Thar She Blows!  -  Is my mare ready to foal?  

Several different signs will help you determine when your mare will foal.  The most important of which is her due date.  Mares gestate and average of 340 days.  Go ahead a year from her last cover and come back 25 days.  Understand that any mare can foal with any, all or no signs at all and any mare can foal healthily anywhere from almost a month early to a month late.  Most mares stay somewhere near the averages and the following signs should help you know when it‚s time to lose some sleep.  

Bagging up is usually your first sign.  You'll feel a pouch starting well ahead of the teats, but the teats will remain deflated.  As she progresses, the teats will eventually fill out, in many cases 'til they seem like dimples in the udder, which will be huge at this point.  It's imperative to handle these udders daily, especially if you've got a maiden mare, or she may be so shocked by the baby biting at them that she won't let it nurse (she will eventually, but you'll be there for hours) - which reminds me, on a sidebar, have a baby bottle handy.  If the baby hasn't nursed in two or three hours, it may just run out of steam.  No big deal, but it then often helps to strip out several ounces of colostrum into the bottle and feed baby for the energy to keep trying.  Also, slathering the teat with fresh colostrum gives baby a clue as to where it came from.  Remember - and this is critical - you can't go back to bed until you've not only seen baby nurse, but felt its throat to be sure it is swallowing, not just playing.  A foal is born entirely devoid of any antibody protection whatsoever.  Everything it needs to fight disease in its first fragile months of life will come from its mother‚s first milk.  This first milk, or colostrum can only be absorbed thru the stomach lining for the first 12 to 24 hours.  Failure to nurse properly in the first 24 hours will mean plasma transfusions later.  Very pricey!  

I would recommend getting online to http://www.valleyvet.com or http://www.kvvet.com and ordering a Predict-A-Foal kit.  About 30 bucks.  You get test strips that test the calcium level of milk that you dilute with distilled water (they call it "test solution.")  When all 5 bars turn red, you're having a baby.  It's been better than 80% accurate for us.  

Next big development will be the softening of the muscles around the tail head and the very noticeable relaxation of the vulva.  When she loses all tail tone - you can fold her tail flat on her back and she can't stop you - you're very close.  Also, the teats themselves may go from dry black (or pink on some spotted or white mares) to shiny.  Another good sign.  She may also develop wax on the tip of the teats.  It's like dripping candle wax, or old, crystalizing honey.  Not all mares do this, but many do.  She may also stream milk down her legs for up to a week before foaling.  If it is excessive, it's not a bad idea to strip out about a pint and freeze it.  For that matter, if your first mare goes great, after baby nurses couple times, strip out about a pint and freeze it, then if your subsequent mares should become aglactic (doesn't lactate) you have colostrum to bottle feed the baby for the antibodies it needs.  Also, start stripping milk, a few squirts each day and look at it.  It should be very clear and a pale yellow at first.  It will thicken and become more cloudy as she progresses.  Generally don‚t waste test strips on clear milk.  Often on the day she will foal, the milk will suddenly turn white.  While that is a powerful sign, some don‚t turn white until the baby is out and some are white for a week.  

Any or all of these signs can be present in any imminent mare.  Each is different, so you add up the signs till you have enough to feel she's ready.  The Predict-A-Foal kit is priceless.  

Final twist, if your mares have access to fescue, even a little bit in hay or pasture, they may suffer fescue toxicosis.  An endophyte infects most fescue that, among other things, interferes with the hormones that signal the end of gestation and the beginning of parturition.  In other words your mare comes up on her due date, and just nothing really happens.  She may get a little bag, she may soften up behind, but not enough to foal and the date comes and goes with no baby.  The first mare I encountered this with went a month late before I figured it out.  Luckily there is a simple remedy.  A drug called Domperidone, often sold as Equi-Done, comes in a 5-dose paste syringe.  It should run $50 or $60.  You administer one dose orally each morning from the due date on just like wormer.  You'll often see fast changes and most foal within 3 days if they were truly ready and the fescue was truly the problem.  If the mare is milking well, though, fescue is probably not a problem aand she's just taking her time.  Note that this does not actually induce foaling in anyway.  It just allows the hormones to release if she is truly ready to do so.  As any mare can be up to a couple weeks late and be perfectly normal, I'll often let several days pass after the due date on a mare who is not "shaping up" before I give her the Dom.  To give it before she's ready is just a waste of money.  Also, if your mare has been grazed on fescue throughout her pregnancy, she may have what‚s known as Red Bag Syndrome.  The placenta, instead of thin and whitish, can be red and thick.  In some cases the placenta has been too thick for the baby to rupture.  A perfectly healthy baby is foaled in a perfectly normal delivery only to suffocate in the placenta ˆ a VERY good reason to try and be there.  It‚s rare, but it happens.  A small opening with a  sharp knife when baby is more than halfway out (shoulders must be clear) should be all it takes.    

If it helps, I've read darn near everything ever written, could just about give a lecture on the topic and I've been off by up to 11 days.  Just a gentle reminder from God that we ain't Him :))