Winter's Here!!!!

Winter has arrived in NE Ohio!! And none too gently. We were lucky through this first onslaught....most of the heavy squalls went west and south of us, so we only had to deal with 6-8" vs 2' in Burton!! But this next storm promises to be ugly....and they are talking about FEET instead of inches.

The biggest problem with winter in our area is that the road back to the barn gets blocked. The drifts tend to set up right where the road leaves the main pad, then another at the end of the old barn, another halfway to the hay barn, another in front of the hay barn and then one humongous drift right in front of the horse barn. We can easily get easily get 5 18" drifts out of a little 5" snowstorm. This time the winds are expected to be over 50 mph, so the drifts will be even worse.
Occasionally, we luck out and the wind comes from the direct west, which blows most of it right down the drive and across the street.

This blockage makes life interesting when you have sick-y animals.

Right now our newest arrival, weanling Melody (or "D" as we are calling her), is having trouble shaking the snots. It seems all weanlings get "the baby snots" when the weather turns.....and since our weather has had a hard time deciding whether it wants to be warm or cold-----she's been dealing with sinus problems for some time. Now she has developed a cough....a cough we've been treating for about 10 days now. So even tho her lungs are clear and air is moving easily, she has a dry cough, high in her airway. As a medical professional, you get an ear for where these coughs are starting. We have her on an anti-biotic to prevent bigger problems.

I don't like putting horses on antibiotics unless they need them, for the simple fact that they begin to build up a tolerance to the medicine (as do the little nasties that live in them) and it gets trickier to treat them as they get older. It's no different than we see in humans, where the so-called "super-bugs" run rampant because we all have had way too much antibiotics for no reason (colds/flu are VIRUSES and cannot be treated with antibiotics which is for INFECTIONS). But all things considered, antibiotics prophylactically (oooooow, THERE's a big word!!!) is probably the better part of valor. In other words, trying to PREVENT pnuemonia or bronchitis is better than treating it once it gets a hold of the horse.

The snow also makes it harder to get sawdust and feed back to the barn.....it needs to go back little bit by wheelbarrow or shoulder.
That's probably one of the biggest drawbacks of farm life. Since we don't plow or harvest with tractors, the tractor we have is not quite up to the serious plowing it needs to do. Oh, we've TRIED....but it just isn't heavy enough (and we get some really heavy snows!) Some day I hope to get a bobsled style sleigh to let the horses help in their own care. Hey! What a novel idea!!! Totally new concept!!!