Instead of cruising along on autopilot, take a minute to walk through your barn chores and see them with fresh eyes. You’ll find ways to save money—as well as time!—with a few simple one-time tweaks to your current system.

Below are our top gizmos that will save you big over the long run.

15 Equestrian Hacks Amid Inflation

1. Cushion From the Cold

Make winter watering easier with insulated buckets and tanks. While tank and bucket heaters are nice, a single tank heater can increase your electricity bill by $30 a month!

For those of us living in northern states, insulated bucket holders, either purchased or homemade, make barn life easier. A little bit of insulation means no more swinging a rubber mallet at the side of the bucket to break up the ice every day.

Large, outdoor tanks can be set inside a heavily insulated box with a piece of floating hard insulation on the water surface. My 100-gallon tank in Maine stays amazingly ice-free most days in the winter. There are no extra electricity expenses (perfect for dealing with inflation!) and no extension cords crisscrossing the farm.

2. Magnetic Tool Strip

A hammer, leather punch, screwdriver, or knife: How many times do you find yourself needing to quickly grab a tool but end up digging around for long stretches to find one? You may have even given up and thrown money away on a replacement simply because you couldn’t find it when you needed it.

For less than $25, you can purchase a three-pack of heavy-duty magnetic strips. Designed to hold heavy metal objects, they can be mounted on the walls in the tack room or feed room to keep the tools you use most at hand.

3. Invest and Save

My best tool investment was a portable air compressor; small ones start at $100. Air compressors are worth their weight in gold, especially if you add up all the tires at your farm. Tallying up my truck, horse trailer, hay trailer, lawn mower, tractor, utility trailer and wheelbarrows, I have 26 tires on the farm, and at least one of them always needs air.

4. Cord Control

Keep your barn aisle neat with a wall-mounted extension cord reel. These cord reels keep power at the ready, yet neatly put away when not in use. This way, you don’t need to go looking through the tack room for the last place you saw an extension cord or deal with tangled, twisted cords, and you won’t have dangerous tripping hazards in the barn aisle.

5. Collect Rainwater

Here in the U.S., we have some regions that are desperate for rain, while others are wishing it would stop. Whatever the situation, we rarely take advantage of harnessing this natural resource.

Rainwater can easily fill your troughs, and you don’t need a fancy system. If you have buildings with metal roofs, just add a gutter and downspout directed to the water tank.

Numerous websites can help you calculate how much water can be collected based on the size of your roof and the amount of rainfall you receive. For example, my small run-in shed has a 24-square-foot by 16-square-foot roof. That’s 55,296 square inches. Multiply this by a 1-inch rainfall, and I can collect 55,296 cubic inches of water. Divide that by 231 (the number of cubic inches in a gallon), and the result is 239 gallons of water—not bad for a small run-in shed! This is actually more water than my trough can hold.

If you have horses in remote pastures with run-in sheds, you can add a storage tank to collect the water and a float valve to let it automatically fill the tank when the level drops.

Think about the time you save not having to lug water or drag out hoses as often, not to mention savings on your water bill. You can find plans online for building a simple rain barrel or a more complicated rainwater-catchment system.

6. In Hot Water

For less than $250, you can have hot water on demand in a system that is so portable, you can even take it to shows or to trail rides.

These portable systems can easily save you money over a permanent fixture (which runs at least $600-$1,000) if you’re not using it every day.

7. Clean Up Your Act

Washers and dryers at the barn are luxury items, but it sure is nice to not have to drag hairy blankets and sopping-wet towels into the house or off to the laundromat.

Thankfully, you don’t have to buy new, expensive machines to wash smelly blankets. My appliance repairman advised me to shop for used washers circa early 2000s; he said they last forever and repairs are inexpensive. Perfect for dealing with saddle pads and blankets! Check online classifieds like Craigslist and Facebook Marketplace for used washers and dryers near you.

8. Take Note

For less than $10, you can turn any wall in your barn into a chalkboard. With some chalkboard paint and a few strokes of a paintbrush, you can create a fun board for writing notes, phone numbers and feeding schedules.

Compared to the cost and hassle of buying and mounting a dry-erase white board with markers that can dry up or permanently stick to the board, this old-school system won’t let you down.

9. Simplify Cross-tying

Get your cross-ties out of the aisles and put them in your stalls. Many barns now have cross-tie hardware in the stalls, or they designate the wash stall as a grooming area.

By eliminating cross-ties in the main barn aisle, there is less debris that needs to be continually swept up, and you’ll have more room for others to navigate around the barn when bringing horses in or out. You also don’t have horses in the way when doing routine barn chores like mucking or feeding.

10. Reinventing the Wheelbarrow

When it comes to wheelbarrows, the design hasn’t changed in the past 100 years. You have your basic choices of a single- or dual-wheeled (I prefer the single because it turns corners easier), and plastic versus metal tray.

Until recently, you could only find basic wood stump handles that seem to be designed for ridiculously large hands. Finally, someone realized actual handles would go a long way toward making the wheelbarrow better. Even when fully loaded, this type doesn’t feel like a runaway train when going downhill because I can keep a firm grip on the handles.

11. Bright Ideas

If you’re guilty of leaving on lights after you’ve left the bathroom, tack room or feed room, install motion sensors and watch your electricity bill go down. This, combined with energy-efficient LED lights, is a money and aggravation saver. Exterior lighting on motion sensors also saves money. You may hear that motion sensors are unreliable, but if they are set up correctly, they work great. I’ve used them on my farm for more than 25 years.

No power in an outbuilding? A battery- or solar-operated motion-sensor LED light is the answer. The one in my hay barn has been operating on the same set of batteries for seven years.

12. Shelve It

Roll those grain bins out of the way. Shop for used kitchen cabinets with slide-out bases, or just add a countertop and mount your grain bins on barrel dollies, then roll them under the counter. You’ll wonder what you did without this additional work and storage space until now.

Metal trash cans are 100 percent rodent-proof, and being able to move them around allows you to keep the floors swept clean.

13. Open-Door Policy

Another old-school idea is to put solid board rails in doorways when barn doors are open. Fit the boards into slots so they can be dropped down easily for people, yet keep a loose horse from leaving the barn.

Good ventilation is key to your horses’ health, and these board rails will allow you to leave the doors open, even if you own an escape artist.

14. Save on Salt

Instead of buying small salt bricks or spools, buy a 50-pound block and place it in a corner of the stall. It will keep your horse happy and provide a source of salt for more than a year.

On a pound-per-pound basis, you will save $40 or more a year. As a side benefit, many horses that chew up the smaller bricks will just lick the larger block.

15. Nothing But Net

For years, I fed hay outside on the ground, but when horses had their fill, they wasted the remaining hay and trampled it into the dirt. (With today’s inflation-induced hay prices, this could easily add up to hundreds of dollars wasted per year.) Hanging hay nets reduces hay waste, but wrestling the hay into the nets each day is time consuming.

At a dressage farm that I visited, I noticed they had hay-net hoops. This was the best of both worlds—no more hay waste and no hassle putting the hay in the net.

Become an idea shopper! Hundreds of ideas like this abound at stables that you visit. Keep your eyes peeled and look for them. By sharing ideas and looking at the ways that other equestrians are doing things, we can all benefit—especially amid inflation.

Also Read: Beat Inflation at Horse Shows

This article about hacks for equestrians amid inflation appeared in the January/February 2023 issue of Horse Illustrated magazine. Click here to subscribe!

The post Dealing with Inflation as an Equestrian appeared first on Horse Illustrated Magazine.

We worry about our horses being too hot or too cold or exposed to sudden weather fluctuations. We stand in stores reading fly spray labels to determine which might work best and fret about whether a rain sheet, mid-weight, or heavy turnout rug is necessary, only to then worry about our horse sweating or shivering under it if we pick the wrong one.

Therefore, it’s not surprising that our overworked minds might miss something. Problems pop up like pasture weeds. Here are 10 potentially problematic horse care mistakes to keep on your radar.

1. Over-Blanketing

Opinions about blanketing horses are as fraught with emotion as those about keeping newborn babies warm. Is the baby cold? Too warm? Is the blanket too tight, too loose? When should it be removed? The decision to blanket depends primarily upon weather conditions, temperature, available shelter, and your horse’s hair coat.

If your horse lives outdoors and wears a turnout rug, it should be removed daily for grooming while his skin is checked for rubs and his overall body condition is noted. Clipped horses have their natural protection removed, and need heavier blankets than horses with natural coats. Rain sheets and mid-weights are often enough for unclipped horses, while heavy rugs and neck covers are usually needed if the horse is clipped, thin, or used to a warmer climate.

Many healthy animals with a natural coat don’t need blanketing in winter as long as they have access to shelter from wind and precipitation. Blankets should always be removed if your horse is sweating underneath. It’s easier and far worse for a horse to overheat than be uncomfortable from cold or breezy weather, so err on the side of under-blanketing instead of over-blanketing.

2. Moldy Hay

Buying hay is always a challenge and has become more so in the last decade. Small square bales have given way to large ones, and round bales are practically impossible to assess for quality.

Drought conditions have made the supply smaller, with farmers baling fewer cuttings every year. Prices are high, requiring long searches for good hay in a tough market. Too often, when hay prices get high, horse owners are tempted to lower their standards and feed bales they would typically reject. This is risky, since bad hay causes respiratory problems and can be fatal if it is contaminated with blister beetles or toxic plants.

Never mistake tight, heavy bales or a green tint for quality, as weight can indicate that the hay was baled damp and the green color can be sprayed on like a faux lawn. There’s no substitute for your eyes and nose.

Learn what good hay looks and smells like and always inspect a few bales before you purchase. Even if you board your horse, always keep a close eye on what he is eating and insist on quality hay.

3. Dusty Bedding

Dusty bedding, hay, and arena footing can trigger equine asthma, a respiratory disease that is much harder to treat than to prevent. When buying pine shavings, check the wrapper to make sure you are buying the dust-free option. The cheaper products can become very expensive if your horse ends up with a persistent cough.

Shredded newspaper is the lowest-dust bedding available, although it may not be feasible to find in all areas. Straw bedding is the highest in dust.

4. Cluttered Barn Aisles

Your barn aisle is ground zero for your horse activities. It should be de-cluttered periodically and assessed for safety.

A horse may have gone in and out of his stall without incident for years, but it only takes one mistake for a door handle to slice his flank enough to require stitches. Protruding tack hooks and slippery footing are other avoidable accidents waiting to happen.

Cross-ties should always have breakaway hardware fastened closest to the wall so if you need to unfasten it in an emergency, you aren’t as close to a panicking horse. A loop of baling twine between the hardware and the wall hook is another breakaway point that will hold everyday forces but gives in case of a panicked pull-back.

Another potential hazard is the placement of feed containers in the aisle in front of stalls. Many horses are escape artists, and nothing tempts them like available food they know is just inches away.

5. No Pre-Purchase Vet Check

Both experienced and novice horse buyers often skip a pre-purchase exam for a variety of reasons: cost, inconvenience of scheduling, not knowing a local veterinarian where the horse is located, and believing they have the skills to detect conformation flaws or signs of looming disease.

A pre-purchase exam is not a health guarantee because the vet is only examining what exists the day of the exam, but any major issues will be a red flag to a professional who treats horses on a regular basis.

Laminitis has a lingering imprint in the ridges on a horse’s hooves; a heart murmur declares its presence through a stethoscope; and lameness is often subtle and difficult to detect—all are best assessed by a veterinarian. The fee for this service is tiny compared to owning a horse that you can’t sell in good fait.

6. Contracts for Horse Sales or Lease Agreements

The era of closing a horse sale with a handshake is long gone, yet many purchase agreements today have an abysmal paper trail. We live in a world that requires documentation as protection against lawsuits and disputes between parties who can’t remember the details of the original transaction.

7. Failing to Pre-Check Your Trailer

You’ve probably been there before: You’re in such a hurry to get on the road to the horse show or late for that trail ride that you skip the checklist of pre-departure truck, hitch and trailer inspections before starting the engine.

Owning a new trailer does not preclude a safety check on door and window latches, air vents, butt bars (if you have them), tire inflation, trailer lights, hitch connections, and electric wiring. Trailer windows should be open (with grills closed) based on weather and predicted inside temperature once underway. Most of the time, the temperature inside the trailer is much hotter than outside.

8. Buying and Keeping an Unsuitable Horse

Far too many people fall in love with a horse at first sight (or photo), throw caution to the wind and buy it, only to soon discover he’s not suited to their skills or needs. Disappointed new owners may resist selling because they are already emotionally committed. This situation typically ends with the horse as a pasture pet or the owner hiring a costly trainer to fix what usually can’t be fixed—an unhappy owner paired with an unsuitable horse.

Buy a horse for what you want to do with him, not because he’s a fashionable breed or has a flashy coat. Buyers should remember the adage, “A good horse is never a bad color.”

9. Trying New Things While Your Horse is Distracted

Don’t set yourself up for failure by ignoring obvious warning signs when teaching your horse something new. Cold, windy weather is not the best time to introduce sidepassing or trail riding. Impending storms often usher in erratic behavior in horses and cause problems under saddle.

Avoid trying to train when the arena is filled with distractions like jumping ponies and galloping reiners. Your horse learns better when he can focus. Likewise, don’t expect concentration when it’s feeding time and all of the other horses are happily digging into their meal.

10. Spoiling Your Horse

Horses are like children in that they will take advantage of weak leadership, and they occasionally need correction. Failing to assert yourself as the leader of your “herd of two” usually ends in disappointment, if not injury.

If you can’t assert yourself enough to do this, your horse will step right into the role. Watch two horses turned out together and you’ll see they settle who is in charge within minutes, and every breach of that agreement will be challenged. Horse owners should never fall for the myth that horses love those who placate and spoil them. Horses respect clear leadership, not pushover love.

Every horse owner has made one of these mistakes in horse care and horsemanship, and probably asked themselves later why they didn’t listen to their inner voice telling them another day would be better to try something new. There is no need to learn a lesson the hard way!

This article about common horse care mistakes appeared in the November/December 2022 issue of Horse Illustrated magazine. Click here to subscribe!

The post 10 Common Horse Care Mistakes appeared first on Horse Illustrated Magazine.