Keep Your Horse Hydrated This Summer

As the warmer weather slowly creeps in, it is important to ensure your horses are kept well hydrated. Our Tictac Equestrian team all feed our horse’s additional supplements onto their regular diet and in the summer months we all agree that feeding our horses NAF Electro Salts helps to keep them hydrated and healthy.

When horse’s work and during warm weather they regulate their body temperature by sweating. Excess sweating can not only dehydrate a horse very quickly but as they sweat, they lose essential body salts called electrolytes; sodium, potassium, chloride and magnesium being the main four. If we do not replace these electrolytes, it can result in fatigue and damage to muscle, bone and cartilage. NAF Electro Salts is a balanced combination of plasma salts:

• ·         Sodium
• ·         Potassium
• ·         Calcium
• ·         Chloride
• ·         Magnesium

Combined with dextrose to optimise absorption of the salts, NAF Electro Salts is an ideal supplement for horses in any level of work or for any horse during warm weather when excess sweating can occur. It is also recommended to give your horse a Himalayan rock salt lick to help them obtain their daily salt requirements. NAF Electro Salts can be fed in your horses feed or dissolved in their water.

Lauren has fed her horses Electro Salts every summer for over four years as they are all in high levels of work. Combined with the warm summer weather it makes it essential to keep your horse well hydrated. Even her three retired ponies have Electro Salts add

ed into their water in the field J NAF Electro Salts are available in 1kg and 4kg containers.

If you have any questions for any of our team, we are more than happy to help. Contact us through our Facebook or Twitter. 

Rachael’s Corner: Travelling Horses – Partition versus Full Length Bar

In the Tictac Equestrian office today, we have been chatting about how we travel our Tictac ponies to and from competitions, the vet or the beach. I have a trailer but Lauren and Jenny both have a lorry. When I bought my newest horse Honey, we had a nightmare of a time trying to even get her home. She definitely didn’t like the look of Lauren’s big scary lorry! When we eventually calmed her down enough and got her home, I started to try and get her used to walking in and out of the lorry with no luck for the first while, until it came to the day we moved yards and I tried her in my trailer without the partition and just a full length breast bar. The box was a lot less scary with a little bit more space to move around for Honey the worrier! Sometimes loading a horse is just that little bit less stressful on us and the horse if they feel comfortable after a little bit of practice.

At first I was worried about travelling her without the partition in case she lost her balance and toppled over, but it was the complete opposite. She was so much more relaxed and content in her spacious trailer and managed to balance herself a lot more easily than in the lorry or the trailer with the partition. My other horse that was sadly put to sleep in October was the total opposite of Honey. She loved feeling secure with either the lorry or trailer partition there to lean on if she did lose her footing (she was a little bit clumsy sometimes!)

If your horse is very nervous about travelling or loading, I would recommend trying NAF Instant Magnesium Calmer which you can buy from our website. It is an effective, affordable option to consider to make the experience a lot less stressful on us and our horses. It helps to relax them and over time it definitely pays off. I have used it a few times and would highly recommend it. It made Honey relax and realize that a horse eating monster didn’t actually live in my trailer!

How do you travel your horses and ponies? We would love to hear your opinions and experiences about this. When I was asking some of the girls’ at the stables about this, their opinions were very varied. Would you travel your horse without a partition? Let us know on our Facebook or Twitter.

Rachael's Corner: The War Against Flies

We’re getting to that time of year again! At the Tictac Equestrian office, we are all looking forward to the summer months, for us and our horses. A break from mucking out every day and our horses can run about without rugs and act like horses instead of being wrapped up all year round (we do live in sunny Scotland after all!) But along with all of the perks that the summer brings, we have to deal with the flies! L

Summer fly prevention for our Tictac horses is the same every year! I use NAF citronella or NAF deet spray for all over Honey’s body and NAF deet gel on her face and around her ears. The gel saves the drama of trying to get near her face with a spray bottle (she is a big woos!) You can buy all of these on our website at www.tictacequestrian.com Deet is and effective, alternative ingredient to citronella. It is used in some top quality fly deterrent products for humans.

A few years ago, citronella was banned from being used in any products to deter flies as it was discovered that it can damage the skin. Chemists still sell citronella oil, but will only sell it to be used for other uses, like making candles. Before, I used to make my own with citronella oil, cold tea, vinegar and some other things that are cheap and easy to come by. This was also really effective and I still do make it sometimes if I run out. You can find a lot of instructions for homemade sprays online.

A good quality fly rug and/or fly mask are also an effective way to keep your horse happy in the field. I would recommend the Hy Guardian fly rug as it covers all the way up to your horses ears and doesn’t slide down like some others. It also comes with a fly mask! Bonus! You can buy this on our website at www.tictacequestrian.com; along with a wide range of other quality rugs and masks from Mark Todd, Jhl and others.

The Tictac Team wish you the best of luck with your fly prevention over the summer months and hope all of your horses are happy! Do you have any useful tips or advice for any of our customers? We would love to hear from you.

Rachael’s Corner: Tying Up In Horses

Today in the Tictac Equestrian office, we have been discussing horses that are prone to tying up, or developing Rhabdomyolysis syndrome as it is more commonly known. This is a condition in which the horse develops stiffness in the lower back and thigh area. The episodes of stiffness can range from mild cramping to a severe problem where muscle destruction occurs. In these cases, the urine will darken due to the muscle fibres breaking down.

My horse Honey has tied up now on three occasions, which can be pretty frightening if you do not know enough or anything about it at all!  Her episodes, so far, have been very severe. In every case she has been unable to walk and she starts to become increasingly distressed the longer she is left untreated. The first time this happened, I called my vet straight away and he came out to treat her. He gave me enough pain killers to keep her comfortable for the week, and due to the severity of her pain he thought on that occasion that it would be kind to mildly sedate her to help relax her muscles. He also took blood to examine in case it was something else underlying causing her problem, this came back negative. In the following two occasions that she has tied up, I have been able to treat her and keep her comfortable without having to call out the vet. I have given her two weeks off of ridden work afterwards to ensure her muscles have fully recovered before bringing her gradually back into work.

It is advised to keep your horse warm and not to move them if it is possible as this can cause further damage to the skeletal muscle fibres. Although, be careful not to over-rug as due to the stress, sweating can occur. In Honey’s case, she tied up after strenuous exercise but in some cases, horses are known to tie up with no sort of strain put on the muscles at all. This could be caused by an electrolyte imbalance which can be resolved by supplementing your horse’s diet with electrolyte salts which can be fed with hard feeding or dissolved in your horse’s water. You can buy these from our website. This can affect horses more frequently in hard exercise or in the summer due to excessive sweating in which they lose too much salt.

In the 1990s, research was carried out which suggested this condition could also be brought on by a defect in a horses carbohydrate metabolism which can affect the skeletal muscle fibres. Equine Polysaccharide Storage Myopathy (EPSM) is when a horse is unable to effectively break down carbohydrates. This is one of the reasons my vet suggested to me that Honey persistently tied up. I stopped feeding her hard feed which contains high carbohydrate and starch levels, and started feeding her Dengie Alfa A Oil and British Horse Feed Fibre Beet which contain high levels of fibre and oil which my vet told me would prevent further problems. Since I changed her diet, she has not tied up again! Thank goodness! Prevention is always better than cure after all. A good quality supplement such as NAF Vitamin-e, Selenium & Lysine will provide your horse with the vitamins and minerals that they will be lacking to cause this problem. You can buy this off of our Tictac Equestrian website. Honey has been supplemented with this for just over a year now and I believe that this has also prevented her tying up again.

If you find yourself in the situation I did and feel that your horse may be tying up, phone your vet as soon as you can and explain their symptoms. Keep them as comfortable and calm as possible until your vet arrives and also keep yourself safe! Horses can become very distressed and unpredictable in this situation. We hope that this never happens to your horse but if it does, we’d love to hear your experiences and any advice you have to give to our customers and the Tictac Equestrian team. Good Luck!