Tuesday Tips - Winter Water

With many people talking about cold weather and water woes, we thought we'd find some good tips on how to make sure your horse is getting enough water.


This information is courtesy of Kentucky Performance Products
http://kppusa.com/tips-and-topics/3-easy-tips-ensure-horse-getting-enough-water-winter-2/


In a nutshell....


Tip 1: Provide moist feed when possible (it probably isn't possible to soak hay in sub zero temps) but if you grain them, add a bit of warm water and turn it into a mash.


Tip 2: Keep drinking water from getting too cold or frozen. It's a bit of a hard task to do in sub zero temps but automatic waterers should be chugging along but if you have a 100 gallon tank with a tank heater, make sure the heater isn't shocking the horse and make sure that it can keep up. Even if it can't, make sure that the hole where the heater is keeping the water open is wide enough for a horse to get their muzzle in and that the water is at a level were they can reach.


Tip 3: Make sure horses are consuming adequate levels of salt. Keep those salt licks handy! At rest, a horse should be eating about 2 oz of salt per day.