Preparing For Winter
Staff at The Horse Trust in Speen, Buckinghamshire are preparing for more snow and icy weather over the coming weeks.The snow and cold weather conditions mean staff need to work round the clock to ensure the horses, ponies and donkeys in the fields have access to water and food, and to grit the paths around the sanctuary to prevent the horses and staff from falling over in the ice.
"In these icy conditions, our grooms need to regularly go out into the fields to break the ice in water troughs," said Shirley Abbott, Yard Manager at The Horse Trust. "We also need to be vigilant about frozen and burst pipes. When the pipes freeze, the automatic water feeders in the stables and the troughs in the fields don't fill, so we need to manually transport water to the 200 acres of fields and the stables."
Deep snow makes access to grass impossible, so The Horse Trust provides supplementary forage to the horses throughout the winter. The charity expects to get through over 1000 bales of hay and haylage this winter. Due to the poor growing conditions this summer, the charity has only produced a third as much hay and haylage from its land, compared with last year. This, along with the high cost of hay and haylage, means the charity expects to pay around £24,000 this winter on supplementary forage.
The Horse Trust provides lifetime sanctuary for 91 retired working horses, ponies and donkeys from many different backgrounds. Despite the cold weather and their age, most of the sanctuary's residents live outside during the winter months.
"Most of our horses grow lovely thick coats in the winter and happily live out in these sub-zero conditions using nature’s natural provision of shelter such as bushes, trees and each other to keep warm and dry," said Shirley. "When our horses show signs of cold, such as their tips of their ears are cold or they visibly shiver, we rug them up to keep them warm and comfortable."
A few of the sanctuary's residents live in stables during the cold winter nights, or in the sanctuary's large barn. The barn is primarily used for the donkeys and the larger, older horses who prefer more room to stretch their aging, stiff joints.
Staff are also working hard at the moment to keep the yard and paths clear by gritting and salting the areas where the horses and staff walk. Horses are prone to falling in slippery conditions, particularly if they wear shoes.
As The Horse Trust is only accessible by narrow country lanes, which are not regularly gritted, there is a risk that some staff will be unable to travel to work if more snow falls in the coming week. Three members of staff - the Yard Manager, Estate Manager and one of the grooms - live on site, which means that the horses will always get looked after properly, no matter how much snow falls.
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