Home Life

While horses make for great friends and ‘team mates’ they can also serve a useful function on the homestead.  Most commonly they make enjoyable work of checking fence lines, chasing cattle, and helping with harvesting, even in some types of construction (pulling heavy items around).  For others, some homesteads make horses a prime source of income through boarding, breeding, instruction, training and/or other services (however, horses can cost a lot to keep, and combined with loans, insurance, and other expenses you will have when owning your own facility, it may not be realistic to rely on horses as a source of actual income) For most types work, horses (and especially their handlers) have to actually be trained to perform and help out around the farm - trying to get a horse to pull a wagon when he’s never done it is asking for a disaster.

Horses are my favorite animal.  I spent 13 years of my life with them, and during all 13 years I had one main horse who was my buddy through thick and thin.  When I became pregnant with my second child about two years ago I had to leave the horse scene, as I was leasing a barn and doing all of the care of the animals and barn myself.  When complications came on during the pregnancy, I could not afford to have someone take care of everything for me, so I had to make the hard decision to duck out for a while.  I found it odd, considering when I was pregnant with my first, I worked through the entire pregnancy mananging a barn of 25 horses (yep, mucking stalls, stacking/throwing hay, turnout of 25 horses and bringing them back in again, riding, lots of hard work!), training, and instructing riders.  During the last month or two of pregnancy, I started leasing another facility, and went back to work full time in my business with baby in tow two weeks postpartum (riding instruction, training, and barn work).  Considering I kept up the pace after birth of my first I never thought I’d have problems while pregnant with my second, but I did. 

Anyway - enough about me.  During those years I learned a lot about the work animals horses truley can be.  For many, horses are a pleasure animal.  Something to ride, show, love and care for.  For others, they are a work animal.  Either on the farm, on the homestead, or out in other area’s of life that horses can be in.

They are expensive to keep, but being the frugal person I am, I learned a lot of ways to cut down on their cost.  Though every barn I was at didn’t have tons of pasture, if you do, you can dramatically reduce the amount of grain/hay your horse gets (and this can turn into huge savings).  With enough quality pasture, your horse can live trough the warm months on that alone.  Just be sure to keep up on your deworming schedule!  You’ll also want to rotate pasture to avoid one from being eaten down too much or being destroyed in wet weather Cows and horses can go together (and horses and goats, or just about any animal).  Horses don’t tend to eat the grass close to their manure, but cows will, so by combining the two you can avoid missed pasture :-) 

Horses generally love to be outdoors as much as possible, even overnight.  If you have the facility to do so, and the horse is comfortable with it, leave your horse outdoors year round!  He will grow a thick coat, store fat, and adapt for the cold weather if allowed to do so naturally.  For a horse that isn’t going to be worked much over the winter, a blanket is not necessary.

If you have to give your horse grain, look to your local grain mill to mix the feed for you.  I found that by buying grain in bulk, you save a lot of money.  Hay can be very expensive also… Many homesteaders will grow their own hay and sell off any extra.  If ths is not an option, again consider buying in bulk, or find a local supplier that you might be able to barter with.  Learn to vaccinate your horses on your own if you feel comfortable, and deworm your horses yourself.  Try to coordinate your farrier visits with other local farms that might use the same farrier and ask if the farrier would be willing to cut a discount on the barn call (or see about trailering/riding your horse over to another farm to meet the farrier there).  For a horse that is not ridden regularly or who is ridden on good soil, generally a trim is all he’ll need.

The best tip I can tell you about frugal horse care, no matter if your horse is a pleasure animal or work animal: take good care of them, feed quality hay/grain, and keep up on their regular care and maintenance.  If you try to cut corners in these areas (like feeding a poor quality hay or grain to save a few bucks) you will certainly have more expensive problems crop up later.  Most problems in horses can be avoided by quality care and good nutrition.  Trying to increase the amount of time betweetn farrier visits, deworming, vaccines, floatings, etc. can lead to more problems down the road.  Try to establish a good relationship with your vet and farrier, and make a list of questions for them each time they’re out so you can increase your knowledge, learn new things, and be able to take better care of your horses!

That isn’t all the frugal ideas I have, but it’s all I have for today.  I scratched my eye yesterday while out at the air show, and I am legally blind without my contacts which I can’t wear right now…  I’m getting a really bad neck cramp scrunching over to see the computer monitor, so I’ll leave off here.

If you use your horse on the homestead, what is his or her use?  What frugal ideas can you share on horse keeping?