Stacie’s January 2021 health column for Montana Horses magazine picks up where her December column on winter physiology left off: a horse needs adequate fat coverage to stay warm, and under a thick winter coat that fat can be hard to see. The column teaches the two practical tools for monitoring a horse’s weight at home – body condition scoring and weight taping. The magazine has since ceased publication and its online archive is gone, so the column is reproduced here in full.
Two Ways to Weigh a Horse at Home
By Stacie G. Boswell, DVM, DACVS — Montana Horses, January 15, 2021 issue (Vol. 2 No. 3), pp. 33-34
The text below was read from the printed magazine using optical character recognition and lightly edited for the web, so that this article can be found and read online. The original article as it appeared in print is reproduced at the foot of this page and is the version of record — where the two differ, the printed version is correct. If you spot an error, please let us know.
Montana winters are tough for horses. As we learned in last month’s article, they have quite a few physiologic strategies for staying warm. One of the things a horse needs to stay warm is adequate fat coverage, which can be difficult to see under a horse’s thick winter coat. This month we will talk about weight monitoring and next month we will talk more specifically about feeding strategies for thin horses or hard keepers.
Of course, in a perfect world, if we are monitoring a horse’s weight, we would simply weigh him. However, that’s obviously not feasible – you cannot just stand him on your bathroom scale! There are two main ways to practically monitor a horse’s weight: body condition scoring (BCS) and weight taping.
A body condition score (BCS) is a method for tracking the fat coverage and condition of animals when a scale is impractical or unavailable. It’s been used for over 30 years and has stood up in multiple court cases of neglect across the country. To BCS a horse, fat is evaluated over 6 areas of his body: crest/neck, withers, spine/loin, behind the elbow, barrel/ribs, and tailhead. A scale from 1-9 is applied in each area, then the average is calculated. In the winter, with a thick hair coat, it’s hard to tell fat coverage vs. fur coverage, so a horse must be felt and palpated and not just visually observed.
A BCS of 1 is extremely emaciated, and the animal has almost no body fat, with his spine and bones showing clearly. A BCS of 5 is moderate or ideal and the animal has just the right amount of fat coverage and is round over his spine and rump. Finally, a BCS of 9 is a very obese, and the horse will have patches of fat and an obvious crease down his spine and rump. A 700-pound pony is very different from a 700-pound Quarter Horse. Describing a horse by his weight alone doesn’t give a clear picture. But, if you say that a horse has a BCS of 2, that’s a clear mental image of his condition.
Weight taping is another way to estimate a horse’s weight. For most horses, a weight tape gives an excellent weight estimate. They are useful for monitoring trends of the condition of an individual horse at home. A change in BCS score on a horse can have a range of 35-50 lbs or so; weight taping will catch trends sooner. To use a weight tape, it should be placed around the horse’s barrel just behind his elbow and perpendicular to the ground.
When we are working to help a horse either gain or lose weight, I advocate using a weight tape weekly and recording the number. It seems like we can be pouring feed to one, and it’s hard to tell we are making a difference, but again, the weight tape will catch the trend before our eye does. Knowing we are making progress prevents us from feeling discouraged. If a horse is stable, it’s still important to monitor him regularly – once monthly is reasonable – so that he doesn’t gradually gain or lose condition unnoticed.
With weight monitoring through body condition scoring and weight tapes, we can adjust a horse’s feeding and exercise regimen for ideal health. These tools help us get horses through our frigid winters with enough fat to stay warm and comfortable.
Dr. Stacie G. Boswell is a veterinarian, board-certified in large animal surgery and has an interest in equine welfare. She practices in Belgrade, MT and is the author of The Ultimate Guide for Horses in Need.
The article as it appeared in print, including the six-area body condition scoring diagram and weight-tape placement photos:
Montana Horses magazine is no longer published and its online archive has been removed. An archived copy of the January 2021 issue’s listing is preserved by the Internet Archive.
The Ultimate Guide for Horses in Need is available directly from Stacie or from Trafalgar Square Books.