Happy New Year from Sadie Acres!

I've been amazed at how many people have expressed that they miss the Sadie Acres blog posts, so with the start of the New Year I'm starting up the blog again.  

For many of the Sadie Acres residents it is our first Colorado winter!  I'm happy to say that we are all managing the cold quite well, despite some record lows in October and another dip into negative numbers over the last couple weeks.

A frosty day in October where we reached record lows

We did our research early on to ensure that all of the animals would be safe and secure for the cold temps.  

We expected that we would be blanketing the horses, but upon further research we found that horses that are able to acclimate during the fall and have access to shelter are actually better suited to manage their temperature than we are. Horses have the ability to loft and lower their coats to 17 different levels, so it's like exchanging 17 different thermal weights of blankets off and on them all day and night, depending on what they need.  We were pretty nervous those first few nights, but sure enough our horses have done great in the low temps and often choose to be in their runs versus their covered barn stall.  They have also enjoyed many romps in the snow!

The girls of Downhen have adjusted very well to the cold, they spend a lot of time huddled together.  The only change has been that they are laying eggs less consistently, but that is normal when the temps drop.   

The girls have become so friendly, the 3 big ones Lady Mary, Lady Edith and Mrs. Patmore all squat to be pet and picked up now.  Lady Mary is especially fond of attention, I usually get a strong peck to the shoe if I ignore her when she wants attention.  We are still waiting for the little one to catch up, Lavinia is still pretty standoffish...not to mention fast and hard to catch! 

I thought we would definitely be bringing Oscar and Chloe in from the barn on those super cold days, but once again we were surprised by the results of our research.  We found out that we would have actually caused them more harm than good by bringing them into warmer temps after they have adjusted to colder weather.   Major temperatures changes like indoor to outdoor in the winter can be fatal to these little guys.  As you see below, they are happy as can be with extra hay for bedding.

Our biggest challenge is swapping out their water, on a cold day their water bottle will freeze multiple times (this is a challenge for all the animals actually, there is a lot of ice breaking going on at Sadie Acres!). We were shocked to find out that the average rabbit consumes between 50 and 150 milliliters of water per kilogram (2.2 pounds) of body weight per day.   

Schumi has adjusted quite well to Colorado life, his napping has not been at all impacted by the cold temps, there are just a few more blankets involved :)  

I'm off to brave the cold and feed these critters!  Signing off from a very snowy Sadie Acres!