Yearly Vaccinations

Nikki Salo · Grand Prix

Yearly Vaccinations

justice · Grand Prix

Aside from the ongoing controvesy surrounding the actual necessity for annual and/or bi-annual vaccs, I do a spring thing in mid to late April. Coggins on the out-going, Rabies, Tet, WN, EEE, Distemper. That's pretty much it.

We are deliberately self-contained, other than sharing air, when we leave the property and are normally just the two or three of us on a solitary, non-event ride. MY horses are not transient nor is my yard so we are able to keep it to a minimum. If I was to be out on the circuit, I would be more aggressive.

-- Edited by justice on Monday 31st of January 2011 01:24:11 PM

Wind_Chaser · Well Schooled

I'm very similar to Justice - my vet would probably prefer to split the vaccinations up between spring & fall visits so they don't have as much coursing thru their systems at once, but we're a fair distance from our vet so we just have a March/April check-up.

We have our two geldings' teeth floated, clean their sheaths while they're under sedation, and then have vaccinations done for Rabies, Tetanus and West Nile. Coggins isn't as much of a threat in Canada as it is in the States and our vet recommended not giving them WEE or Distemper if they were going to stay on the property all year (which they do). He's of the opinion that less is more when they're not showing or coming into contact with other horses and I tend to agree with him!

justice · Grand Prix

We've had several cases of EEE within my state (subsequent equine deaths within 50 miles of me but one was a very young horse and the other never vacc'd) thus we opted to redo EEE this past fall but normally I would only bother in the spring. Sometimes our autumns can be warm and wet well into Novembre, keeping the bugs happy and us not so much. Most of our vaccs are good for 6 months within the system and because we do them earlier in the spring, fall shots are occasionally warranted.

We do sheaths and teeth in the spring and fall, too .