In which I revisit the issue of keeping a big dark horse cool
The best way to keep a hard-working endurance horse cool during a strenuous event is to begin with a small, narrow, grey horse. Preferably an Arab.
Fiddle is big: 16 hands, 1200 pounds. She has a big engine,
and her engine runs hot.
During an endurance ride, cooling is a major issue for all horses. Here's a quote from an article by Dr. Susan Garlinghouse, DVM:
During a fifty-mile ride in ambient temperatures, the average horse will produce enough heat to melt a 150-pound block of ice, and then bring that water to a boil. If that heat is not removed, the internal body temperature will quickly rise high enough to literally cook the entire body.
Please note that the numbers cited above are for an average horse. Not a 1200 pound Dragon, who naturally produces even more heat.
And not a Moose, either.
Moose and his rider ran into metabolic trouble at the April Daze ride, which sent me scurrying to my blog archives to find the post I wrote about cooling a big dark horse. Turns out that…
Fiddle is big: 16 hands, 1200 pounds. She has a big engine,
and her engine runs hot.
During an endurance ride, cooling is a major issue for all horses. Here's a quote from an article by Dr. Susan Garlinghouse, DVM:
During a fifty-mile ride in ambient temperatures, the average horse will produce enough heat to melt a 150-pound block of ice, and then bring that water to a boil. If that heat is not removed, the internal body temperature will quickly rise high enough to literally cook the entire body.
Please note that the numbers cited above are for an average horse. Not a 1200 pound Dragon, who naturally produces even more heat.
And not a Moose, either.
Moose and his rider ran into metabolic trouble at the April Daze ride, which sent me scurrying to my blog archives to find the post I wrote about cooling a big dark horse. Turns out that…
