Horse Care Tips and Tricks: Ready to Become a Horse Care Pro? Start with These Essential Steps

Did you know that horses can live for over 35 years with good care? That's a long time to have a furry friend around. But the most important thing is to be totally responsible for their well-being throughout their whole life.

Now, I recently started caring for a horse for the first time, and let me tell you, I was both excited and nervous! Brushing seemed easy enough, but then I realized there's a whole lot more to it than that. Feeding, training, the whole shebang – it all adds up to keeping your horse happy and healthy.

If you have zero knowledge about horse care, don't worry anymore as I am going to help you with the best tips and tricks on proper horse care. 

What are the important steps of horse care?

If you are about to start your horse care journey, first you have to know the basic steps that you must complete to keep your horse healthy and happy. At the same time, you have to learn about the essential tools necessary to do that job. 

Providing shelter

The first important thing for starting horse care is providing a comfortable place to live, where your horse can stay safe from rain, wind, or pollution. So, the shelter needs to be of three walls for relaxing and remaining safe when the weather conditions are not good. If the weather is too hot or sunny you can provide shade. Plus protect them from bugs or insects, and make sure that the shelter contains no holes or broken fences. 

Feeding

Horses generally eat grass, grains, or hay. But you can provide them with food with mixed nutrients by using other horse-friendly ingredients. Horses love sweet food containing molasses. But you can prepare delicious foods that do not have molasses. Plus you can provide them with fresh water for drinking. If you want to add a new food to their regular routine, start gradually along with the old food and try to stick to a fixed feeding routine. If they have specific health concerns, provide them with supplemental foods. If you provide them with foods containing omega-3 fatty acids, they will get a shiny coat. Try to measure how much food they usually eat, then use a scoop to provide their regular meals based on their needs. 

• Special Tip: Don't give them food immediately before or after doing exercises. Take a break from giving them food for at least half an hour or longer. If you are about to feed them after coming from exercise, let them cool down completely. 

Grooming

Horse grooming is one of the most important steps in horse care. It helps keep your horse clean and healthy by removing dirt and debris from their body. Plus it also helps to increase the circulation of blood in the body. Additionally, conducting regular grooming sessions ensures a great way to check for any kinds of injury or illness. You can purchase a complete set of horse grooming kits with good quality to make the grooming session enjoyable. 

How can you organize a basic first aid kit for your horse?

Organize some high-quality first aid equipment and supplies in a waterproof container. These are very important in emergency cases to manage any uncertain injuries or sickness of the horses. So, some necessary stuff like povidone-iodine solution, disinfectant, gauze, scissors, saline, gloves, self-adhesive, burn ointment, small pincher or tweezer to pick up small things, and cotton wool used for protecting the injured area or cleaning wounds. 

Ensuring preventive care

Horses need to take veterinary care every once or twice a year to check their health. The veterinarian can provide tests to check whether your horse is suffering from any disease that you can not identify through regular grooming. They also provide vaccines to give long-term protection from certain diseases. They plan to give anthelmintics or medicines to remove or kill parasitic worms from the horse's body. Moreover, veterinary care is helpful for regular dental check-ups and providing medicines to your horses if needed. 

• Reminder:
   
• Check the weight of your horses on a monthly basis to understand their complete health condition. 
   
• Check the medication cabinet of your horse regularly and throw away the expired medicines as these are less effective or might be toxic for your horse. 
   
• Make a list of given vaccines, which helps to complete the dose of their vaccines properly.

Regular exercise

Ensuring everyday exercises help your horse stay healthy and active. It increases their muscle strength. Keeps their heart and lungs functioning well. Besides that, it helps their hooves and bones develop properly. Arrange some training programs to teach your horses how to respond to your command and complete the specific task. Create a good relationship with it. Then, try to practice riding with your horse and purchase the necessary riding equipment considering their comfort. Organize the tack room with the stuff needed to care for your horse. 

Ensuring safety

In the daytime, you can hold your horse in the paddock to exercise, feed, or conduct the grooming session. So, you should ensure proper safety of this place. 

If the paddock fences are broken, there is a chance of escaping the horse from the paddock or getting injured. So, make sure the fences of the horse paddock are repaired regularly to remove environmental hazards and ensure safety. 

What is important when designing stalls for horses?

Sometimes horses live in stalls. When designing stalls for horses, focus on the safety of the living area. Make sure that any dangerous thing can not come inside. The size of the stall or barn should be big enough so that horses can freely move there. Ensure proper ventilation to maintain a comfortable environment in the stall for both the horse and the handler.

Why is it beneficial for horses to have companions?

Horses are herd animals, so they feel good to make companionship with other animals along with the horses. It's very important for their mental wellbeing. There are some horses who feel scared of anything. You can keep those horses with some experienced and highly skilled horses to overcome such abnormal behavior. 

To sum up

Taking care of horses is really an enjoyable and rewarding thing for every horse enthusiast. But it's quite difficult for the people who are new in this equestrian world. As they do not have previous experience with horse care, they can not do it properly. And ultimately it may affect their horses' physical or mental wellbeing. 

Considering those newbies in our target readers we have discussed simple and informative horse care tips and tricks in our today's conversation. Hope you guys find our discussion useful in every step of your horse care routine. If you have any queries about horse care, you can comment below. We will try to solve your problems as soon as possible by providing beneficial information. You can also share this conversation to others who need the most accurate and informative horse care tips and tricks for their beloved horses.