I have an 8 yr old Paint gelding, heavier on the muscle (not like a TB), who seems to be having difficulty when the weather turns humid and hot. When worked in the canter for any extent of time, his breathing is very rapid and shallow, like he’s panting. It takes him a loooong time to slow his breathing down to a normal level.
I ride him with a HR monitor and he can shoot up to 170-180 bpm when galloping out on course, but then it drops down to the low 80s within a minute or so and then, if I just let him stand, he pulses down to a high 60 within minutes. However, he’s still panting like a steam engine (or a porn star! :eek:).
I just came back from running Novice xc, where the temps were in the 100’s and the humidity was high, but there was a breeze. He had moments out on course where he felt weird to me (bobbly from side to side), and then he punched it and felt like a rock star. He had a very uncharacteristic run-out at a very simple jump, and then was a pro through the water and out again, and then had another uncharacteristic bobble at a solid table fence, which led him to rap his front legs and almost pitch me off. Since this wasn’t like him at all, I called it a day and scratched him from stadium. At the cooling station, we sponged him down with ice water and kept hosing and scraping like crazy, and he drank TONS of water (more than he’s ever done before) and 15 minutes later, he’s still breathing fast and shallow and the water still isn’t coming off him cool. 20 minutes later, his respiration slowed to a point where I wasn’t worried he was going to explode or pass out, and we walked him back to the trailer, where I hosed him down two more times. Finally - he stopped panting and the water ran off him cold.
Some info on him - he suffers from seasonal allergies. he tends to have a warmup cough in the hot, humid weather. He is on Cough Free which was working well until the really hot weather hit, and was on an antihistamine (Tri-Hist) for one day before the show (we stopped 24 hours out, according to drug regs), and he’s also on Dex to reduce inflammation. My hubby, who is a bike racer, said that most likely what happened was that due to the antihistamine, his body temps skyrocketed and there were probably moments on course where he felt woozy (hence the wobbling I felt at odd times), and he was panting to cool himself down - he says that antihistamines tend to raise your body temperature like that, as well as dehydrate you quickly. That would explain a lot about today, but it doesn’t explain why this horse tends to respirate quickly but drop his heartrate down at the drop of a hat.
So, what do you think? Can a horse have a quick HR recovery time, yet still be respirating quickly and be hard to cool off? the other horses were hot and panting, too, but they all recovered much better than mine did. I talked to my vet and she said that it was definitely strange, and she was going to look into it, but meanwhil I thought I’d pick your collective brains.
Thanks in advance!
, had I have been on been on the road, ;trailers of any sort, are no match for:eek: a tornado; :yes: find a highway underpass, and, wait it out. :yes: I have found that when a storm is coming in, and the barometer changes , that respiration is higher,:yes: and horses do begin tying up;:eek: We, riders, horses, and vets experienced this c.1990; at the the eRadnor three day event;:yes: after which, research was done, which bore this out;:yes:
They give ribbons according to weight division. I could have quite a collection, as I’ve never not placed in my division, but we never stick around for them. The ones I have are ones that friends have gotten for me. Frontrunners usually do go by in a whir. I don’t understand how on a day that hot, the lead 50’s can pick up speed with every loop. But that’s what they do. We were on our way out the last loop, just poking along at about 6 mph, mares panting up a storm, and the lead horses blast by us at a gallop going the other way to the finish. I don’t understand how they did it in that horrid head and humidity. 