Who among you hasn’t stepped up to the start cone, with the eyes of the judges upon you, your family and friends watching on the sidelines, and your trainer nervously chewing his nails, and hasn’t felt afraid. Fear is real, but fear isn’t fact. You’ve faced this situation before, and you will face it again. The way you choose to deal with the emotions caused by this pandemic, however, can help to make you a stronger equestrian and competitor when it’s time to return to the show pen.

If your horse has rain rot, you’ll notice scab-like bumps, particularly along the top of the head, neck, back and/or croup. When pulled, the hair will easily come away from the body, leaving behind an infected, hairless spot of skin. These lesions are commonly itchy or painful.

General guidelines call for horses to get 1 to 1.5 percent of their body weight in forage. The aforementioned study of feeding practices showed that few owners weighed their horses’ hay, while the majority did weigh the concentrates. That was one of several findings reflecting misunderstandings of hay’s role in their horses’ diet.