Cold Weather Colic Warning!

[Kelly Marks]

And Pass it On!

It's important and in the H & H today. Make sure your horses are drinking enough in the cold weather to avoid impaction colic.

Mine are having 'soup' for feeds at the moment and one bucket of warm water evening and night with some sugar beet in to encourage drinking.

Keep a watch that their droppings are not getting abnormally hard (I don't mean just frozen!) Colic is dangerous and painful to your horse and expensive and worrying for you!

[Mellymoo]

Oh God, as if I don't have enough other stuff to panic about!! How much is normal? Jos drinks about 3/4 of a large trug a night, has done since he came in - is this enough?? Panicking now :-(

[Deleted]

That sounds like a good amount Mellymoo - have a scroll down the board, there's some other threads where we've talked about how much our horses are drinking.

I've been giving my lad warm chaff soup for breakfast too!

[anastasia55555]

yep ours get warm soup! we get the camping kettle on and warm some water up for them and take warm water down to put in the trough so they can get some warm water if they want it!
We have also tried a kids plastic football (small one) in our trough, the theory being that the wind will blow it and help keep an area ice free for them to drink from. But in the -12 it didnt really work lol! it just got frozen in there!!

[Louise C]

Flynn is producing tons of poo - to much in fact! He's not drinking much though but does get his hard feed in warm water and isn't eating the hay - still got tons of grass thankfully! And saw him weeing today as well!

[lilaclomax]

A spoonful of salt in the evening feed also helps to encourage drinking... I also love the soup version of feeds apart from the dribble down your neck and back afterwards when you are trying to change rugs!

[jen1]

all of mine are keen to drink the warm water being delivered 3 times a day ,

[Caroline]

I'm so glad you mentioned this Kelly. I have been making up warm soupy feeds, just because it seemed like the nicest thing for them. But I have been worrying that giving them warm food or liquid might cause colic. So it's reassuring to hear I have been doing the right thing!

[portiabuzz]

ditto to soup feeds!! x

[Louise C]

Also watch out for lami - my boy has a touch of it this morning so he's on pen rest with hay - not amused! The vet said they had had 4 cases in the last week - 2 she really would not call high risk but they got it anyway.

[Mellymoo]

I hope Flynn feels better soon Louise! Thanks for reassuring me about the amount he drinks. I did try him with sloppy feed last winter, but he turned his nose up at it, so haven't bothered this year. He's a fussy sod!!

[naria]

Another old-fashioned but useful tip is to add liquid paraffin to the feed.

[spring]

Sadly a really good friend of mine lost her Highland mare Shona to colic last week, so def an important message to get out there.

[ticketyboo]

Ours get a warm feed morning and night, frozen water was a problem in the really cold weather we had recently and they weren't drinking as much as we wanted but now we've got new haylage, they are drinking lots more which is a relief!!!

Best way to take hot water to our field is in hot wate bottles - enough to make up the daily feeds and it keeps you warm on your way to the field too lol

[spring]

I did hear that for some strange reason hot water freezes quicker than cold. Very weird