Is your horse in condition for a winter endurance ride

Winter in Cody, Wyoming has been more severe than normal. The Wyoming Game and Fish have extended Elk season through January for the first time in my memory. I have had an Elk license and have kept my Fox Trotter named Traveler shod with borium added to the shoes. I have also kept him on a diet to maintain performance in this wintery weather. The diet consisted of 24 pounds of grass/alfalfa hay, 2 pounds of oats and 3 ounces of Stamina Plus Equine Supplement. Sunday with my friend Richard ,who also rides a Fox Trotter, we decided to go for a ride into the Absaroka Mountains to look for Elk. The temperature was 20 degrees with a 20 to 25 mile wind. We first had to cross a creek that was partly froze over with 4 inch ice. The horses maneuvered the creek well by standing on the shelve ice and letting in collapse into the water and then cross with no mishaps. The snow was 1 to 1.5 feet deep along the trail as we started out. To our surprise no game was seen until we ran into three buffalo which the horses were not too sure about. As we continued to ride into the mountains the snow cover increased to 2 feet and the only tracks that we saw were from a pack of wolves and the buffalo. We continued to explore deeper into the mountains only to see two different Wolf Kills were they had killed Elk. As the day progressed we ended up in belly deep snow drifts, but no Elk sign. It looked like the Wolves had scared any remaining elk out of the area. We decided that it was best to return to the trail head. Along the way the snow was very deep and some of the trails were extremely icy. We finally arrived back at the trail head with no mishaps and the horses were not even winded. This was a great day of winter riding in the wilderness. The take home message of this ride was if you feed your horse correctly with a balanced diet then they will be ready to perform when you need them too.