17/09/2025
Are you planning ahead for Winter?
Winter is the most challenging of times of for horse owners. Less light to get everything done, mud, extra feeding, cold, and flooding. We live in times of unprecedented weather.
We have clay soil here, its well documented winter clay depths can cause tendon injury, shoe loss, difficulty for freedom of movement, hardship for arthritic joints working harder to evacuate each foot.
Continuous wet skin creates an ideal environment for dermatitis (mud fever).
Horses get more thrush during wet times of the year because the bacteria and fungi that cause the infection thrive in the damp, dirty, and low-oxygen environments found in muddy fields where feet remain submerged. The constant moisture softens a horse's hooves, making them more vulnerable to infection, (you may see more abscesses).
Prolonged exposure to moisture can cause a horse's hooves to become saturated with water. This softens the horn and frog tissue, making it easier for the bacteria and fungi to invade and establish infection.
A healthy horse's hoof has a natural self-cleaning mechanism that is activated by movement. As the horse walks, the frog makes contact with the ground, expanding and contracting to help expel debris. In wet, muddy conditions, debris can become impacted in the frog's grooves, disrupting this natural process and creating an ideal pocket for infection.
It is important horses turnout every day, have forage, freedom, and friends. A "trash paddock" in winter can be a false economy in clay soil.
Horse's lymphatic drainage system needs regular movement to work effectively.
We have just finished another large hard turnout area for winter. These have forage stations, water tanks, and will be occupied by groups of horses- who have space enough to canter, mutually groom, play, and move eachother on.
We switch to our daily hard turnout in flooded months, to prevent horses being in water, and the damage of deep winter clay.
