Sunday, March 10, 2013

Winter weight

When I arrived at the barn the other day Q was all by herself at one of the bale feeders. All the other horses were clustered along the other, and there she was all by her lonesome chowing down. Griffin on the other hand, was all on his lonesome in the middle of the field between the two feeders not eating anything.

I think I got really, really lucky with Q (knock on wood!). She's a brilliant eater and has kept weight on without issue all winter. She looks great, in my opinion. She's got awesome feet. She's sturdy and has withstood all of the exercises we have done (endurance, jumping, trails, parades, dressage). And, she got ALL of her vaccines last Friday and was completely fine and not sore in any manner from them a mere week later. Were I to not work her in the summer she might gain a little too much, but that's not a problem for us. She's really wonderful in terms of being a pretty easy keeper (knock on wood, again).

While the photo suggests otherwise, Q's winter coat is actually about half
the length of Griffin's. Her's is a little denser and a lot shorter.


Griffin, while leaps and bounds beyond where he was this time last year, isn't getting through winter as spectacularly as Q. While its hard to tell in photos, his ribs are showing slightly. His neck is pathetic compared to the way it was in summer, too. He played a TON through the summer months with Oliver and was slightly toned, so I wonder if their play habits have altered through the winter.

Tiny bit butt high (again). Additionally, I wonder if he'll have dapples this summer?
Can observe his ribs here.


I'm not greatly concerned with how Griffin is - I do remember how poor he was before - but I will be increasing his food intake by going out more frequently and feeding him. I'm sure he'll bounce up pretty quickly.

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