Weaning

[Barnmother]

OMG I am so mortified. I just caught my (almost) yearling nursing! Not just on her mother but on a mare that hasn't had a foal since I purchased her in 2007.

Now I am trying to figure out what my choices are to remedy this situation. The weather is bad and our barn is attached to two pastures (one large and one small). Our current configuration is Stallion and a Gelding in the same small pasture with a stall to get out of weather. Gelding, two mares and yearling (filly) in the large pasture sharing two stalls. This has worked well all winter evidently with the exception of the mares both nursing this yearling. (I wondered why the dam was loosing so much weight I guess now we know the answer to that)

I have a larger pasture (currently out of service for winter) that could be made available at the next nice weather day which is at least a week away.

Right now I have the dam locked in a stall which leaves one stall to be shared but mare, gelding and yearling. I figure i could do 1/2 day in for mare (fillies dam) and then lock the yearling in with the gelding and let the two mares be out together for the other half. (The one mare (not the mama) doesn't stall well and will run the wall) This seems to of upset everyone sufficiently that the mare (not the dam) won't allow the yearling to nurse. (Guess she would make a great nurse mare obviously very maternal.)

The yearling seems pretty stressed about this and is running around out in the pouring rain (supposed to freeze tonight). I know she will get over it but I would hate for her to get sick. I will be going to check on the mama here in a little bit to be sure that she isn't stressing but somehow I don't think she will be.

Anyone have any great ideas. If I would of acutally caught her Friday or Saturday when the weather was good, we could of cleared the fence line and charged the fence on the other pasture, moved the gelding and stallion over there and then put the mama mare in the small paddock adjacent to the one where the rest are. However that leaves the boys without any stall but lots of trees to stand under, great unless it gest really windy.

Gheez I thought this whole weaning deal was done months and months ago. She appeared to be all dried up, I guess persistence on the part of the filly has won out.

 

[chandab]

Can you put the gelding and yearling together in one stall and then the two mares in the other stall; and alternated their times out on pasture for sufficient time for the filly to be weaned again or the weather to clear so you have access to your other pasture? I know you said the one mare doesn't like to be stalled, but perhaps she'd tolerate it with the other mare for company, unless they don't get along well enough to be shut into the stall.

 

[supaspot]

you said you will soon have a large pasture available , why not just leave them as they were until you can use that , just give the thinner mare a little extra feed to keep her weight on

 

[Barnmother]

you said you will soon have a large pasture available , why not just leave them as they were until you can use that , just give the thinner mare a little extra feed to keep her weight on

That is pretty much what I have decided. What is another couple of weeks. The (dam) mare is getting extra feed (Equine Junior) now and has been for the last few weeks, I wondered why she was getting so thin when no one else was and they are all wormed regularly etc. She is a slow eater to boot, always has been so that isn't helping matters. So she is going to be fed seperately until we can rearrange things.

The two mares used to live together and certainly could again. I just don't want anyone else to pick up that "stall walking/weaving" thing. Awful habit that she came to us with. She will walk the fence as well.

 

[Barnmother]

So how long do I need to have them seperated for to effectively wean her? Obviously what I did before wasn't long enough! My bad, I really thought that three weeks and what seemed to be no udder and one that could only be checked under severe protest meant it was a done deal!

 

[chandab]

So how long do I need to have them seperated for to effectively wean her? Obviously what I did before wasn't long enough! My bad, I really thought that three weeks and what seemed to be no udder and one that could only be checked under severe protest meant it was a done deal!

More like 3 months, and even then sometimes the mare may let her foal nurse again, if the foal is persistant. It doesn't really matter what the udder looks like, the foal nursing can bring it up again; what matters is more psychological, the mare has to say no to the foal and the foal has to be indifferent to the mare. HOpe that makes sense.

 

[vickie gee]

Would add to check the almanac for best upcoming dates for weaning.

 

[Barnmother]

Chandab, I guess I have never had the opportunity to put a mare and foal back together after weaning until now. I just know that in my stabled horses three weeks seemed to be enough for the milk to dry up. But.... I never put them back out together again. I guess this will be a summer project. She will have to just buddy up with the one gelding while the other mare is off to be bred and then she will go out with the bred mare while the other four make the show circuit. That should pretty much handle it! Thanks for the advice. I am going to wait until all the pastures are back up and functional from the winter and the weather isn't so wet and wild. I mean what is a little bit longer at this point. I will just feed the mare extra in the barn in the afternoon by herself to get some weight back on her. I did feel her udder this afternoon although she could kick the antenna off a gnat at 20 paces. (Wish she would use some of that gusto on her filly!) She had been seperated all day and there really wasn't anything there to speak off. I think it is comfort nursing, we were clipping in the barn and there was a lot of calling back and forth as we worked and moved horses about the barn. I am hoping that it was a "oh this isn't right I don't like it, better go nurse" kind of thing. I honestly haven't caught her nursing for months but to go to both mares..... wow, especially since she was well received at any milk bar.