Tuesday, December 09, 2014

What are a Horse's Comfortable Temperature Ranges?

Eastwest-construction.com - Full Article

Posted by East-West Arena Construction
Dec 7, 2014

Every year as the days get shorter and temperatures drop horse owners wonder if they should blanket their horses. If they do blanket them, what weight of blanket? Do they need to go out and change the blankets several times a day as the temperature changes? Do these decisions change if the horse is clipped? Should the horse be clipped? Should arenas and barns be heated?

Horses like the cold

Most horse owners are quite aware that horses seem to prefer much cooler temperatures than they themselves do. Therefore deciding to blanket a horse just because people feel the need to wear sweaters and coats is obviously not the correct approach to deciding upon horse apparel.

One interesting study of clipped horses engaged in trotting races reported that horses seemed to prefer exercising in 12 to 19 degrees Celsius weather. Their performance declined outside this temperature range, but declined the most as temperatures went higher- the horses preferred 4 to 12 degrees over temperatures above 20 degrees. But they really liked the 12 to 19 degree zone. To those of us in Fahrenheit areas, this means that clipped horses are most comfortable exercising in 50 to 60 degree weather...

Read more here:
http://www.eastwest-construction.com/blog/what-are-a-horses-comfortable-temperature-ranges?utm_content=10414645&utm_medium=social&utm_source=linkedin

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