While everyone else is oohing and aahing over cold, starry nights and snowy days, if you own a horse you know that winter can be a challenging time of year. Your horse gets cold, things get wet and there’s the inevitable mud. To help you this winter, we’ve put together a list of six items (think of it as a Christmas gift list for your barn!) that can help make this winter a little less troublesome. 

Photo Credit: Southern Comfort Barn and Fence- Emge Equine 

With the fall’s beautiful weather comes hunting season. Whether you’re heading out for a trail ride or turning your horses out in a pasture adjoining the woods, you need to be aware of the hunting seasons and take a few precautions. Here are some tips to help keep you and your horses safe!

Photo credit:  Synergist Saddles

There's a lot to think about when you’re planning to build a horse barn. From how best to position the barn on the property to just what style of a barn you want to build, your plans will quickly become detailed and extensive! But there’s one common factor that you don’t want to forget about until it’s too late: Climate.

Photo Credit: Fine Art America

If you watch HGTV, you’ve probably seen a show called “Love It or List It.” It features homeowners who have lived in their cute, but often crowded or crazy floor plan home for several years, but now need a home that better reflects their current requirements. Two experts take on the challenge with a budget – one looks at how to make over the existing home, the other looks for a new home with all their requirements. Once done, the owners decide – love their old, but remodeled home or sell it and buy the new home.

It’s Halloween and there are a lot of scary Spirits around.  So how can you protect yourself from things that go “bump in the night”?  With a magic horse shoe, of course!

Next weekend we turn the clocks back an hour.  While it’s great that we get to sleep in an extra hour, it means that days are going to start getting darker sooner.  Shadows and poorly lit areas can make stall cleaning cumbersome and inhibit observation and care of your horse.  In order to get all the riding, horse care and barn work in that you want, it’s a good idea to look at ways to add more light to your barn. 

Keeping horses off rain-soaked or frozen pasture is critical if you want to maintain healthy grass plants.  During the winter, plants stop growing and horses will continue to graze pastures down until little grass is left.  Soon you’ll be left with bare spots that will turn to mud as soon as it starts to rain.  Another reason to keep horses off pastures during the winter is to keep the soil from becoming compacted.  When horses step on wet or soggy pastures, the soil is pressed down, squeezing out the space between soil particles and eliminating the pockets of air that allow roots to grow and water to penetrate. Finally, horse’s hooves, with or without shoes, can trample existing plants and dig up divots of dirt.  And weeds usually are quick to move into these areas.

Equestrian sports has a long and positive history of building character, responsibility, sportsmanship and teamwork in riders, both old and young.  But as more and more horrifying stories of bullying and sexual misconduct in a wide variety of sports come out, from gymnastics to female sports reporters, United States Equestrian (USEF) has recently taken steps to help prevent this from becoming a part of the equestrian world.

If you are ready for a new horse – whether it’s your first or your 10^th – you might want to consider the Off-Track Thoroughbred (OTTB).  In the recent Thoroughbred Makeover series, Thoroughbreds have proven that they are all-discipline horses, from dressage to driving to jumping to working cattle.  This article will tell you what I’ve learned from my experience buying Lotta Promise  (a/k/a Stormy), a 2007 Oregon-bred grey gelding.  If you know the horse’s racing name (or lip tattoo number), you can find out a lot of information about a potential OTTB purchase on Equibase, Thoroughbred racing's best database.  This includes a free five-generation pedigree and their complete racing history.  The good news about Stormy was that he is a grandson of Triple Crown winner Seattle Slew.  The bad news was that in 15 starts, he wasn’t very successful – one win and no place or show earnings.

Now is the time of year when wildlife starts to find its way into your barn. And while squirrels, mice, and birds might be enjoyable while they’re outside, when they come into your barn they become nuisances and even health hazards. Need to keep wildlife out of your barn this fall and winter? These tips can help you do that!