Tricks of the Trade

                                               by Laura Crum

            There are things that I do differently from most other horse people I know. These things work for me. Most of them have dual motivation. I either think that they are better for the horses or I think they are easier for me and won’t hurt the horses. Sometimes both. The thing is that I have been doing these things for a long, long time (like twenty years) and I’m pretty sure they are fine choices, however odd or incorrect others may see them as being. So today I am going to share some of my tricks of the trade—in case they might help someone else have a happier life with horses.

            I want to start by saying that I don’t in the least need anyone else to agree with me. If you do things differently (and most people do) that is well and good. Secondly, I find that the labor saving aspect of my program is very important, not just for my benefit, but also for the horses’ benefit. I take care of five horses all by myself in the midst of a life that is very busy with other things. If the horse care was too time intensive, I would not be able to do it. So my five horses continue to have a good life here partly because I have arranged things such that horse care is not an unreasonable burden.

            AND—and this is very important—what I do works for me under my particular circumstances. I have light, sandy ground, and my corrals are very sheltered and laid out on a south facing slope. There is never a time when the horses do not have some not-muddy ground to stand and lie down on. We do not get snow here, or extreme temps—either high or low. Some of what I do probably would not work under other circumstances. So, with that caveat, here are my tricks.

            1) First of all, I don’t use stalls. Like all my rules, there are exceptions to this. When Henry was recovering from colic surgery, he had to live in a stall. When a horse gets an abscess in the wintertime (which has fortunately been very rare for me), said horse needs a dry stall. I have a shed that can be converted into a stall with some temporary panels and I can keep it clean and dry. But no horse that does not need confinement for medical reasons is ever put in a stall.

            I think the confinement of stalls is very bad for a horse’s health, and maintaining a stall in a reasonably clean fashion takes a LOT of time. It is win/win for both me and the horse to eliminate the stalls.

            I keep my horses in large corrals (averaging 40 by 150 feet)—one horse to a corral. They have pasture sheds they can go in and out of as they choose. The horses live there 24/7, free to move about as much as they please. The corrals look like this.

            2) I don’t turn horses out together in my corrals. A lot of people will argue about this. I have heard more silliness than I can shake a stick at along the lines of the idea that horses need to live in a herd situation. I totally disagree with this. Horses are happiest if they can see and touch other horses, yes. Horses do NOT need to be kicked by other horses. I cannot count to you the number of serious injuries/fatalities that I know about in horses that were turned out with other horses. It’s a very common problem.

            In my opinion the absolute WORST is keeping horses confined and separate from other horses during the night and then turning them out together during the day. This is a recipe for injuries, as far as I’m concerned. I only turn horses out together in a group when they are in a big field—several acres, and the horses will be staying together for a long time. As long as there are no super aggressive horses, this can work just fine.

            I have to add that I have kept horses in every way you can think of throughout my life. Turned out with other horses in a big pasture, turned out with other horses in large corrals, in stalls with turnout during the day…etc. I am quite familiar with the upside and downside of all these approaches. For me, my current system works best.

            3) I don’t pick up the manure in my large corrals. I clean it up with a tractor once or twice a year. Some folks will think this is awful. In twenty years I have not had one problem that could be attributed to this habit. It saves me an immense amount of time and work. I grew up on ranches where this was the way things were done, and I guess I just accept it. Works for me.

            4) I don’t pick feet. Lots of people are going to think this is awful. I never pick feet unless I think there is a problem. If I have a horse that appears to have a foot problem, I immediately pick all four feet and look for signs of thrush or a wedged rock or what-have-you. If I see signs of thrush or any other sort of foot problem, the feet are picked a couple of times a day and treated until the problem is gone. But in twenty years of keeping multiple horses here, I have had maybe two cases of thrush, and maybe three abscesses. I always watch carefully when the farrier trims my horses and ask if he sees any signs of a problem. For many, many years now the answer has always been, “No.” I have had virtually no soundness problems related to hoof care.  (Oh and all my horses are very mannerly about having their feet handled.)

            5) I don’t groom except when I ride. Once again, there are exceptions. I groom my horses when they are shedding. I groom my retired horses just to give them attention. But I feel no obligation to groom a horse for the sake of grooming. And again, I have had no problems due to this cause.

            6) I don’t feed grain or supplements. There are exceptions (again). The older horses get equine senior feed when they need it. By the time they are in their thirties they usually need a lot of it. All horses get trace mineral salt blocks. They get plenty of mixed grass alfalfa hay—the amount varies depending on the horse, and I can fine tune this, since I keep the horses in individual corrals. This keeps weight on most of my QHs quite nicely, including the ones that are working hard as team roping horses. They are shiny, healthy and long-lived overall. Again, works for me.

            7) I don’t walk in the corrals to feed. This is a funny one. I have worked on a lot of horse ranches. I have had to walk into a pasture full of young, half-broke horses more times than I can count, and distribute buckets of cubes into individual tubs as the horses vied for the chance to eat. I know how to establish boundaries and get the horses to respect my space and all that crap. I also think it’s a dumb battle to fight. I once had a really gentle reliable bay gelding (Burt) who simply could not help himself when it came to food aggression. Not just me, but a couple of very handy cowboys were unable to train this out of Burt. The solution was simply to feed from outside the fence. It taught me something. When I built my own place I made sure that all the horses were fed from feeders I could access from outside the corrals. No more walking through the mud and/or fighting a pointless battle with those horses who have the food aggression issue. (And by the way, I could ALWAYS drive Burt off his feed if I needed to—and there is no horse on my place that I cannot walk into the pen with as I’m feeding, or catch in the middle of a meal.) It just works better in so many ways if you don’t have to walk into the pen to feed. So much more enjoyable and relaxing for both human and horse. And I like to pick my battles. I don’t like to fight over nothing. Or get mud in my boots for no good reason.

            8) I feed three times a day. This is one thing I do that’s MORE labor intensive, not less. But I am usually able to arrange my schedule so that I can do this, and I think it’s really good for the horses’ overall health and happiness.

            9) I don’t do teeth unless I see a problem. Pretty much everyone is going to disagree with this. But here’s the deal. I have many times in my past had an older horse’s teeth done because the vet said it was needed only to have the horse seem uncomfortable chewing for not just a few weeks but for months afterwards. I began to be very wary about this. One day I asked a vet I really trusted what he thought about doing the teeth on older horses and he said, “If a horse in his teens or twenties seems to be doing well and shows no discomfort, it’s better to leave the teeth alone.” This totally validated my instincts and I have adhered to this principle ever since. When I buy a horse I have the teeth checked and get the vet’s opinion. If he/she says the teeth need work, I usually do it. After that I watch the horse. If all seems well that’s it, as long as the horse is past ten. I have several times noticed a horse seeming uncomfortable chewing and at that point I call the vet—the horse’s teeth inevitably need doing. And when they are done, the horse is better. This approach works well for me.

            10) I don’t do vaccinations on older horses unless I see a problem, such as a disease going around in our area for which there is an effective vaccination. I do/did vaccinate younger horses, especially when they are being hauled. All of my older horses have been vaccinated many times in their life—I think (and my vet agrees) that the downside of vaccination reactions/complications outweighs any potential benefit from giving the vaccines. And yes, there are serious potential problems/complications that can result from vaccines. My vet actually told me that he wished more of his clients with older horses would take my approach. If a horse is injured I give a tetanus booster. The one horse on our property who does get hauled to events (Wally’s Twister) gets yearly vaccinations.

            11) I firmly believe that too much forced exercise--particularly circles, whether lunged or ridden, and particularly loping in circles—is just as detrimental to a horse’s long term soundness and thus his longevity, as not enough exercise. Confined horses need to be exercised, yes. But those constant circles are very hard on horses, both mentally and physically.

            12) All my buildings and fences that the horses interact with are built of metal—as far as the horses can reach. I use pipe panels for fencing and the pasture sheds have metal uprights. This is one of the smartest choices I ever made. It saves an incredible amount of time and money not to be dealing with wooden fences and buildings. Many horses chew wood, and even if you don’t have a wood-chewing horse on your place, wooden fences and buildings deteriorate over the years.

            So there you are—a dozen tricks of the trade that make my life with horses better for both me and my horses. These are practices I’ve come to after forty years of horsekeeping. Again, nobody needs to agree with me, but if any of my little ways helps another horse person, well, that’s a good thing.

            You may ask how I came to these beliefs/way of doing things. The answer is careful observation, and trial and error over a lot of years. For the first twenty years of my horse keeping life I religiously picked feet every time I got a horse out. And then I started keeping my horses together with my friend Wally. Wally never picked feet unless there was an obvious problem. And what do you know? His horses didn’t get thrush or other foot issues. I was getting older and that hoof picking wasn’t my back’s favorite thing. I decided I’d give Wally’s approach a try. If I had started to have thrush issues or any other foot issues, I would have gone back to the hoof picking. But it turns out I never did. Lesson learned.

            Most of my other “rules” came about in a similar way. I once did things the way most horse people that I knew did them. I gave the recommended vaccinations to all my horses, I fed whatever supplements the vets were currently keen on, I loped lots of circles on my horses…etc. It was only after many years of paying attention to what I saw, both in my own horses and in other people’s horses, that I came to these conclusions. So far these practices are working very well for me. I would encourage others not so much to follow my ideas, but rather to think for yourself. Just because people around you do it one way does not mean that this is the best way for you.

            Here is an example of what I mean. When I was in my twenties, all the vets recommended straight alfalfa hay as a “perfect diet” and also recommended we supplement with wheat bran to “prevent colic.” And I faithfully did this, as did most of my horse owning friends. Nowadays almost no one thinks straight alfalfa is a good diet, and wheat bran is said to contribute to stones. See why I don’t jump on whatever feed bandwagon is fashionable at the moment?

           

            I want to add that in my lifetime of owning horses I have never lost a horse who was younger than 20. I realize that this is partly luck. But I have had several horses who made it into their thirties, and I think my track record as a horse-keeper is pretty good. So, though you may not agree with my practices, you might want to recognize that they don’t seem to be doing any harm to the horses I care for. But please feel free to argue with me, or provide some tips of your own in the comments. I’m always open to hearing other points of view, and I learn a lot that way.

            

Lame

                                                            by Laura Crum

            If you’ve owned horses for any length of time, you have dealt with lameness. It’s just a fact of life with horses. They go lame from time to time. If you’re lucky, it’s not permanent. If you’ve never had a lame horse, you just haven’t owned enough horses, or owned any horse a long time.

            So I’ve been really lucky when it comes to lameness. I can pat myself on the back and say it’s because I have great horse keeping/riding practices and I know how to pick the sort of horse that stays sound, and maybe this has something to do with it. But really, maybe I’ve just been lucky.

            As of last year at this time, I had five completely sound horses on my place, including my retired 32 year old horse, my retired 23 year old horse, my riding horse, my son’s riding horse and my friend’s horse that I board here. Today? Well, the boarder is still sound.

            I know, it sounds bad. But it is part of life with horses.

            I retired Gunner, my now 33 year old horse, when he was 18 because he had enough arthritic changes that I felt he would be more comfortable if I didn’t work him. I retired Plumber (now 24) at 19 for the same reason. Both horses became much more free moving after some time off, and would long trot freely and completely sound as retired barefoot pasture pets. And this made me happy.

            Last winter Gunner got cast and was down (I think) most of the night. I found him there at morning feeding. He was stuck in a hollow by the fence and we had a very hard time getting him up (took a couple of hours). He was in pretty rough shape when he finally stood up, and I thought it was the end. But my vet convinced me that the horse could pull through, and this turned out to be true. It took a couple of weeks, but eventually Gunner was trotting sound again. However, he was never as free moving as he had been before being cast. Still, he was sound, he ate well, his weight was good, he would buck and play—I thought his quality of life was good enough. Here you see Gunner this summer.

            Several months after being cast, Gunner fell while running around screaming for his buddy (who I had taken out of the corral). Gunner got up from that fall limping, and since then developed some very obvious arthritic changes in his left knee. And he was lame. When it became clear that this wasn’t going to resolve on its own, I had the vet out.

            To cut to the chase—yep, he had bad arthritis in his knee, and we put him on Previcox—a pain killer which works well for long term use in arthritic horses. Gunner got better. But he never got really completely sound. And now, as it gets colder, he’s a little more off on that left front, despite the drug.

            He still bucks and plays a little, he eats well, his weight is pretty good. But he’s definitely lame. Here he is a week or two ago—getting fuzzy for winter.

            Gunner will be 34 next spring if he makes it that long. Right now I think his quality of life is good enough. But if he keeps getting lamer, I will have a hard choice to make. I have buted older horses to keep them comfortable, and I could do this with Gunner, but I am not sure I want to push this 33 year old horse to make it through another cold rainy muddy winter (and he hates being confined so locking him up in a stall won’t work). The end result is the same. Eventually the bute won’t mask the pain, as the Previcox is currently starting to fail to do. Do I just want to prolong this so Gunner can stand in the rain? I’m not sure.

            And then, just for icing on the cake, three weeks ago I went down to feed and 24 year old Plumber was lame in the right front. Plumber has been sound and comfortable, so my first thought was an abscess or a bruise. It just so happened the farrier was coming that day, so we trimmed Pulmber and used the hoof testers and could find nothing. No bruise, no tenderness. Also no swelling, no heat, no sign of injury anywhere on the leg or foot. But lame in the right front. OK then.

            I did not call the vet because I have been down this road before. We had done most of what a vet could do. The next step was X-rays. I decided to wait and see if Plumber got worse or better. If he got worse it was probably an abscess and would become much easier to diagnose. If he got better, well, as we expert horsemen say, he just tweaked himself. Or, more accurately, he probably aggravated an existing low level arthritic condition (such as ringbone, sidebone or navicular).

            Every day I checked Plumber out. First he got better. Then he got lamer. Then better. Then lamer. And then consistently a little better every day. Right now you can’t tell he is off unless you jog him in a circle on hard ground. Trotting in a straight line in his corral, he looks sound. And that’s sound enough for his pasture pet life. We’ll see what the future brings.

            Here you see my son giving Plumber a little love.

            Ok, retired horses having soundness problems is par for the course. At least my riding horses were sound. We’ve been riding two or three days a week all summer and having lots of fun. I’ve particularly been enjoying riding in the redwood forest on Sunny.

            My son and Henry have enjoyed chasing cattle.

            My son started his junior high homeschool program three weeks ago, and we have been really busy getting up to speed with that. We took a brief break from riding just due to how busy we’ve been. But last week things seemed to smooth out and we decided to go for a ride. We saddled up and my son started to warm Henry up. Henry is 25 and though he is still sound, his hocks are getting stiff. He needs lots of walking before he is asked to do more.

            I led Sunny out on the driveway to climb on and dang, he looked lame. I jogged him. He WAS lame. Lame in the left front. I picked his foot carefully. No obvious problems in the foot. Also no injuries, swelling or heat in foot or leg. I jogged him again. Still lame.

            This was a big surprise because Sunny gallops around in his corral every day at feeding time and trots up and down the fence, and I had seen no sign of lameness. But he was definitely lame in the left front now—too lame to ride. I unsaddled him, let him graze a little, and turned him back out.

            I bought both Sunny and Henry roughly six years ago. They have both been completely sound virtually the whole time I have owned them, and taken us on hundreds and hundreds of rides. In the nearby hills, on the beach, gathering cattle—we even hauled them to the Sierras. They have been barefoot almost the entire time. As Henry has gotten older, we’ve quit loping a lot of circles on him, but that has been the only real change. These two horses have been sound, solid riding horses for six years and given us an amazing amount of use. Henry is 25—Sunny is possibly as old as 20. So I wasn’t entirely shocked to find that Sunny was having a soundness problem. To be frank, I knew this would happen eventually. And eventually just happens to be now.

            My horses are all older. This is what happens when you don’t get rid of your beloved friends once they get past their best working years. To put it simply: you have older horses with soundness problems. I accept this. That doesn’t mean it makes me happy. But I accept it.

            I am going to give Sunny some time off and see if his lameness will resolve (unless he gets worse, in which case I will have the vet out ASAP). But if he still gallops up the hill at feeding time and trots without a head bob in his corral (as he did this morning), I think his quality of life is OK. I’m not sure about mine. I am pretty addicted to going for a ride any time I feel like it.

            Anyway, it’s early days to make predictions. Sunny may be sound next week. Or I may have the vet out and we’ll put Sunny on the Previcox, if that seems like the right choice. Or maybe it’s an abscess. If so, it will show itself and I’ll deal with it. For the moment, I’m going to take a deep breath and be grateful for all the happy rides I’ve had on my good little yellow mule. I’ll turn him out to graze, and give him lots of attention and accept the fact that owning and loving horses means dealing with lameness. It’s not all about happy rides in the sunshine. Sunny has given me plenty of wonderful rides and taken really good care of me—now it’s my turn to take care of him.

           

            

Old Horses and Mixed Blessings

                                                by Laura Crum

            This is Burt, the first horse I was able to keep until his death. I bought Burt when he was five years old. I was 21 and still in college. Burt lived to be 35—and though I had to farm him out occasionally, as I moved and went through life changes, he remained my horse at the end. He spent his last years turned out in a pasture fifteen minutes from my house, where I visited him as often as I could. He died one sunny winter morning five years ago. I was on my way out to feed him and the pasture owner called me and said that Burt had been trotting around and suddenly fell down. And now he couldn’t get up because he was caught in the fence.

            I got there within ten minutes and I got Burt out of the fence and rolled him over, but though we tried and tried to get him up, it became clear that it wasn’t going to happen. Burt was twitching and showing neurologic symptoms, and he wasn’t trying to stand up. He’d had a couple of seizures previous to this, but he’d recovered OK. However, I knew, as I looked at him on the ground that day, that his twitching/seizing was getting worse, and that this was the end.

            I called the vet, who was there within a half hour, and she concurred. We put Burt down as he lay in the sunshine, and his death was quick and peaceful. I was grateful, though I missed the old horse, and still do.

            Burt taught me a lot. He was a real character, and always made me smile—Burt was a horse with a zest for life right up until his end. It makes me happy to know he was trotting around (and sound) on the day he died. What makes me sad is I wasn’t there to watch his joy. Oh, I saw him often, but I didn’t live with him. I didn’t hang out with him a lot in those last years. I fed him and rubbed on him a little and made sure he was in good flesh and his needs were met, but I had a kid and horses at home and I was always on the run, always busy.

            Burt was, I think, happy in his pasture. There were other horses to socialize with and the pasture owner and neighbors gave him attention. I think he had a good life. He wasn’t the one who missed out. I was. And after he died, I was aware of that.

            Death is very final. I remember Burt with much affection and his photo is on the wall above my desk. I have many happy memories of riding him on the ranch in northern California where I worked for several years. I am glad that I cared for him until his end. I’m glad he had a long, happy life. But I wish I could just be with him again, and feel his particular upbeat energy. I wish I could watch him trot around, with the sun shining on his bright bay coat. And that isn’t going to happen.

            It’s hard to juggle several retired horses along with your current riding horses, if your space and budget is limited. My little horse property is set up to house five horses, no more. Over the years, I have often chosen to turn my retired horses out—in our 60 acre pasture in the foothills (three hours from here—looked after by an old friend who is an experienced horseman), or at that pasture fifteen minutes from my house, which belongs to a friend. It saved me both time and money to do this, and the horses had the benefit of living in a natural way, which I thought (and still think) is good for them. But the downside was that I couldn’t keep an eye on them and spend time with them.

            Losing Burt made me think hard about Gunner, who was living in the same pasture where I had kept Burt. When Gunner got to be 30 it became harder and harder to keep weight on him, and I thought he wanted more attention than what he got in the pasture. But more than that, I just wanted to be with him and spend time with him before it was too late. So I brought him home...as one of my two boarders had left me, thus making a space for Gunner.

            The good news is that after living at home for a couple of years Gunner DOES look happier. His weight is just right, and he has plenty of pep. It gives me lots of joy to take him for walks and hand graze him. Every time I watch him run around his big corral, bucking and spinning, I get a silly, infatuated grin on my face. Every time I rub on him and see how good he looks, it takes me right back to all our many times together-- gathering cattle, cutting, team roping. I remember the blaze-faced three year old gelding with thirty days on him that I started riding thirty YEARS ago. I remember hauling this horse all over the western United States (Arizona, Nevada, Oregon, Washington) to various events. I remember camping with him. We did so many things together.

            So, yes, I am very glad I brought Gunner home. And it gives me joy every single day to see him looking happy and healthy. The bad news? The bad news is it takes a lot of time to care for an old horse properly. I now have two retired horses (Gunner and Plumber) and my riding horse (Sunny) to care for. My son exercises his own horse, Henry, but my kid is still young enough to require some supervision and help. So, in essence, I’m now in charge of making sure that four horses all get the attention they need. And this is on top of a busy life as a homeschooling mom with a large garden. For those who don’t know, both homeschooling and gardens take a lot of time, too.

            And then Gunner got cast just before Xmas, and I thought it might be the end of him. Luckily my old horse has made a full recovery, but it was a wake-up call for me. I began prioritizing Gunner’s walks and hand grazing over everything else. And though this DOES give me joy, there’s a limit to how much I can do in a day. So sometimes Gunner gets a walk and the other horses get turned out to graze…and there is no time for a trail ride. It’s my riding time that has taken the hit.

            I don’t think Sunny really cares—he is happy to be turned out rather than ridden. My son often rides his horse while I do the other chores. And I usually manage to ride at least once or twice a week. But I can see that, essentially, I’m exchanging riding time for time with Gunner. In a way, it’s a tough choice.

            Still, it’s the choice I’m making now. Maybe because I’m older and I’ve been riding all my life…maybe its easier to put time with my old friend first? I don’t know. I just know that despite my occasional moments of frustration, this is what I am drawn to do.

            Anyway, I thought I’d ask if any of you have had to make similar choices. Any insights? Because my horse time these days often looks like this.

            Instead of like this.

            

Good Enough--Or Not?

by Laura Crum

Many thanks to Alison, whose post last month titled “Good Enough?” got me started thinking about this subject. I wanted to comment on Alison’s post but my comment rapidly became unwieldy as I thought of all I could say on this subject. So I turned it into a post.

The truth is there is more to say on this topic than I could ever cover. But I want to focus on one specific aspect. There is plenty in the horse world that is obviously not “good enough”—neglect and abuse…etc. There are also folks who keep their horses in more lavish style than I keep my child. Much more than good enough. And these are not what I want to talk about today. I want to talk about the in between.

Really, what I want to talk about is my own good-enough-or-maybe-its-not situation. Its easy to point fingers at others. But often its more realistic to evaluate what we are ourselves are doing or not doing.

So here’s my dilemma. I have a very nice situation for four horses at my home, and I keep my son’s horse and my riding horse, my recently retired riding horse, and one boarder at my place. Three out of the four horses are ridden regularly—they live in big corrals where they can run and buck and play, they have shelter, I feed them three times a day, the fences are good. All four horses seem happy.

Where’s the problem, you say. Well, the problem isn’t here. Its that I am responsible for five other horses. And these horses live at a property that is fifteen minutes from my house. All of these horses are pasture pets and have been for many years. Two of them are thirty-one. The other three are in their twenties or late teens and crippled enough that they can’t be ridden, though they are comfortable in the pasture.

And they live turned out 24/7. They are looked at every day and the two oldest ones are supplemented with senior food and blanketed during winter storms. Given their ages they all look pretty good. They seem content. The problem? The fences are not so good.

A lot of the fencing is OK. Some of it isn’t. The big field is forty acres and the smaller fields are five acres each, so we’re talking about a lot of fence. Over the years I have used every spare fence panel I had (over a dozen), fixing the bad spots. But there are places that really need to be re-built.

The pasture owner is unwilling to afford this. I am unwilling/unable to plow a lot of money into this property, and I don’t think the pasture owner would accept it if I was willing/able. Because there is a lot of feed in the pasture and no horses on the other side of the fence, we have just let things go. All the horses are very sedate; they don’t try the fences. They are all familiar with the field and know the boundaries. And I have been keeping horses there for almost fifteen years with no major disaster. Nothing worse than small cuts/scrapes that did not require a vet. (Knocking on wood here.)

Did I know it wasn’t good enough? Yes. But the solution eluded me. To be frank, most people would euthanize my five horses that live out in this pasture. Only one was my riding horse, of the other four, two are rescues, two are horses I helped train, who got hurt early in their working lives and had to be retired. They are living a very happy life and have been for many years—in the not-good-enough pasture.

Yes, I know we could put up “cheap” plastic tape and/or hot wire, but the cost of installing this stuff (with all the requisite posts…etc) on such a big setup is still more than I can afford to put out on property that is not mine—it isn’t fair to my family. My husband isn’t interested in horses, we don’t have money to burn, I’m already spending quite a bit of money to maintain my horse herd. It would be just plain irresponsible of me (financially) to put our money into this property. But it is irresponsible of me (as a horse owner) not to do something about this not good enough fence situation. Periodically I think I should go ahead and put the horses down (I don’t need them/they are a financial drain/I worry about them)—but they seem so happy. So I just go on feeding them as needed, keeping an eye on them, and hoping for the best.

Fifteen years is a very long time to go with no major problems. Yes, we have euthanized three horses during that time, but all three were to do with the maladies of old age, none were the results of accidents with the fence. Or accidents of any kind. Our track record in that not-good-enough field is actually pretty good.

And then….yesterday I got the call. One of the horses had gone through the fence and was hurt. Not one of my horses. The one horse in the field that belongs to the pasture owner was the one who got tangled in the fence. She was pretty badly cut up, but not lame.

Well, I helped the pasture owner get a vet and doctor the mare, who will probably be fine. And I told that vet that if any of my pasture pets were injured any more severely than this, that I would just put them down. I explained what they were and about the bad fences and the vet shrugged. “I’d do the same as you’re doing,” he said. “These horses look like they’re having a good life.” And he patched the old mare up.

So here’s my questions for today. Should I just put these horses down now and make sure they never suffer? Or should I let them go on living a happy life in that field and put them down when their time comes, bearing in mind it may come because they get in that fence? Because its not “good enough”? I am not going to be putting significant amounts of money into that property—does that make me a not-good-enough horse owner? I must confess, I do not know the answers to these questions.

Too Many Horses

by Laura Crum

I’ve written a few posts with this title, I think, but it just keeps coming back up. I’ve got too many horses. I care for ten horses—I just don’t need that many. Even though I have them arranged such that it works, I sometimes wonder what the heck I was thinking to end up in this position. And then, when I add it up another way, it makes perfect sense.

I’ve been owning horses non-stop since I was sixteen—and I’m about to turn fifty-three. Naturally I have a few old horses (since I didn’t dump them when their working life was done), and a few that got hurt and aren’t ridable. Should I abandon them? Then there are two horses I took on because no one wanted them—one very old, one crippled. Should I jettison them? Then there is my son’s horse and my trail horse—both very much loved, valued and enjoyed—don’t want to get rid of them. And then there are my boarder’s two horses—both very sweet horses that I love to ride myself—and my boarder pays for the feed that makes my horse program possible. Uhmmm, don’t want to get rid of his horses, now, do I? So, I’m back to square one.

Realistically, the only horse I could sell is Sunny, my palomino trail horse, who is sound, useful, not too old (ironically, I just got an offer for Sunny—almost twice what I paid for him). I could ride my boarder’s young horse, Smoky, who I already do ride a lot—simply because Smoky needs riding—he’s six years old and currently lives in my one smaller pen (a fifty foot round pen with a fifteen by fifteen run-in stall). This pen isn’t meant for a permanent resident, its meant for temporary use—a sick or injured horse. When Henry was recovering from colic surgery, I used pipe panels to enclose the stall, and then later, when he could have more space, Henry was kept in the small pen. As soon as he was well, he went back out in a big corral where he could run around. But my place is set up for four saddle horses. When my friend Wally insisted on buying Smoky (over my protests, I assure you) there was no place to put the horse here but in the small pen. So Smoky must be exercised at least three days a week—it isn’t fair to him otherwise. Thus I am riding Smoky rather than Sunny a lot of the time. So, I could, theoretically, sell Sunny.

But I love Sunny. I love riding him. I love looking at him. I get a kick out of interacting with him. Sunny lives in the biggest pen I have and runs around a lot. He is frequently turned loose to graze when I don’t have time to ride him. He seems happy. Should I sell him? Even though I don’t want to? Seems silly. Completely reliable bombproof trail horses are hard to find.

But there are times, like yesterday, when I shake my head at myself. I wanted to ride. But household chores are always there and must be done if life is to be pleasant. And then I had to go out and have a look at my retired, pastured horses. This took another hour or so. I rubbed on thirty year old Gunner, who is fat—I have my fingers crossed he doesn’t founder (he never has—knock on wood), and had a close look at thirty year old ET, who has rebounded once again and is healthy and shiny and a decent weight. I’m pretty sure ET is almost completely blind, but he is once again content seeming, so I’m leaving well enough alone for the moment.

When I came home it was in the low 50’s—chilly, gray and drizzling. I did not want to ride all that much in the drizzle. So I started turning my saddle horses loose to graze (my son was also a wimp and did not want to ride in the drizzle). My boarder had hauled his two horses off to a team roping. I turned my son’ horse (Henry), my old horse (Plumber), and Sunny loose to graze one at a time. This took a few hours. I groomed Henry, who is prone to dandruff in the spring when he sheds out. Then I saddled Sunny. The sun never did come out. It was chilly and gray with a brisk wind that made me shiver, even in a jacket. In the end I had a twenty minute ride, and Sunny was, for him, a butt head. I didn’t really blame him, since he’s had two weeks off, due to lousy weather and me riding Smoky. And Sunny’s version of being a butt head is pretty mild, just some uncooperative balking and a few jiggy moments. Still, it wasn’t the most fun I’ve ever had on a horse. I got off feeling put upon. Even keeping horses in the low maintainance way that I do (see my previous post “Horsekeeping Simplified”), the whole day got eaten up with horse chores. I am just not riding nearly as much as I used to. I have too many horses, I told myself. I don’t need all these horses.

And then I stopped and asked myself, “What part of this day did you not enjoy? What part would you change?”

Well, that was easy. I wanted it to have been sunny and 70 and I went for a two hour ride on the ridge and Sunny was mellow and cooperative. OK. But given it was what it was, what part would I change? And at that I remembered my happy horses grazing on green grass, and the fact that every horse got rubbed on and every saddle horse was out of his pen and given attention, and that I had, in fact, enjoyed most of it. And despite being somewhat annoyed at my less than ideal ride, I understood perfectly why it was what it was, and that it was not a big deal in the grand scheme of things.

Sunny days will come again. Sunny the horse is a steady trooper—his version of “feeling good” is just not that hard to cope with. I can be grateful that he’s not prone to violent misbehaving. We’ll get back out on those trails together and be back in sync soon enough.
I thought about other horse blogs I’ve read. We all cope with some adversity. Weather, horse keeping conditions, bad backs and other health issues, lameness and health issues in our horses, lack of time and/or enough money, fear issues….the list goes on. Do I expect my life to be the only one that is all sunshine and perfectly behaved horses? When I thought about it that way, the answer seemed obvious. I suddenly felt lucky and blessed.

So, once again, I’m back to working on my mindset. Because maybe I don’t have too many horses. Maybe my life is just fine exactly how it is. I simply have to learn to see it that way. Even on the gray days.

How about you guys? Do any of you struggle with the too many horses dilemma? And do you have any tips to offer on how to keep your perspective when your horse program seems more like work than fun? I could use a pep talk right about now.