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Showing posts from 2020

Comfort Gut Standard, Pro and Ultimate. Miracle panacea?

Of our 4 horses 3 of them needed a boost of some kind or another.  Beau had ulcers in his youth, Parker is a stress-head and Stella is a busybody who loses confidence in stress situations I read that once a horse has had ulcers, they either always have them or always have the risk of recurrence.  Beau has always shown irritation when being girthed up.  I always do it gradually and only as tight as it needs to be which is really important, especially if the girth has elastic inserts.  It's hard to tell whether that's just his grumpiness (he likes his own space best) or discomfort, but I decided not to take a chance and started him on Comfort Gut  Parker is a big stressy juggernaut. Most days he is fine and relaxed and settled.  However some days he worries if Beau is not in eye-shot, or if he is in eye-shot.  He worries if someone else is being exercised, or if nobody is being exercised!  His droppings have a tendency to a pat-like consistency, and he wriggles and jiggles an

The Equestrian Athlete - Alison Kenward's approach

It may seem strange in the middle of this unprecedented World-wide pandemic, but let's use this time of lockdown to learn, and plan, and improve In tandem with super-coach Alison Kenward i have been looking at how I can plan to improve, and not just in terms of lessons which are becoming increasingly difficult to arrange right now We are all very well aware these days of the fact that our horses are athletes, and as such we need to support their well-being.  Are we as aware that we are athletes too?  Our imbalances and physical weaknesses affect our horses, and so we need to focus on our own fitness and strength just as much If, like me, you drive a desk all week it's difficult to fit in all you need to do - particularly when you know that out of the saddle exercise is just as important as in the saddle exercise Similarly, if my brain is full of the things I need to do at work, at home, and with my horses it's tough to get myself into the right mindset on demand, s