WHAT TO DO RIGHT NOW?
Say you are the owner of the non-sweating horse in our previous discussion. What do you do? Veterinarians say to first walk the horse in the shade to see if it will cool down on it's own. If the breathing doesn't begin to slow within five minutes, get off, remove the saddle, stand the horse in a shady area, and sponge or spray cool water all over the horse's neck, chest, back , barrel and legs. Scrape off the warm water, and keep repeating this over and over, giving the horse occasional sips of water as well. If your horse is still breathing hard after a few minutes, take it's temperature. If it's 105 degrees or higher - or if it's 103 to 104 when you first take it but doesn't drop a degree or two within twenty minutes, you could be looking at anhidrosis.
If the conditions persists, continue your all-over sponging and scraping to bring your horse's temperature down -- but switch to ice-cold water if possible. (Veterinarians used to caution that very cold water might cause circulatory shock and muscle cramps. "But that's not true, we know now," says Steven J. Berkowitz, VMD, who cares for eventers and other sport horses at Unionville Equine Associates in Oxford, Pennsylvania. "It's more important that the horse be cooled out."
