Get Prepared for Foaling Season

It’s foaling season! Now is a great time to remind all of our expectant horse owners how to best prepare for your leggy bundle of joy. This article was originally published last year, but the topic is timeless. – Editor

OK. So, last spring you bred your mare and her due date is fast approaching. Here’s a list of things to expect and to watch out for.

What to Do to Prepare

Being prepared is essential. Here’s how:

Have your foaling kit ready. (See sidebar.)
Have your vet’s phone number handy. Now would be a good time to put it in your phone contacts.
If the mare has had a prior Caslicks procedure, let’s remove that now.

Don’t schedule a foaling party. Unless, of course, you won’t mind hosting several foaling parties; in that case, by all means, party on. Just keep in mind that mares can stop-and-start first stage labor. Your mare will wait to foal until it’s nice and quiet. And remember, those foaling predictor kits are better at telling you when she’s not going to foal. So, if you’re planning to go see the latest blockbuster movie, use the test before you go.

A video monitor is an excellent idea, but if you’re not watching exactly when she foals, you’re wasting your money. Solution: augment your video equipment with a foal alert system. These devices typically send an alert when the mare lies down. You may get lots of false alarms, but you’ll waste less face time with the camera than if you leave it up to fate.

Your Foaling Kit Should Contain:

Vet’s Phone Number
Tail Wrap for the Mare
Navel dip to disinfect the umbilicus. You can also use Chlorhex or Betadine, not strong iodine.
Shoe string — the thick cotton kind. (If the foal is bleeding excessively from the navel cord, it’s handy for tying it off.)
Banamine non-steroidal anti-inflammatory for the mare. Remember, she has to earn it first by passing the placenta. Give it to her prior to that, and you’ll probably get to see me for a retained placenta.
Dry towels to dry the foal off, 3 or 4, bath towel size
A bucket to put the placenta in. We’ll want to examine it and we can tell more if it’s in a cool, secure location. (As in, don’t let it cook in the sunlight or get chewed on by a dog.)
An old soda bottle and a lamb’s nipple. If we have to bottle feed the foal, it’s best to have the bottle on hand ahead of time, rather than try to find one at midnight on a Sunday. (Mares never drop problem foals during regular business hours! Trust me on this.)
An enema kit. It doesn’t need to be one for equine use, a kit intended for humans will be fine, easy to find at the drugstore, and cheap.

After Foaling

When the mare finally decides to get serious, second stage labor — i.e., when things get messy — should last no more than 45 minutes, with luck, less than that. But, when things aren’t proceeding well, call sooner rather than later. Here are some important time windows:

Foal should be standing, within two hours.
Foal should be nursing, in less than three hours.
If the mare kicks at the foal, or refuses to let it nurse, call right away.

That enema kit is for the foal. After the foal nurses, it may strain to pass the meconium. This is the first manure, and it’s sticky and tarry. It is, by far, the leading cause of colic in the newborn foal. And I do mean by far. It’s the first thing on my top ten list of probable causes. Once the foal is a couple of days old that list expands, but in the first 24 hours…

The mare should pass the placenta within three hours. Unlike in a cow or a goat, if the mare’s placenta stays in for an extended length of time, she will become toxic. But, resist the urge to pull on it. If a part tears off, the probability of your having a very sick mare increases significantly — and I will be very vexed with you. Getting the tip of the horn out, once it’s been torn, is very difficult. And remember, no Banamine for Mama until her placenta is in the bucket!

If everything is looking good, schedule a foal check at 24 hours. We need to wait for your foal to nurse and consume the colostrum. This is how it receives the antibodies it needs to protect itself. If it doesn’t get enough antibodies, the result is Failure of Passive Transfer, and that requires a plasma transfusion to save the foal’s life.

That’s right —its life. If your foal doesn’t have these protective antibodies, bacteria will invade, cause septicemia, and kill the foal. Guaranteed. Fortunately, we’re ahead of the curve; we’ll conduct a simple blood test to make sure your foal has been adequately protected.

And, as part of the foal exam, we’ll give mom and baby a thorough physical exam. In addition, the foal will receive a shot of selenium, because this part of the country is low in this mineral, and we don’t want white muscle disease, now do we? (I’ll talk more about this in another post.) Baby will also get a dose of Tetanus antitoxin, just to be safe.