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Horses & Water
(6 facts you should know)

*On average horses only spend one to eight minutes drinking water each day, even though it is essential to sustaining life. Episodes occur two to eight times a day and last 10 to 60 seconds each time. This reflects horse behavior in the wild, where they have to deal with predators and don’t spend more time than absolutely necessary with their heads down drinking.

*A horse consumes water intermittently in a roughly 24-hour cycle, with each episode divided into two distinct parts. A long drink is followed by sips of shorter duration.

*The average 1,100 pound horse requires approximately 6.6 gallons of water per day. She gets it in three ways: by drinking it, by extracting it from feed, and by generating it internally during the breakdown of dietary proteins, carbohydrates and fat. Pasture grass can provide a substantial amount of water, but dry feed like hay and grain contains as little as one or two gallons of moisture, far less than needed.

*Water intake varies from day to day, depending on the weather and how much dry feed the horse consumes. Horses will drink less cold water than warm water when it is chilly. In winter it is beneficial to offer horses water warmed just enough to take off the chill. When temperatures go up in summer, horses drink more to make up for water loss through perspiration.

*One study looked at whether horses have a preference for drinking water from a bucket or the bowl of an automatic system. When given a choice, horses drank 98 percent of the time from the bucket and 2 percent from the pressure-valve or float-valve bowl.

*Horses offered water during long-distance travel will drink more during daylight hours and less at night. Water intake decreases during travel. To combat this, accustom your horse to eating soaked hay for two weeks prior to the trip. While traveling provide soaked hay to provide much needed water. Acclimatize your horse to drinking flavored water (most horses enjoy apple juice or molasses). Then during travel you can add it to water to prevent the “foreign” taste many horses reject.