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As published in Ride! Magazine, November, 2003 Readers Write By Jane Messics of Lone Willow Ranch I have kept my horse at many different barns. In Novato I was at a barn where a horse stood in a box stall sweating under a hot blanket for weeks at a time and never got any turn out. When I wasn't there to take off his blanket I worried about him, even though he wasn’t my horse. I have been to places where the horses have been around loose and dangerous fencing and my horse was injured in wire and no one called a vet or even called me. I have been to fancy barns with curly cue, wrought iron bars on stall windows surrounded by rich shiny expensive woodwork and automatic fly spraying machines. As upscale as these barns appear, sometimes the horses in these places are incarcerated for days on end in an environment of frustration. They may go out for 10-15 minutes if the person responsible for turn out is not in a rush. Then they go back to jail. A horse is a prey animal. It needs to be able to move quickly and be able to stretch out its legs and muscles daily. A horse will be in better physical and mental condition if it is allowed to roam and forage and play with other horses daily. The horse is a fight or flight animal. This means a horse should naturally be in condition to move quickly, be warmed up and stretched out for hours at a time. I wanted to establish a place where horses could have the lifestyle they deserve, where they can live a life more natural to their heredity, where they can roam and play with other horses for a minimum of eight hours a day in large pastures. I looked for a place to develop where these requirements could be met. Lone Willow has 100 acres. There are 12 huge pastures for the horses. For the horses that come in at night to bedded stalls there are barns and a line of three sided paddocks. Between 7:00-7:30 AM every horse on the ranch goes out to a designated large pasture (minimum of five acres) to have breakfast. This way they can eat their feed off the ground, stretch their legs out, play, groom each other and generally have a life that horses should have. They get to roll, sprint, lounge, run and be a horse for eight hours a day. This is safer in the end than keeping a horse confined and letting them out for short periods of time where they are more apt to hurt themselves. We are very careful on the ranch to evaluate the horses temperaments and personalities and introduce them under careful supervision to pasture with other horses. If there appear to be personality conflicts or aggressive behavior, a more compatible situation is found, as there are many different choices available. If horses do live out in pasture all the time, they have a 12x24 foot, three-sided shelter to get out of the weather. Pastures are never crowded. At night there are no more than four or max. five horses to a large pasture with shelter. Often, when there are more than 5-6 horses in a pasture, fights will arise around feed. The horses that live in stalls or paddocks come in and have dinner in their stalls between 3:00-3:30. This gives everybody time to eat before it gets dark in the winter. This way the horses are checked on to see that everyone is warm, well fed and happy before bed when weather is an issue. Even if there is inclement weather, the horses usually go out for a few hours. This way even if they get dirty or muddy, they can get a break from the stall or paddock where they have spent the last 15 hours. Imagine spending 15 hours in a box. And we humans complain about flying to Europe! Boarders have often reported that their horse is like a different animal since they have been in turn out here. Older horses are more flexible, younger horses are more manageable and horses that didn’t have play time before are much more exited about life in general. If a horse needs to be confined for whatever reason without other horses, we make sure that a horse has a minimum of three hours turn out in a place where he/she can get fresh air/sun in a large paddock area or in the round pen or occasionally in the covered arena. We feed grass hay mixed with some alfalfa, as oat hay is too coarse and can cause a multitude of problems. Often there is a reduction of problems with colic when horses are switched to grass hay, and there is no waste as is often the case with oat hay. The grass/alfalfa hay is direct from a grower in Oregon, so it does not have as much Calcium in it (avoid entroliths) and the grass is rich, green and soft to the touch. This grass hay most closely resembles what a horse would naturally forage for in the wild. Our philosophy is to enjoy contented horses that are happy being able to exercise and interact in a natural way with their buddies in large pastures. Horses train better, behave better, and have fewer accidents living under these conditions. It is what they deserve. We are lucky enough to be able to ride them, so why can’t we give them back at least a bit of what their natural life should be? Lone Willow may not be as fancy as some stables, but the horses here are happy, balanced and well cared for. Give em’ time and space, and they’ll give you the world! |