Anhydrosis: sweating again?

[quietann]

So… Spinning off from the anhydrosis supplement thread…

Has anyone had a horse just start sweating again, without intervention? 'Cause I have one.

Feronia is 27, retired, and has had anhydrosis for 5 ish years. We’re in Massachusetts so it does get hot and humid in the summer. I’ve used various supplements, acupuncture, and Equiwinner patches, all of which helped some, until they didn’t.

So I was worried about how hot it would get on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. Upper 90s, and over 100 on Tuesday, and quite humid. When I visited her on Monday, it was 96 F, and she was sweating in all the appropriate places. Ditto yesterday and today. I hadn’t started any anhydrosis treatment, because we had a cooler and wetter spring than normal. Yesterday, the record-breaking hot day, she apparently was outside of her shed in the sun for most of the afternoon.

She’s completely normal othrwise. Eating and drinking fine, cranky about being hosed off, cranky about the epic bugs, perky… Just her usual self.

Weird.

Photo for tax (and yes that right knee is worrisome…)

[Marla_000]

Does she get extra salt in her feed?
This is my first time having a
Non sweater in Fl. After having many many horses and over 50 yrs.
But our brutal heat started back in April. She gets 2 TB. Salt in feed year round. But she’s black
And in April still had a heavy coat

I hope your mare continues to sweat but I’d still watch her carefully.
.

[Texarkana]

I’ve had 3 anhidrosis horses and all 3 had summers where they didn’t sweat and summers where they were fine without much rhyme or reason.

[quietann]

Yes, 2 TB salt per day. I’m watching her as this is such a surprise.

[RhythmNCruise]

I wish mine had done as well as you pretty girl over the past few days down here in NC. Monday he was okay, slightly sweaty, not huffing and puffing. I hosed several times, fans left on all day and night. Yesterday, coat was a little drier and slightly elevated breathing. More hosing, fans left on. He’s been in the barn under the fan every time I’ve gone out to check on him, so he at least knows where to go. Today, barn manager called just as I was turning onto the road to the barn to let me know my horse was standing in his stall breathing heavily, no sweat. I got there and sure enough. I’ve seen him worse (really blowing hard), but it was bad enough. Hosed for a long, long time, gave a bath, and he was closed up in his stall with hay and water and fan for the rest of the afternoon. At evening feed he was fine, though still a tiny bit of heavier breathing. Got hosed down again, and thankfully some thunderstorms were kicking up around us (never directly where we were) and the wind started whipping, clouds started filling the sky, and the temperature dropped a good 15 degrees almost immediately. Mr. Horse was very glad, as was I.

I procrastinated on starting One AC this year and just started him on it Monday, which was the first of the really hot days. I bought two containers and I feed two scoops twice a day. I’ll keep feeding it, hoping that he resets with this little drop in the temps (still hot, but not 110 heat index hot!).

I’m eyeballing those Equiwinner patches. I’ve only used One AC and Platinum Refresh (switched back and forth between them one year), and I THINK they worked, but it took the weather cooling off so the horse could reset, and I swear if it got brutal again, he’d still all but stop sweating. Those patches sound interesting (if a little magical).

Might stop and buy him some beer on the way to the barn tomorrow, LOL. I’ve never tried that either.

[quietann]

It’s one of the things about anhydrosis - it’s so hard to predict what’s going to happen. Feronia also has mild heaves, but the two conditions don’t track each other much. I’m curious to see whether she will still sweat when the temperature drops a little.

She is outside 24/7 and her shed has a solar powered fan, which isn’t very strong but she seems to cope. The BO is adding solar powered ventilation fans to draw air through the shed more.

[Amberley]

In my experience as long as it cools off at night relative to the days heat they will sweat. Once the temperature differential is too small they stop. That happens some summers here but most of the time it does not, so we get intermittent non-sweating as described above.

[quietann]

The Equiwinner patches worked for Feronia, enough to make them worth buying again. But I still think they’re voodoo.

I realized today that there was another time I saw her in a full sweat; it was over the winter when the BO had brought the horses up to the barn for the farrier. They were all blanketed, though Feronia is blanketed more lightly because she runs a little warm. So I arrived, and she was in a stall that was maybe 45 degrees, wearing a 100g blanket, and she was quite sweaty underneath it. I was surprised because it honestly had been years since I’d seen her in a full sweat, other than a few times when she’d been sedated.

[quietann]

But that’s the thing… In this little heat wave, the overnight temperature was maybe 15 degrees lower, so still in the 80s. So not much of a drop.

The extreme heat is over now, and we’re supposed to have 2 days with highs around 70 to 75, and mid to low 50s at night.

[Amberley]

I think its the number of days in a row that really does it. You’d probably have to collect a ton of data to really tease it out.

I am so jealous you are having those nice temps, I don’t think it will be 70 during the day here for months, sadly.

[RhythmNCruise]

Yeah, I’m jealous of those temps too. I’m happy to see upper-80s as highs next week! It’ll be at least late September or early October before we see any high temps in the 70s again.

And I agree, it’s when there isn’t enough of a cool down overnight that it seems mine stops sweating. When it’s still 80-85 degrees at midnight, that’s brutal. Yesterday’s actual temperature got to 102, I think. That was when I was heading out to the barn for evening feed. Thankfully the storms blew up and around us and cooled it down (to the mid/upper 80s instead of 98-102). I think it was 74 this morning when I went out. Brrrrr! (LOL!)

[quietann]

Update: Feronia is continuing to sweat like a normal horse!

[cnd8]

No, but I’d be thrilled if mine reverted to normal sweating during the summers.

I’ve got my horse on “nearly” a grain free diet, ration balancer, and one flake of alfalfa, grass 24/7. He gets 2 tbsp salt in his grain, I’m giving Platinum Refresh this year (not working), soaking his feed, and giving him 3 shots of vodka each day. He’s not sweating normally, but he does sweat a little…sometimes. Other times it may be one side of his neck. It’s just random.

Last year I stalled him during the day but he just walked in circles all day. This year I am trying to leave him out. I put him in a pasture with a shade tree by the water trough, and I put a solar powered fan under his shelter (he doesn’t use–but its there), and I’m paying the barn manager to hose him each afternoon at 2:00. It’s getting him through so far with no hard breathing.

In the mornings, I ride in the covered arena and I have a bucket with a sponge on the rain to soak his neck occasionally to sweat on his behalf, essentially.

Last year I tried doubling OneAC dose, Guiness, Equine Mega Sweat, and Equiwinner patches (amazing normal sweat on day 1, but then nothing). I started Purina Refresh toward the end of the season and it seemed to help a little, so I went with that starting in April this year. No luck this year.

It’s all such a gamble. I’m glad you’ve had the random victory! I want that! lol

[cnd8]

Yeah, mine will sweat again after the low temps dip below 70, but that’s not until end of September here likely.

[PREs_Rock]

Mine stopped sweating when we hit our 100+ summer days a few years ago. Then, summer of 2023, I started taking him to the mountains for June, July, and August. We went from an elevation of about 3500 feet (high desert) to about 6500 feet (forest) and a facility that has a covered arena and is bordered by an irrigation canal and small creek on one side and a small river on the other. There’s a small RV Park attached so we all live here in the summer (spouse, dog, 2 horses and me). Its quite close, about 2 hours away from home. I didn’t make any feed changes but did add 1/2 a can of an IPA beer to each evening’s mash. He started sweating the first summer we were there and has continued to do so since. I am still very careful year-round to not over work him and who knows how he would do in our full desert summer with no covered arena. Funny thing is that he has always sweated great in the winter.

I read something years ago when all of this started that said getting them out of the heat that triggered the anhidrosis for a season will often “reset” their sweating system. It certainly worked for my boy.

[quietann]

Yet Feronia did just the opposite… Started sweating again on the hottest days of the year - and has continued to sweat appropriately for the temperature.

[RhythmNCruise]

I don’t know who might be doing research into this issue, but it’s something I wish science could crack. It’s so hard to watch a horse suffer with this.
Mine is on patch 7 of the Equiwinner patches. I was optimistic after the first 24 hours, been a little disappointed for the next several days, then he rolled/bucked one off in the middle of a thunderstorm that blew up a couple of days ago and went patch less the rest of that day and all night. Put a patch back on yesterday morning and lunged at noon to see if he might pop a sweat. Nope. Just barely moist and huffing and puffing. By that evening, he was perhaps a touch more damp, but nothing much (though, to be fair, he’s spending a lot of time in his stall under his fan and it hasn’t been AS hot (still hot though…I’m pouring with sweat every time I go out there, wish I could give it to him!)

This morning, I could look at him and see a slight difference in his coat. A bit more shiny, not so dried out looking. Some very slight dampness between back legs and around ears under fly mask. When I took the patch off to replace with a new one, it was the first time I’ve actually seen dampness under the patch and a circle where one of the…nodes?..seemed to have gotten down good against his skin. Previously it didn’t look like anything had even been there.

Anyway, we’ll finish out the patches over the next three days. Next Friday the vet/chiro is coming to do acupuncture on him to try to get him sweating again. She’s got some Chinese herbs too, so I guess I’ll try those as well. He’s getting double (almost quadruple because I do heaping scoops) the dose of One AC too.

The one thing I haven’t tried yet is beer. Which is so stupid of me. It’s the cheapest and easiest thing to try. I’ll give it a shot if he doesn’t start sweating after the acupuncture and Chinese herbs.

It’s so frustrating.

[cnd8]

Good luck. U of F had been doing research on anhidrosis, but I want to say that their funding had been rerouted or something like that. Don’t quote me. Maybe I’m mixing that up with something else I heard, but I want to say it was anhidrosis research.

[lorilu]

Re beer. Aldi has a Guinness dupe for about $7/6 pak.
My guy doesn’t sweat as much as I’d like and it’s been brutal in Ocala. I ride early under the covered. Unfortunately he resists any supplement I try to give him. Right now he will drink Replenimash to which I add Orange Gatorade and half a dark beer.
It’s such a mystery.

[RhythmNCruise]

Thanks for the tip!
Today is our last EquiWinner patch. I rode this morning for the first time since he stopped sweating, since it was breezy and partly cloudy. He had plenty of energy, but that was mostly due to him and his BFF/GF having some drama because she was taken away to another part of the farm to have her feet done and he had to be ridden and…let’s just say there were shenanigans. He behaved though, and got some trotting and cantering in because of the excitement. He didn’t sweat as much as he needed to, but at least there was a little sweat under his tack and on his chest. He got a good bath afterward and was happily out grazing when I left.

Acupuncture is next up. Getting that done Friday. In the meantime, I think I may try riding super early in the AM and just hose him off before I tack up, then keep a bucket of cold water with a sponge to douse him with maybe halfway through the ride. I feel like physical fitness has got to be helpful in dealing with this condition at least.

I’m surprised he isn’t sweating normally, TBH. It got down to 68 the other night, and I thought for sure that would reset him. I think it’s just been going on so long now. He’s never gone this long without returning to normal sweating.

I’ll make a run to Aldi this coming weekend to procure some fake Guinness. I think when his One AC runs out, I’ll try switching over to Platinum Refresh as well.