Ep. 113: 3 Changes to Make When Transitioning Horses Back to Work

Episode Notes

Spring is here and for many horse owners, that means one thing, it’s time to get back in the saddle. But here’s the catch - just because your horse feels ready doesn’t mean their body actually is.

On this episode of the Feeding Fumbles & Fixes series of Beyond the Barn, host Katy Starr chats with Dr. Kelly Vineyard, PhD equine nutritionist to break down what really happens when horses transition from winter downtime to spring work and the small adjustments that can make a big difference in performance, soundness, and overall health, including:

• What’s changing in your horse’s body as workload increases
• How seasonal feeding habits can unintentionally set horses up for setbacks
• What horse owners often overlook when moving from winter maintenance to getting back into performance mode

Spring transitions aren’t just about riding more, they’re about adjusting nutrition, management, and workload with intention to set your horse up for success and avoid unfortunate setbacks.

🎧 Listen now on the Beyond the Barn podcast

Have a topic idea or feedback to share? We want to connect with you! Email podcast@standlee.com

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Helpful resources to reference to learn more – 

• Podcast - Ep. 035: Pro Tips for Getting Pastures (and Horses) Ready for Spring Grazing
• Blog Post - Spring Pasture & Grazing Tips
• Blog Post - Spring into Action: Simple Steps to Bring Your Horse Back After Winter
• Blog Post - How to Avoid High NSC Intake for Horses in the Spring
• Nutritional White Paper – Spring Pasture Turnout – What We Need to Know

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*Views and opinions expressed by guests are their own and do not necessarily reflect the view of Standlee Premium Products, LLC.*

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Read full episode transcript

Katy Starr (00:01):

Hi, I'm Katy Starr and you're listening to Beyond the Barn. Join me on this journey as we bust equine and livestock nutrition myths and sit down with some of the most intriguing experts from across the country. We'll also take you behind the scenes of how premium Western quality forage is grown and brought to your favorite farm and ranch retail store. I'm so glad you're here.

 

Katy Starr (00:27):

Did you know your horse can feel ready for work long before their body actually is? Welcome back to the Beyond the Barn podcast. We're back to our Feeding Fumbles and Fixes series. It's all about learning from real life feeding mistakes and experiences and finding simple practical ways to make improvements for your horse ownership journey. In this episode of the series, we're covering how to transition your horse back to work in the spring. As a reminder, any of the topics we cover on the Beyond the Barn Podcast are more generalized and not specific to any individual horse or any specific situation. Be sure to always work with your veterinarian and nutritionist before making any drastic changes to your horse's feed program. Or you can reach out to us with any questions for our PhD equine nutritionist on any specifics you'd like to know. There are telltale signs that spring is in the air.

 

Katy Starr (01:23):

The birds start chirping. Mud becomes its own season. Horses are shedding and somehow their hair ends up in places you didn't even know were possible. But while we're celebrating longer days and brushing out winter coats, there are a few other things happening with our horses that deserve our attention. When we transition into spring, our horse's nutrition and management needs shift as well. Fitness doesn't return evenly across the body. Some systems rebound quicker than others. While it takes months to build muscle, it can take just weeks to lose it. And that lush spring grass out in the pasture begins to rapidly grow, changing more than just the color, but also the composition of the plants. So, let's talk about some helpful adjustments that matter during this season of change for our horses. Today we're talking about three changes to make when transitioning horses back to work. The goal of this episode is to give you helpful tips on making adjustments for your horse going from winter break to spring work, minimizing unexpected delays due to nutrition and physiological challenges. For change number three, when transitioning horses back to work, transition your horse to pasture strategically.

 

Dr. Kelly Vineyard (02:38):

Yeah, I mean, I do think most horse owners are probably aware of the potential dangers of spring pasture, especially for horses that are metabolic or at more, you know, higher risk with insulin dysregulation or a past history of laminitis and things like that. But we have to mention it, right when you talk about the spring. And so what's happening is, you know, you've gone all winter, you're relying on stored hay, stored forage most likely because the grass isn't growing, but that hay is going to run out soon and you're going to put your horses back on pasture. Or maybe they're on pasture, but the grass is going to start growing more and all of a sudden you have all this fresh green pasture, which is very different from that stored hay that you've been feeding all winter.

 

Katy Starr (03:18):

Right. So, what exactly do we need to change?

 

Dr. Kelly Vineyard (03:23):

Well, you need to be observant, number one, and you need to be strategic and start introducing pasture access slowly. Now, I will say if your horses are on pasture and just the grass is starting to green up or it's starting to come up naturally with the rains and the climate, that's actually kind of a slow natural transition. So, this is more so if your horse been, has been in the barn or stalled or dry lotted and then all of a sudden you're going to put them back on green pasture. Maybe just start by a few hours at a time over one to two weeks. Increase that slowly every, it depends on the quality of your pasture and it also depends on the risk of your horse, but it's never wrong to transition slowly. So, yeah, just manage that risk with the timing. But also you can use a grazing muzzle if the timing is not an option or if they do live on pasture and man, you get a bunch of rain and all of a sudden the grass is really green, you have a laminitic horse that you're concerned about, go ahead and put that muzzle on them soon or start using a dry lot.

 

Dr. Kelly Vineyard (04:20):

And here's another little tip about transitioning to fresh pasture. You can fill them up on hay before you turn them out. So, they don't just gorge themselves. Or you can also continue feeding hay while on the pasture and they kind of naturally will eat a little bit of hay, then they'll eat some pasture. I do like trying to, don't turn a hungry horse out on spring pasture, especially if they're not acclimated.

 

Katy Starr (04:45):

They're going to go to town for sure.

 

Dr. Kelly Vineyard (04:47):

Yes, they are.

 

Katy Starr (04:49):

So, by doing that transition into that green pasture, how is that going to help the horse?

 

Dr. Kelly Vineyard (04:55):

Well basically we're just trying to avoid hindgut disturbance. Number one, those microbes are used to digesting one type of fiber and then we need to slowly acclimate them to the new type of fiber in your pasture grass. But we also want to avoid a sudden insulin peak and glucose peak. So, glucose triggers insulin. So, we want to say a lot of pasture grass that has sugars that's going to trigger a glucose spike, then that can trigger insulin. And in a, in a very susceptible horse, an insulin dysregulated horse, that certainly will not be good. We don't want to trigger laminitis. And also on the flip side, transitioning from hay to pasture can be a really good thing because it's going to save you a bunch of money on your hay bill. Yeah, if you can rely on good quality, fresh pasture, then you have to feed less hay. So, there's so many benefits to fresh pasture. Don't be afraid of it. Just understand the potential risk for susceptible horses.

 

Katy Starr (05:51):

Excellent. And so, change number two. When transitioning horses back to work, start feeding your horse like an athlete, especially if you're going to be riding and/or showing regularly.

 

Dr. Kelly Vineyard (06:03):

Well, sure, I mean a little bit depends on where you are in the country, right? If you live in Florida like I do, the winter is our show season. We've been riding, we've been feeding our horses like an athlete, especially if we're in the show world. But these horses, this doesn't really apply. You know, if you're, you haven't had time off in the winter, right.

 

Dr. Kelly Vineyard (06:24):

A lot, I mean if you're in Chicago or you know, somewhere where there's snow and it's very cold maybe and you don't have a covered or an indoor, you're probably not doing a lot of riding in the winter and these horses are just kind of hanging out. But now the weather's getting nicer, these horses need less calories in the winter. So, transitioning to feeding them like an athlete means looking at your calorie intake or they have getting enough calories to maintain body weight with the increased workload. That's kind of a big one. And also look at your electrolyte program, you know, in the winter it is helpful to feed salt or electrolytes in the winter to drive this drinking behavior. But in the summer and when it gets warmer in the spring too, they sweat more and they may even need a different electrolyte, maybe more electrolytes than they did in the winter to compensate for what they're losing in sweat.

 

Katy Starr (07:14):

Yes. And so, what exactly, for those that are in the more northern parts of the country and they are taking kind of a break, what do we need to change for them?

 

Dr. Kelly Vineyard (07:25):

Well, I just think you need to be observant again, on your horse's body condition. You can regularly take their body condition score and also regularly track their weight with a weight tape, maybe weekly, maybe biweekly, and sort of have a plan to increase calories, whether that's more concentrate or maybe you're feeding a ration balancer and you may supplement with a fat or a high fiber supplement with for more calories. But just kind of keep track of that to match your calories to your workload. You may start top dressing electrolytes. You may pay more attention to vitamin E and amino acid intake because especially if they're working more their vitamin E requirements increase in working horses and also with amino acids to support muscle. Maybe you use certain type of supplements only in a show season, maybe some type of joint supplement or a coat enhancer to make them look pretty. For the show ring, like essential fatty acids, maybe you start bringing that back in too, if you're going to be, if that's something that's important to you.

 

Katy Starr (08:24):

Excellent. And so, for example, especially talking about increasing calories, I mean that makes sense because it's going to basically match their workload, right? As they're kind of moving into more exercise and things like that. But along with like electrolytes and some things like that, how is making those changes, how are making those changes going to help?

 

Dr. Kelly Vineyard (08:44):

I mean you basically are going to prevent problems down the road. So, for example, an electrolyte deficiency can be very problematic. One cause of tying up is actually electrolyte deficiencies. You know, most people forget that. They think, oh, my horse has a muscle disorder, but an electrolyte deficiency actually can also lead to a tying up episode. We want to avoid that. And even anhidrosis, or when horses stop sweating, sometimes that's related to lack of electrolytes too. So, we just want to kind of be proactive and prevent some of these issues from happening by nourishing the horses appropriately.

 

Katy Starr (09:18):

Yes. Excellent. Okay. And so, for change, number one, when transitioning our horses back to work, rebuild your horse's tendon and bone load tolerance gradually.

 

Dr. Kelly Vineyard (09:29):

Yeah, I mean, over the winter these horses might be sedentary and it's really tempting when the weather gets nice to just hop on and go at it. Just like where you stopped, right? Maybe where you left off in the, before the winter came through. So, realize that their fitness has gone down. But also, yeah, their structural integrity isn't what it was three months ago, four months ago. So, as you are building your horse back up, don't go on a two hour trail ride like the first weekend that it's nice that's just asking for trouble. But even, you know, as maybe you're going to build fitness like in the, in the arena or do a little small trail rides, remember that muscle adapts faster than tendons and bone. Okay. So, we can get stronger, but sort of, especially with tendons and if you're working in arena, you know, footing and you know tendon injuries can happen when they're weak and sometimes going too hard too fast before those tendons have sort of built back up thattensilestrength.

 

Dr. Kelly Vineyard (10:34):

It's tempting sometimes because you haven't ridden in a long time and you want to start getting back to work. The horse feels good, he feels strong, maybe he's getting a little bit fitter, but the rider starts to ask for more if their body's not ready. That's kind of where you have an increased risk of tendon injuries that are really going to put you back. So, I guess the answer there is increased workload gradually and over the course of several weeks. Right. And then wait, if you're doing speed work, like if you do a barrel racer or you doing things like that, wait to introduce speed or let's say like you're a dressage rider and wait to introduce highly collected work after the aerobic conditioning, you've got your baseline there and then you can kind of build in some of more of that strength work.

 

Katy Starr (11:17):

Right Well, and I think sometimes people might forget when you're working with your horse, if you were doing it yourself as an athlete, you would be doing the same thing. Mm-hmm . But when you're asking it of your horse and you're not maybe feeling it yourself. Yeah, it might be hard to remember that. And so that's a great point to make sure that we take caution with that. Not realizing to push. It might seem like our horse is doing fine, but there's some things there on the back end that'll sneak up on you. And then problems.

 

Dr. Kelly Vineyard (11:46):

Well, it does seem like they're doing fine. They're probably raring to go. They're like, this is good. I'm glad to be out. And they may be a little bit, maybe a little, little hot just because they're happy to be out too, but that does not mean their body's necessarily ready .

 

Katy Starr (12:00):

Excellent. No, that's great. Awesome. Well, thank you Dr. Vineyard. We appreciate you helping us out on these changes.

 

Dr. Kelly Vineyard (12:07):

All right, thank you.

 

Katy Starr (12:08):

Today we covered three changes to make when transitioning horses back to work and how to make them safely without causing unexpected delays in our horse's performance. Here are some key takeaways from Dr. Vineyard. Rapidly growing pasture is nutritionally dynamic. Strategic introduction from hay to pasture allows the horse's hindgut and metabolic system time to adapt, reducing the risk of digestive upset and potential laminitic episodes. Start with the numbers, body weight, body condition, score, workload and adjust before weight loss or fatigue occurs in your horse. Feeding like an athlete means planning ahead, not reacting after performance drops. And just because your horse feels fit doesn't mean their tissues are conditioned yet. Tendon and bone adapt more slowly than muscle. So, workload has to increase gradually or there is a risk of outpacing the body's ability to strengthen. If you want to dig a little deeper into more tips for transitioning horses from winter to spring, we've linked some additional resources in our show notes and we'd love to hear your feedback on our Feeding Fumbles and Fixes series, or ideas for future episodes. Reach out to us anytime at podcast@standlee.com. Thanks for listening to the Beyond the Barn podcast by Standlee Forage. We'd love for you to share our podcast with your favorite people and subscribe on Apple, Spotify, or your favorite listening platform. Until next time, keep your cinch tight and don't forget to turn off the water.