Keeping your horse at home

Hello to everyone! What about writing something in English? I thought that could be a good idea because I'd like to exchange informations not only with Italian people but also with others all around the world. First of all I can tell you something about be. I'm a horse owner, I have them at home and I started to write this blog almost two years ago to "help" people to understand better their horses. Here in Italy there are two different kinds of horse owners: those who have their horses at home and those who have them in stables. At the beginning of my story with horses I used to keep them in a stable where there where people who helped me with training lessons and others who cleaned them. After a while I decided to bring them at home and I had to face many things that I didn't expect. I had to choose hay, decide when and how to feed them, clean the stable and so on. Even if at the beginning it seemed to me quite difficult now I know that it was the right thing to do. So my first advice to every horse owner is: if you have enough time and space, well, bring them at home! It's an incredible experience. In this blog I don't want to teach anything, the only thing that I 'd like to do is to share my own experience. I'm not a vet nor a trainer, I'm only a person who loves horses and tries to do her best with them. Living with horses at home allows you to have a better approach with them and you can understand better their "way of life". The first thing that you have to keep in mind is that horses naturally live outside so don't keep them in stables too long. They need to walk freely and eat grass (always remember that they're not only "sport horses"), in fact if you look at free horses they spend the two third of the day eating. So, if you keep your horse in a stable, remember that the best thing to do is to give him hay many times during the day (it's better than giving him huge quantities of hay only one time -for example in the morning). Look closely at your horse habits: everyone is different from the others. For example I've got an Haflinger who eats everything in a little time while I've an Andalusian who eats for a while then stops and then starts again. If you give the Haflinger ten kilos all together she will eat them in a couple of hours without stopping! Next time I will talk about feeding your horse, I hope that it will be interesting and, please, leave your comment to let us know how you do that!