[RC] Dehydration in travel and rain rides... - Natalie Herman
We travel up to 1000 miles to go to rides (3 days of driving) and most rides are a minimum of 6 hrs away...Never have had a horse pulled for metabolic or really anything else but Overtime or the "rock with your name on it"...We DO have the luxury of arriving early and staying late (for a Sat ride we arrive Thurs nights and leave Sunday or even Monday, for Multiday rides that are over 500miles away, we arrive with two full days of rest for the horse..so if the ride starts Sat that means arriving Weds evening). We feed hay (not wet, but could try that) in the trailer and every 3-4 hrs stop for 1/2-1hr and take horses OUT, let them rest, eat WET mush, drink, grass if available, then reload. As well as the usual gas stops that also let them rest and eat carrots and offer water. Takes FOREVER to get to where we are going, but we always have happy, fairly well hydrated horses that haven't had any issues so far (and my riding partner, Terri, is #1 in the nation right now for milage, so something must be working :P). We also electrolyte very little (top dress a tad on the food each night at a ride, and sometimes a little at VCs on the mush if it is hot out...if we remember, we leave a salt block out for free choicing as well). As to riding in the rain (I live on the FAR north coast of CA...basically in OR...), in the "winter" (aka wet season as apposed to fog season...only two times of year we have :P) which lasts from Oct/Nov-April/May, we ride when it is not raining out unless desperate (ie a new horse needs condintioning...the been-there's do fine with occaisional riding til ride season starts again, since we ride slow and don't aspire to racing so don't need peak conditioned horses...in fact, with as much as we ride, they enjoy the several months of rest, LOL). Then we ride a lot on the beach or lumber rock roads. This is also the time of year to practice your dressage in the covered arena...or start the young'ns under saddle, also in the arena :). A full length slicker can keep you dry, but is heavy and you still get wet faces and cold hands. So why bother... As to riding at RIDES in the rain and not getting pulled...we ALWAYS have a rump rug on the saddle, unless it is 100 all day for hte whole weekend...it does not weigh much and is ery usefull when needed. RIDE with it in the rain. Also, last mile give or take, no matter how miserable you are, WALK in...do not run in...lets your horse cool and pulse down. Walk to your trailer (only if they make you strip tack, if not, go straight to the VC and only if a long line, go to trailer instead and get a binkie), get a WARM blanket (rather the horse take longer to cool down, slightly higher pulse, than be cold and cramp up) and toss it over RIGHT away (I throw it over all hte tack, untack under the blanket and slide stuff out from under it). Go to the VC and keep the horse walking if you can (small circles in line if the wait is long)...don't worry about gut sounds...who cares if they are a B or C (caveat: as long as there is nothing else wrong and you KNOW it is only that the horse needs some food in it, which it can dig into after the VC). If your are OCD about gut sounds, take a haybag or mushbucket with that you can hold in line while you wait. This has always worked for us, even in snowy/gale force wind blizzards, rain, hail, etc... Can't BELIEVE they made ppl take the tack off at the 1hr hold! ANd that they didn't shorten it...horses need to get HOME...and the Spillway shuld have been a Check and go...sheesh... keeping horses for 1/2 an extra hr in the wind and rain, less than ten miles from camp (done Oroville several times, glad I did not this year), is dumb.... No wonder I like XP rides now...make much more sense...you get so spoiled, LOL... Nat
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