Incoming! Preparing for WEG Horse Arrivals

The first group of horses will arrive on the venue Sunday. Once the planes touch down, the horses will be trucked to the Tryon venue where they’ll spend 42 hours in post-arrival quarantine before transferring to their competition stabling. The feed and forage crew is currently pre-loading the quarantine barn with hay before these horses arrive. Conveniently, the quarantine barn is adjacent to our office and storage space!

Once the horses are released from quarantine, they’ll be stabled by discipline. The stables are new and all feature mats, heavy-duty fans, and outlets on each stall. There are two barns designated for horses positive for piroplasmosis, a tick-borne disease found in Africa, the Caribbean, Central and South America, the Middle East and Eastern and Southern Europe.

Because piroplasmosis is considered a foreign disease in the United States, organizers must take precautions to prevent contact between infected horses, which often show no clinical signs of illness, and disease-free horses. For example, WEG 2010 designated separate stabling and grazing areas as well as hands-on inspection each time a positive horse moved into the secure area. This also affects the feed and bedding, as Kentucky Equine Research has to source products from areas that are free of ticks capable of carrying the disease.

Deliveries continue to arrive at the feed and bedding office, including the third container shipped from the United Kingdom and the first truck of straw. The load contains 735 bales; we expect to go through three of these over the course of competition.