Mark Twain said, “The coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco.”
This saying needs to be revised to: “The coldest winter I ever spent was April in Eastern Washington.”
I write this on April 14 as once again little white flakes are drifting down from the sky. The wind chill in the past two weeks has been, well, frigid. This would normally be the time to start getting miles on my horse, and putting the garden in. Instead, I am hunkering inside. At least I can catch up on my writing. As I write this, the sound of the heater fan is hard to separate from the sound of the wind howling outside.
I do remember experiencing snows in April before, especially in the Cascade Mountains, but also down lower in the Columbia Basin. I remember when we first moved to Spokane from western Washington, and I experienced “thunder snow” for the first time. I love thunderstorms, and thunder with snow was very cool. Literally. I wouldn’t mind a little thunder snow now since those storms roll through quickly and then are gone. Instead, the cold fronts this spring are just hanging on, taunting us, keeping us inside.
I used to ride in frigid weather, but I find myself wimping out more these days. I rode yesterday, but it was a short ride on the property. My horse Vali and I are going stir crazy. As we rode in the paddock, he kept looking through our fence line trees to the neighbor’s yard. Vali was looking for the neighbor dog to come running up, so he would have an excuse to shy and bolt a few strides. It’s an ongoing game that I am tiring of, but at least it gave me something to work on, keeping his focus on me, instead of simply riding never ending trot circles in the dirt. We need to get out on the trail.
My horse doesn’t sweat much under the saddle like other horses do, I don’t know why, maybe it is his thick strong draft horse skin. I’ve also never seen him shiver like many thin-skinned horses, not even in the coldest windy wet weather. Fjord horses are built fjord tough. Cold does not bother them. Why do other horses shiver? It warms them up by making the hair stand on end to better insulate them. If your horse is shivering, feed them grass hay. The digestion of the fibrous hay warms them up. If they continue to look miserable move them to a barn or put a blanket on. My fjord horses meanwhile will be happily standing out in the weather with snow piling on their backs and ice crystals forming on their whiskers.
I do carry a light horse blanket in my trailer for use after lessons, when my horse is sweaty (only on his chest and neck) and the air is cold. I blanket him just to haul him home and keep the wind chill under control in my open trailer. I carry a big orange slicker in my trailer, too, in case I misjudge the weather at a trailhead or forget my lighter raincoat. I have a space blanket in my emergency kit in my saddle bags, along with matches and a candle. Like a horse, if I am cold, I need to eat so I carry a bag of emergency peppermints. I don’t like being cold, and it can be dangerous if you are too cold for too long. So on the trail I am prepared for an emergency overnight in the woods with supplies for food and warmth. Hopefully I won’t need to use them. Hopefully spring will emerge out of our winter chill, and bloom like sunflowers under the pines.
Michelle Eames 