Yeah, you can lead a horse to water, but not make them drink.
My older mare is doing OK and feels fine and has plenty of energy, but looks like shit like a lot of the horses---this weather has been brutal, and even though they are getting plenty to eat, a lot are thin. I give her everything under the sun to bulk her up, but I think the biggest problem is she's not drinking enough, so gets very tucked up. It's cold so maybe she doesn't want to drink, or the water tanks are muddy around them. I bring her in every day and have a bucket of water for her, but mostly she won't drink until maybe she's eaten for awhile and one of her daughters drinks. Apparently she likes to drink out of the big tank at the top of another pasture, where one of my leasors takes her when she rides.
She's getting extra salt, I've tried flavoring it, different buckets, etc. I'm going to try a muck bucket that is bigger at the barn today, because maybe the visual will help? Any out of the box ideas I can try? If it were the cat, I would just subcu fluids, but I can't do that.
Any new ideas to get a horse to drink?
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Re: Any new ideas to get a horse to drink?
When my 28 year old wasn’t drinking (or eating) enough and really disliked oral electrolytes I started him on one pound of soaked beet pulp pellets twice daily. I layered the beet pulp with 1/2 pound rolled oats or barley. He has been gobbling it up and is now looking quite good. He also gets free fed Bermuda hay and a mixture of orchard and alfalfa 4x daily. He can be extremely picky and I have had him on almost every brand of senior feed plus supplements at some time. My vet and I have come to agreement. He gets anything he will eat. Good luck.
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Re: Any new ideas to get a horse to drink?
Can you soak her food? My oldster wouldn’t eat if we soaked her grain or timothy pellets, but give her a bucket of soaked oats or beet pulp, and she’d dig in.
And do tube electrolytes work with her? They’re more palatable for my garbage disposal mare than powdered.
And do tube electrolytes work with her? They’re more palatable for my garbage disposal mare than powdered.
Re: Any new ideas to get a horse to drink?
She gets grain that I actually grind at home in the blender so it's more broken down and rice pellets in water as well as soybean oil. I haven't tried beats or tubed electrolytes, so maybe that's an option. She is eating all of the grain, rice pellets, and oil with all of her supplements, which include a good amount of salt.
She eats and can pretty much all day. They have all of the grass hay they want and most of the pasture horses (which has nibbles, but not much grass) see the fencing as guidelines and get out (and go back in) all of the time, but mostly not her. When I am there and it's not pouring or a foot deep in mud, I usually put her to landscaping, and she will snarf the green grass nonstop. I'll sweep up all of the alfalfa leaves and give that to her, and she usually happily eats that, but maybe not so much more grass hay.
She eats and can pretty much all day. They have all of the grass hay they want and most of the pasture horses (which has nibbles, but not much grass) see the fencing as guidelines and get out (and go back in) all of the time, but mostly not her. When I am there and it's not pouring or a foot deep in mud, I usually put her to landscaping, and she will snarf the green grass nonstop. I'll sweep up all of the alfalfa leaves and give that to her, and she usually happily eats that, but maybe not so much more grass hay.
Re: Any new ideas to get a horse to drink?
Agree with suggestions to soak food or try things like beet pulp or make some very soupy mash with alfalfa cubes
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Re: Any new ideas to get a horse to drink?
In cold weather, when my oldster came into the stall for p.m. feeding, I'd fill his flatback water bucket(s) with very warm water. He'd take big long drinks. Especially if I held the bucket.... I always thought the shock of cold water on his teeth in cold weather made him reluctant to drink sometimes.
Re: Any new ideas to get a horse to drink?
texsuze, yeah, I've been doing that for missIdon'twanttodrink. It hasn't been that cold here, but warm bucket of water. No. Hold it up to her nose. No. I tried the muck bucket so it was more like a tank yesterday. No. Quilla, especially, loves to stick her nose in buckets and play and dump water as well as drink a lot. Sometimes when she does that it inspires mom to drink, or not. I will just work on adding more to the food, though she doesn't always like that. Sigh. At least it's not raining and warming up, so I hope that will help a lot. So much rain and mud and temperatures in the 40's for weeks on end during the day is something that doesn't happen here!
I was going to grab some of my powdered Gatorade and add that to her grain and see it it might help.
I was going to grab some of my powdered Gatorade and add that to her grain and see it it might help.
Re: Any new ideas to get a horse to drink?
Ditto - what texsure said for giving warm water to an older horse. This detail has always been successful with my older geldings - so maybe a dental sensitivity with age. The outside water source must always be fresh clean water without mud, algae, slime etc. as many horses will refuse to drink it. I can't blame them.
Trivia - This may be a quirk with my pony but he will always drink water after I give him TUMS mints. I use these treat mints for our neck stretches when he is loose in his stall. He does his neck/shoulder stretches - gets the treat reward then goes for a drink of water.
Trivia - This may be a quirk with my pony but he will always drink water after I give him TUMS mints. I use these treat mints for our neck stretches when he is loose in his stall. He does his neck/shoulder stretches - gets the treat reward then goes for a drink of water.
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Re: Any new ideas to get a horse to drink?
Tubed electrolytes are my go to for horse not drinking enough.
Re: Any new ideas to get a horse to drink?
I use a couple of handfuls of triple crown senior feed and mine suck the entire bucket up
Re: Any new ideas to get a horse to drink?
She's doing better now that the weather has changed (no more atmospheric rivers!) Having a muck bucket to drink out of helped, and just a half a scoop of alfalfa pellets in over a gallon of water soaked all night seemed to do the trick. Thanks for the ideas.
Re: Any new ideas to get a horse to drink?
For my older boy who doesn't drink enough water in the winter became much better when I started to warm his water, and feed him soaked beet pulp.
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