, if his internal temperature continues to climb, he goes to the next stage of heat dissipation: The electrolytes “unlock” the sweat glands, and fluid pours out onto the skin, where it evaporates---a process that speeds cooling.

If the ambient humidity allows for fast evaporation, sweating is extremely efficient and effective, enabling a horse to gallop on hot, sunny days without harm. But there is a price: Equine sweat contains high levels of electrolytes, much more than in human sweat. All those electrolytes in the sweat are lost to the body and must be replenished through diet. But if the sweating is prolonged, and the horse loses too much before he has a chance to replace them, he will start down the path of imbalances and depletions.

It’s important to remember that the cause of the sweat is irrelevant, says Todd Holbrook, DVM, Dipl. ACVIM, an equine medicine specialist at Oklahoma State University experienced with endurance horses. “It’s not just elite athletes that are losing electrolytes; it’s the pleasure horses, too,” he says. “A horse who spends all day sweating on the trails of a local park is at the same risk as the horse who sweats the same amount training over an Olympic cross-country course.”

Many studies have explored just how much of each electrolyte a horse loses per gallon of sweat, with the goal of determining the amount that needs to be replaced, how often and by what means. “This is a topic of endless fascination with endurance riders and endurance-minded veterinarians,” says Mero. “We can spend days talking about it.”

But the research hasn’t always provided straightforward answers. Studies have shown, for instance, that during three hours of foxhunting, a horse may lose from 33 to 148 grams of sodium, 12 to 51 grams of potassium, and 63 to 284 grams of chloride. The ranges are so wide, researchers say, because the actual losses are influenced by variables such as the ambient temperature, the type of work and the amount each horse sweats.

“As hard as we’ve tried to come up with one, there is no tidy formula to determine if a horse needs electrolyte supplementation and how much he might need,” says Mero. “People would love a cookbook approach, but it’s just not possible.” Instead, she says, a rider needs to consider a particular horse’s situation and make a judgment call.

Who needs supplements?
The most obvious candidate for electrolyte supplementation is a horse who sweats profusely for a prolonged period of time due to exercise---a description that is admittedly imprecise. “Again, there is no formula,” says Mero, “but whenever you have a horse who is going to be actively sweating for three hours or more, without the opportunity to graze or access to a salt block, you might want to start thinking about giving him an electrolyte supplement.” Endurance horses obviously fit this criterion, but so do trail horses who are out all day and show horses with a busy schedule.

Yet people tend to overlook one other good candidate for supplementation, forgetting that a horse doesn’t have to be working to sweat for prolonged periods. “I used to see this all the time in humid summers,” says Mero: “A horse is trailered a few hours to a show and steps off the trailer soaked in sweat. He’s probably lost a lot of electrolytes. If he were allowed an hour to relax with a flake of hay, a salt block and water, he’d have time to recover them naturally before he started competing, but in a show environment that’s not always possible.”

A horse who stands out in a pasture all day, even in the hottest weather, probably isn’t going to sweat enough to upset his electrolyte levels---with one exception: “An older horse with Cushing’s0 disease may still have a heavy winter coat during summer,” says Holbrook. “In addition to a heavy hair coat, some horses with Cushing’s sweat excessively. It’s very possible these horses can lose significant electrolytes.”

If you find a horse in that situation, a dose of electrolytes can be part of your immediate efforts to make him comfortable---along with a cooling bath. But over the long term, says Mero, “What you need to do is control his Cushing’s with medication and give him a body clip if necessary. Then he’ll stop sweating so much and won’t need the electrolyte supplement anymore.”

Horses who are not good candidates for electrolyte supplements are those who are sweating for only short periods, regardless of how hard they work or how hot it is. “I’m always amused by the fact that they’ll give Thoroughbred racehorses electrolytes before a race,” says Mero. “They go out and sweat for maybe 10 minutes. There’s no way, no matter how fast they run, that they are going to need supplemental electrolytes.”

Show horses don’t usually require much supplementation either, says Holbrook, who owns several Western performance horses. “I’m riding them 90 minutes a day at most,” he says. “They definitely work up a sweat but it’s not typically for a length of time that they’ll need electrolyte supplementation beyond what they get in their feed and from a salt block.” That said, though, Holbrook says that he has given some of his harder working horses electrolytes during periods of unusual and prolonged heat: “Last summer we had a 30-day stretch of incredibly hot weather in Oklahoma. I did add electrolytes to the grain of a few of my harder working horses during that time.”

Delivery options
When you do decide to give your horse electrolytes, you have several choices for administering them. Which you choose will depend on when your horse needs them and why.

• Powdered electrolytes are fed as top dressing on grain. These products are useful to prepare horses for upcoming events that will cause them to sweat. “If I know I have a big ride planned in the summer, I might start adding electrolytes to my horse’s grain two or three days beforehand,” says Holbrook. “The biggest reason for starting so early is to make sure he eats them. It seems to take some horses a few days to get accustomed to the taste, but then they don’t seem to mind at all.”

One common misunderstanding is that the purpose of starting the supplementation ahead of time is to increase the levels of electrolytes a horse is carrying. “You’ll hear people talking about ‘preloading’ electrolytes before a ride, but horses do not store them from one day to the next,” says Mero. “You can’t send a horse into an event with extra electrolytes. All you can do is make sure he’s starting out with what he’s supposed to have. You’re topping off the tank, so to speak.”

How much of the powder to give and how often will be outlined on the label. “Just follow the directions and give the recommended amount based on the duration of expected work,” says Holbrook.

• Gels and pastes are delivered directly into the mouth via syringe. These provide quick relief and are convenient to use during sweaty situations, without the need for water or grain. Plus, they pack easily in saddlebags. “Let’s say you’re a pretty dedicated trail rider, and you’re going to be hauling out to meet a friend for an all-day ride on an 80 degree day with 90 percent humidity,” says Mero. “You can pack a few syringes of paste: Give a dose when you unload from the trailer, another during a stop on the trail four hours later, and maybe even one more when you’re done before you head home.”

Mero cautions that regularly giving pastes and gels to horses with an empty stomach could potentially lead to gastric irritation: “Some of the products are pretty caustic. You wouldn’t want to be giving them too often on an empty stomach. Once or twice on a given day is fine, but I wouldn’t rely on them as a routine thing.” Having studied the effect of some of these pastes on gastric ulceration in research horses, Holbrook agrees that some can worsen ulcers.

• Dissolvable products are added to a horse’s drinking water. These are a safe and easy way to make sure a horse always has access to extra electrolytes. “The single biggest thing I think people can do at home in regards to electrolytes is to provide two water buckets: One with plain water and one with electrolytes added,” says Mero. “Horses will voluntarily drink the electrolyte water when they are exercising heavily enough to need it. Just follow the directions on the packet for how much to add.” Some horses may be initially reluctant to drink the electrolyte solution, but they will eventually.

Once your horse is accustomed to the taste of the electrolyte-enhanced water at home, you can pack the product for road trips to events where he might really need the extra boost.

“Don’t wait until the day of a show or a ride to try to get him to drink water with electrolytes in it,” says Holbrook. “You need to start at least a week before it’s needed, and make sure that you also offer a bucket of plain water at the same time.”

You can stick with the two-bucket system all summer long, if you like. Mero adds that there is no harm in the horse drinking the water with electrolytes even when he doesn’t need the extra minerals. “He’s just going to pee out the extra,” she says.

If you’re not sure whether you ought to add electrolyte supplements to your horse’s routine, consider that if he’s generally alert and active, and he’s eating and drinking well, he’s probably just fine.

“It’s easy to over-think electrolytes,” says Mero. “People think they have to be this complicated thing, but for the majority of pleasure horses it’s very simple: Just provide water, hay and a salt block, and you’re all set.” And for those rare times a horse is going to be very sweaty for several hours, a scoop or squirt of a supplement is a safe and easy insurance policy against electrolyte depletion.

A barn fire is every horse owner’s worst nightmare. Your stalled horse is particularly vulnerable, because barns are packed full of combustibles. Here are 12 lifesaving fire-safety tips.

Don’t overload your circuits. Adding extra sockets increases fire risk and can invalidate your fire-insurance policy.

Photo by Katie Navarra

If you notice a small fire despite your prevention efforts, call the fire department immediately, then grab your fire extinguisher. Think PASS: Pull, Aim, Squeeze, Sweep. Pull the pin, aim the nozzle at the base of the flames, squeeze the trigger, and sweep the extinguisher from side to side, covering the fire area. After the fire is out, recharge or replace the extinguisher.