Heat attack: Sprinklers to the rescue

One summer, we took in a new horse, an older mare that was in pretty bad shape. Her people had been feeding her, but her teeth were bad, and she was not properly processing her food. She came to us very skinny and weak. Late one afternoon of that summer, the mare went down with heat exhaustion.
Through gradual application of cold water on her legs, and carefully moving up her body, we were able to get her standing. As we continued dribbling hose water on her body, the mare's temperature went back to normal.
This mare was proof that, like humans, really young and very old horses often have trouble regulating their body temperature to cope with the weather. When it’s hot, darker horses also may have trouble staying cool.

Besides providing plenty of fresh water, when the afternoon becomes intolerably hot, we cool our horses off with some good old sprinkler play. We lash heavy duty sprinklers to fence posts and turn on the water.
Horses will position themselves to get in the spray (click on photo to enlarge), and some will stick their noses in the water stream, and roll up their lips. Note: Never blast a hot horse directly on their body, especially in the girth area, with cold hose water. You could give them a heart attack.
Back to the sprinklers -- You don’t have to leave the water on all afternoon. In fact, purchasing timers will ensure water is not left on forever and wasted. A side benefit of sprinkler play is dust reduction, which is better for the horses’ respiratory systems, reduces erosion, and keeps nearby neighbors who may complain about stable dust happy.