The Horse:Your Guide To Equine Health Care provides monthly equine health care information to horse owners, breeders, veterinarians, barn/farm managers, trainer/riding instructors, and others involved in the hands-on care of the horse.
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43 September 2015 THE HORSE TheHorse.com EQUINOMICS AMBER HEINTZBERGER TheHorse.com/Equinomics A s open land disappears and de- velopment sprawls, horse owners are having to confine their equine activities to smaller and more urban spaces. With this comes a host of chal- lenges. Neighbors in luxury condos or cozy subdivisions aren't as fond of the smells of hay and horse manure as horse people are. Busy roads can render riding out dangerous, and snarled traffic can make it difficult for veterinarians to get to their patients in a timely manner. Emily Olson, DVM, and Kelly Zey- toonian, DVM, are well-accustomed to the challenges urban horse owners handle in their day to day. Olson oversees B.W. Furlong and Associates' ambula- tory practice on densely populated Long Island, and Zeytoonian operates an ambulatory practice for Starwood Equine Veterinary Services, in Woodside, Cali- fornia, with many of her clients located in the traffic-riddled San Francisco Bay Area and Silicon Valley. Even though they're separated by nearly 3,000 miles of highway, these practitioners' clients—and those of urban- dwelling veterinarians nationwide—face similar problems with managing horses amidst the commotion of the city. Nearly Absent Airflow Managing horses with minimal space takes a totally different approach than caring for them on a sprawling farm. "Things like heaves (recurrent airway obstruction, or RAO) and allergies can become more of a problem," says Olson. "When the horse is out 12 hours a day, things like that might not matter as much, but if the horse is in 23 hours a day, small problems become magnified." Indeed, the ammonia and dust from small, stuffy quarters common in urban areas can be detrimental to equine airways. So designing and maintaining a properly ventilated facility (or retrofitting existing buildings to promote airflow) is key for preventing problems. While many West Coast urban farms are similarly stretched for space, Zey- toonian says their mild weather and win- ters mean more opportunities for horses to enjoy airflow via open barn doors and windows. Elsewhere, winter weather only ex- acerbates respiratory problems because horses spend more time indoors. "I had a couple of calls this winter for horses that spend a lot of time in a barn, who have developed coughs," says Olson. "Open- ing the windows and keeping air moving through a barn helps. If you're building a barn on small acreage, keep ventilation in mind. You can also dampen the shavings and the hay to reduce dust, and keeping stalls clean to prevent ammonia (buildup) helps." Anita Gerami owns Chateau Stables on W. 48th Street in Manhattan, New York, near the Hudson River. She says it's the smallest and oldest stable in Manhattan; her mother started running the business in the 1960s. Gerami grew up there and still runs the family business, offering carriage horses for weddings and funer- als, rides in Central Park, pony birthday parties, and more. Her 21 charges in- clude seven riding horses and ponies and 14 carriage horses, living in a 25-by-100- foot two-story building. "We have windows and skylights and exhaust fans, and we use wood shavings for our bedding because it's absorbent and keeps the smell down," says Gerami of her efforts to optimize ventilation and air quality. Living in Close Quarters Limited space is obviously one of the biggest differences between keep- ing horses in or near a city versus the countryside. Keeping Horses in the Asphalt Jungle STEPHANIE L. CHURCH From vets stuck in city traffic to vexing ventilation issues, urban-dwelling horse owners deal with unique challenges This city horse, a mount for the Lexington Mounted Police Unit, in Kentucky, is fortu- nate to have a little land on which to get out and graze.