By Christine Barakat

You've had horses long enough to know how to play it safe. You wear boots around the barn and would never consider putting your horse in a trailer with a questionable floor. But there are some safety hazards that aren't so obvious; you may not even notice them until the damage is done. To help keep you and your horses safe, we've identified 20 of these hidden hazards, described the associated risks and suggested long- and short-term fixes.

1. Compromised helmets
The risk: Most modern helmets feature a specialized foam layer that absorbs the impact of a blow to the head, intercepting the shock before it can be transmitted to the brain. In other words, the foam gets crushed so your head won't. The helmet doesn't "recover" from the crushing blow, however, so it can't absorb subsequent impacts as effectively. Although the damage to the foam may not be visible, take it for granted that a helmet that has protected your head through one serious contact can no longer offer the original level of protection.

The fix: After a helmet saves your skull, it's ready for retirement. A minor spill in which your rear takes the brunt of the blow probably won't harm a helmet, but if you hit your head hard enough to be thankful you had a helmet on, it needs to be replaced. Some manufacturers have replacement programs in which you can send in an old helmet for a discount on a new one, so it's worth a call to find out if you qualify.

2. Stall-guard failure
The risk: Stall guards and chains give confined horses much-needed social stimulation and fresh air. But the screw eyes attaching them to the door frame can be broken or pulled from their moorings by excessive pressure, freeing the occupant to all sorts of mischief or worse.

The fix: Regularly check the security of stall-guard screw eyes. Tighten them if necessary or relocate them on the frame if the wood no longer "grabs" the threads. The safest guards have multiple anchors, so you may want to upgrade from a single-cable barrier to a solid-body or web design with three or more snaps on each side. Even more secure but still visually open and airy is a door-filling screen.

3. Closed trailer windows and vents
The risk: A tightly closed trailer can not only cause the horses inside to overheat, but it can trap carbon monoxide gas emissions from the pulling vehicle and kill the occupants. The tale of the owner arriving at a veterinary clinic only to open up the trailer and find both horses dead of carbon monoxide poisoning isn't an urban legend.

The fix: Keep the trailer as wide open as possible whenever you ship, blanketing the horses when they need protection from the cold. Stock trailers with their slatted sides allow plenty of airflow, but on solid-sided vehicles you'll have to open the doors, windows and vents to keep the atmosphere inside clear. If you're trailering in very wet weather and must close the back doors of a ramp trailer to keep the horses from getting soaked, make sure the ceiling and side vents are wide open.

4. Blinding lights
The risk: You might think that a well-lit barn is a safe barn, and, in many ways, it is. However, horses can have problems with intense lighting when entering a building from the outdoors at dusk or after. Their eyes adjust much more slowly than yours to light changes. You might blink a time or two as you enter a bright barn from the dark, but your horse is effectively blinded for a full minute or more. During this slow adaptation, horses might run into objects or their handlers, and some may even be panicked by the temporary loss of perception.

The fix: The ideal solution is to have two sets of lights, with the first one or two strategically placed bulbs providing low-level illumination that allows you to see without blinding your horse. The second set with higher wattage can then be turned on once your horse has adjusted. If you can't install two sets of lights, minimize the risk by taking your horse to the edge of the illuminated area and allowing him to stand for a full two minutes while his eyes adjust before proceeding into the full light.

5. Loose broodmare halters
The risk: Foals naturally play close to their dams' sides, and moms are likely to spend much of their days grazing with their heads down. If a foal steps through the noseband of an oversized or even slightly loose halter and the mare lifts her head, serious injury is likely to befall both.

The fix: Whenever possible, leave broodmares halterless at all times, in the stall and during turnout. Many breeding farms use neck collars as a means of identifying and handling their mares without posing the potential hazards of haltering. The leather straps, which fit around the throatlatch much like cribbing straps, are available from tack-supply catalogs.

6. Lost shoes
The risk: Nearly every horse owner knows the frustration of having a horse come in from the field missing a shoe. Yet the extra farrier visit is the least of your worries. If the wayward shoe is sitting nails up in the field, it can cause a serious puncture wound in the horse who "finds" it.

The fix: Make an effort to find every missing shoe. If your property is large, you may be able to do only a limited search; look in "boggy" areas of shoe-sucking mud and along fence lines where a pawing horse may have pulled his footwear loose. If the grass is long, a metal detector can be useful. Also, make it a habit to scan the ground closely for hazardous objects, including thrown shoes, whenever you walk in your fields.

7. Stable clutter
The risk: An untidy barn is more than an eyesore. Clutter in horse-handling areas is an invitation to accidents. A loose, frightened horse can injure himself on a pitchfork, and a calm but inattentive horse can whack a knee painfully on an ill-placed tack trunk or step into a bucket.

The fix: Keep horse areas as sparsely furnished as possible. Store stall-cleaning tools where horses can't reach them, and place all tack trunks, saddle racks and other such items in a tack room or an unoccupied stall. You'll also need to be vigilant about picking up after yourself: Even a single brush left out can cause a person to trip, and if that person is leading a horse, the result could be painful for everyone.

8. Treacherous treats
The risk: A treat that's too large to be easily swallowed but too small to require chewing can end up lodged in the horse's throat, causing choke, a serious and sometimes fatal condition in horses. Small apples measuring 2 to 2 1/2 inches in diameter and the butt ends of large carrots represent this in-between size.

The fix: Cut all treats into safe sizes. Nothing larger than golf-ball size is a good rule of thumb for apples and nothing bigger than your thumb for carrots. If you can't cut an apple down to size, smash it under your heel, scoop up the pulpy mess, and offer the "prechewed" treat to your horse. He won't mind a bit of dirt, and you won't have to worry about choke. For big carrots, bite off an inch at a time, and offer the pieces to your horse.

9. Unsecured grain
The risk: Mice and rats aren't the only creatures looking for easy access to grain. Feed stored in an area that a loose horse can reach is a huge incentive for escape. Combine a convenient location and containers that can be tipped or opened with a strong nudge, and it's an invitation for a colic- or laminitis-inducing nighttime feed raid.

The fix: The safest place for grain stores is a room with a secure door that everyone remembers to shut. An empty stall with a door is also a safe option. You can build in an extra safeguard by putting grain in containers with tightly closing lids. Trash cans with flip-up locking handles are a popular and inexpensive option. Large grain bins that close with a footlocker-style flap and loop can be made safer with the addition of a metal snap through the loop.

10. Square fence corners
The risk: Crisp 90-degree corners might look picture-perfect, but to a horse being harassed by a pasturemate, such junctions are a menace where there's no escaping the attack. A rounded corner lets the horse continue his flight around the pasture without slowing.

The fix: When planning new paddocks, put in rounded or very open-angled corners. For an already-established fence line, you can accomplish the same thing by placing boards across square corners. Either use two boards or place a single board no further than three feet from the existing corners to prevent a curious horse from slipping under and getting stuck in the triangular area.

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