Winter is coming, and most ranchers are focused on the cow herd. But how about those working ranch horses that you rely on all year long to help with the herd? They need your attention too.

Logan Leach, who grew up caring for and training horses around his family’s ranch on the Calamus River in central Nebraska, now trains horses full time with his wife and family in southeast Arizona. In his adult life, when Leach was living on his own near Ainsworth, Neb., he trained mostly working ranch horses from around the Sandhills, but gradually that business shifted, along with his location, to even higher-value show horses.

He says that you can always tell when neighbors gather for branding in the spring which horses wintered well and which ones didn’t. Leach says it usually boils down to a few simple things.

Prep for winter

“If I had to say one thing about keeping ranch horses healthy going into winter, it would be that feeding straight alfalfa and keeping up with their dental work takes care of 90% of the problems,” Leach says. “Paying attention to these two things, along with regular exercise every day, will keep horses in great shape and get them through the winter.”

At one time back in Nebraska, Leach had 38 horses at his place for training and two employees on the job. Now, he works exclusively with his family in the horse business, and his work today is with show horses or show prospects that can be worth hundreds of thousands of dollars each.

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For Leach, the strategy is the same as it was with reining cow horses or ranch horses in the Sandhills. “We feed them straight alfalfa,” he says. “In Nebraska and up into South Dakota, farmers raise about the best alfalfa anywhere in the country, so it is accessible. I like to feed second or third cutting, because first cutting usually has more weeds and heavier stems, and fourth cutting is a little hot for horses. If I have my preference, I would take second cutting.”

Most ranchers probably feel like they own the land and can have grass for free, so that is their staple for the horses. “But I’ve lived in Arizona, Texas, Colorado and Nebraska, and I’ve always purchased feed,” he says. “You have to remember that when you are grazing horses on your grass, it is costing you money because you could be grazing that grass with a cow. So, you are trading cow feed for horse feed.”

That’s why Leach feeds all the horses he works with straight alfalfa, and perhaps hay cubes. “Alfalfa is often cheaper compared to grain or oats, it is good for gut health and reduces ulcers,” he says. “The beautiful thing about it is if they are getting too fat, you can kick them out of the yard where the alfalfa bale ring is and graze them on grass all day before bringing them back in at night. That way, they are forced to pick around on the grass first before going to the alfalfa.”

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Leach notes that out of a herd of horses, there will, of course, be outliers that can’t handle a ration of straight alfalfa because of underlying health issues. “Those horses need to be fed differently,” he says, “but most of the time, most horses will do very well on alfalfa hay.”

Exercise matters

Of course, horses at Leach’s place are ridden five to six days a week, so they get plenty of exercise. If you aren’t riding them regularly throughout the winter, allowing the horses back out to pasture with room to roam, graze and play gives the opportunity for exercise, compared with being fed in a 12-foot-by-12-foot stall all the time.

If you are buying alfalfa for horses, it doesn’t have to be $300 per ton alfalfa hay. It just needs to be clean, in good quality and without any mold, Leach says. And if you are riding them every day, they will need more alfalfa than if you only ride once a week and they are not able to get more exercise.

Keeping up with dental work is another must for horses, Leach says. Horses that are too thin are often having problems with their teeth. Dental work should be done by experienced technicians who understand what they are doing, he adds.

Following these simple steps, Leach says, will not only get working horses through the tough winters on the Plains, but it will leave them in great shape when branding time comes along.