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Water intake during the winter

3K views 10 replies 6 participants last post by  G and K's Mom 
#1 ·
I always think about how much water my horse is drinking at any time due to the fact that she primarily eats hay except for the few times a week that I can hand graze her (which is maybe an hour total :cry:) But when it gets cold I worry a little. I live on the Oregon coast and we're in the teens and twenties at night right now and we've had snow,a little colder than usual. She has an auto waterer but I stick an extra bucket in with her if I feel she needs to drink more (and more deeply you know?) usually in the summer. But as I've said I'm concerned as I've heard horses don't dig the cold water as much (I had my other horses on California, so no worries about that) She seemed a little off tonight, a bit grumpier than her usual self and her poops seemed a little hard although she had eaten her breakfast and all . Any suggestions to increase the drinking? She has a salt lick in her stall. I've heard some people suggest putting electrolites in the water?? If nothing else I may just put an extra bucket in and add some hot water every time I go out to keep the temp from being too cold. Any other ideas? And if anyone wants to tell me I'm not being completely anal that would be cool too :wink::oops:
 
#2 ·
Ya I'm 20 minutes from portland, and I am in the middle of that winter storm as well. I was worried about thunder and being cold, even though he has his winter coat. I'll have to find out from my BO tomorrow how they keep the water from becoming freezing because I felt it when I was out there and it was like tap water cool, not cold at all. looks like we still have a week of this storm left! Although, I don't think it's going to be as bad as they say.....it was SUPPOSED to get down to 14*F tonight, but it's only 24*F so for us anyway it might warm up a bit more tomorrow. Good luck with your horsey and I'll let you know tomorrow if I find out! Stay safe and warm!
 
#4 ·
you can give warm water or warm water with electrolytes - I've also been known to make gatorade for mine with the gatorade powder, and "sweet tea" by throwing a couple of handfuls of sweet feed in her water bucket :)

we're in georgia, though, so i don't have any tips for freezing buckets (we only have about a week of that), although if you added beer or salt to the water, it would freeze at a much lower temperature because of the alcohol/sodium content :)
 
#5 ·
Ya sorry, i went out there today and all the buckets were frozen!! I had to kick Thunder's in and as soon as I did, he was drinking like a mad man :). I'm going to go up there again in a couple hours and ad some warmer water, maybe mix electrolytes or salt as well??? never done that before, so don't know.
 
#6 ·
Actually warm freezes faster than cold tap water....... were in the same deep freeze right now in British Columbia. I give two mashes a day of hay cubes. There's a gallon of water in each, so at least I'm force feeding a bit into them. At night I refill their stall buckets with fresh tap water so there's another five gallons.

In the morning there's been about two inches of ice on the outside bucket, I take a colander from the house and scoop off the ice and the lady that feeds lunch to them does the same.

I hate winter!!!!!!!
 
#9 ·
Actually warm freezes faster than cold tap water.
im not doubting you so please dont think that but how does warm water freeze faster than cold tap water? its got me mind ticking and im very curious. i live in the tropics so i dont have to deal with freezing etc so i feel a little dumb asking this lol pure curiosity/need to know :wink:
 
#7 ·
I took out a med size water tub tonight and parked it by her auto waterer and filled it with 1/2 cold and 1/2 warm water. I'm really glad I did because when I put her up for the night the first thing she did was go to that tub and she drank for three minutes straight! I'm just going to do that morning and night while this cold snap lasts!
 
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