Horse Party

Today the horses and I had a festive gathering.

First of all, I let them out into the yard and played some tricks and training with Bridget. Then I tried to mow the lawn. When the lawnmower broke down (yet again), I pondered for half a second whether or not to go inside and do inside chores, and ditched that idea in favor of staying outside and messing about with the horses.

The center of fun was the open back of the station wagon. Bridget pulled my trimming bucket out onto the ground, so I decided that if she was so all-fired interested in the trimming equipment, I may as well try and tidy up her toes. She let me, after a fashion. George came over to see what was up and amused himself by pulling everything else out of the back of the car and then licking the carpet to see if years of spills had left any tasty remnants.

Rose, uncharacteristically, came over and planted herself in front of me, so I did her toes too. I don't think she was saying, "I volunteer to stand quietly while you trim my feet" - it was more like "Hey, my feet are just as important as Bridget's, right?" George had a little manicure too.

So we did a spot of trimming, and threw objects around, and stuck our heads inside bags, and attempted to dismantle parts of the car, and just generally had a convivial time.

Tuning In

Today, I returned to the miniature stallions. Last time, the dominant one had been playful and curious and easy to work with. The other one, a stocky little brown guy, had struck at me with his teeth when I was working on his front feet. Today, I thought I'd pay better attention to the little brown stallion and see if we couldn't maybe elicit a better response without getting cross at him this time.

I realized that touching the foreleg is an invitation to rough play, as that's often where horses will nip at each other to get the fun started. As I went to pick up the forelegs of each little stallion, he turned to respond with a nip. However, the brown stallion's strike last time had not been of this nature - it was much more of a defensive "get lost" character. Perhaps he thought I was too big and scary to be playing with him.

Today I went slowly with the little brown guy, and this time, he didn't get cranky. Like his more dominant buddy, he started out by trying to nip. I said "uh uh" sternly. Then I remembered my resolution to be kinder and gentler and started just pushing his head away quietly. Then, somehow, we started engaging each other. Our interaction became interesting for both of us.

He began to understand that my touching his foreleg was not a prelude to play, but that I had another purpose. When I picked up his leg and he decided that pawing the ground would be a better activity for said leg, I encouraged him and put his foot up on my knee. I admired his leg and talked about it, and pointed out all the different parts of it. He was right there with me, inspecting his leg and nosing and nibbling at it. He became very cooperative. There was a bucket of treats up out of reach in the little pen we were in. Every now and then I'd take a break and go get him a treat. Once - and only once - he interrupted the proceedings himself to go over to the bucket and indicate that he would like one.

At the end, I taught him to shake hands, which took about 2 seconds.

The thing was - as I realized afterwards - we were both having fun. It was a nice day; I didn't have to be anywhere else for another two or three hours; the owners were pottering about in the background doing yard chores, not breathing down our necks or worrying about how much time it was taking. I wasn't focused on getting it done. I was focused on this little guy and who he was and what he was thinking  - and on how charming and delightful he was. I think horses like that much better - if you're just trying to get the job done, then of course it probably feels a bit to them like you're treating them as an object - never mind that "it's for their own good."  It's the same with the "crazy" mare at another barn - as long as I'm more interested in her than in her feet, everything goes just fine.

Later today, I was working on an apparently rather surly, bossy, uncooperative mare. I resisted the (every-present) temptation to establish dominance (although we did briefly play the Bored Game, which is nearly always helpful) and instead tried to be 100% responsive to all her concerns and complaints and to listen to everything she was trying to say. Mostly what she was worried about was her sore left stifle, and when I was "obedient" to all her requests, she freely offered a great deal of intelligent cooperation.

Having said all this, the other day I worked on a gelding who stood like a perfect statue when I worked on him, and I must say it was quite lovely to be able to mark his feet up and fuss with the details in peace and quiet, being a plain old trimmer for once, instead of counselor-therapist-teacher-psychologist as well!

And This Is Why You Don't Try to Make Donkeys Do Things They Don't Want

(I waited 3 days til the bruise was nice and dark.)

The Human's Training Progresses

I don't know what it is, but despite all the Spilkeration that has gone on in my life, I still have a tendency to want to turn the horses into minions. Not to beat myself up about this, but there it is. I'm working on it.

One form this hegemony takes is the desire to Make George Do Things. One thing I like to ask him to do is to move his shoulder away. I ask him to do this because he hates it, and for some reason I think I should be able to randomly make him do things he doesn't want to, just because he's a horse and I'm a human. Whenever I suggest he move his shoulder away (unless, of course, there's a good reason for it, in which case he is impeccably courteous), he gives me his best "You are such a bitch" look.

Yesterday evening, we were out having a pleasant time together - George getting his tummy scratched, me dancing about to keep my be-sandaled feet from being trampled - when I decided we would practice doing a teeny bit of shoulder moving. Only this time I was determined to be reeeaally nice about it, and make it completely optional, and not, well, not be such a bitch about it.

So I stood by his shoulder and pointed, not at his shoulder, but in the direction toward which I was asking his shoulder to move, holding my arm in front of his chest. Pretty soon he did move in the desired manner, with the result that his butt came round to a good scratching position. That works.

Later, I tried again. Before granting me my whim, George first had to focus on some other agenda items. First we had to stare into the distance at some deer, and then we had to scratch his chest. And also he first had to make me move away from him. He achieved this by the not-so-subtle means of nudging me over with his head. Fair enough. And then finally he did move away in the desired manner, again bringing his quarters back to scratching position.

But only for a moment. He disengaged from scratching, carefully backed up to re-position me by his shoulder, said, "Allow me to demonstrate once more," and again moved his shoulder away from me. Then back to scratching.

So he schooled me in patience, reciprocity, and shoulder moving, without ever once telling me I was a bitch.

This morning, as I returned from yoga, Chloe was waiting for me and marched up to the fence while I was parking the car. Clearly she was a pony on a mission, and as I assumed it involved Improved Grazing Opportunities, I opened the two gates which face each other on either side of the drive and ushered George, Bridget, and Rose out from their current pasture over into the barn pasture. Chloe did not follow - the normal rules do not apply to her - so I shut the others in and let her stay out.

She nibbled a little clover but then walked purposefully over to me. It's been quite a while since she's let me climb on her back, but today I was getting the feeling that maybe it would ok. So I got into - well, it's not mounting position cos that would be giving me too much credit - let's call it scrambling-aboard position. Chloe stood still while I plonked myself like a sack of meal over her back. Feeling that it might be nice if there were less flailing and more dignity involved in the next step of actually getting one leg over Chloe's back, I went in and fetched out the kitchen step stool to aid in the process. But when I put it next to Chloe and stood on it, she walked forward. Only a couple of steps though. She walked forward, stopped, and waited. Ok, no step stool.

I got back into scrambling-aboard position, and Chloe stood, planting her feet, giving that kind of solid, reliable feeling that seems to say, "That's ok, take all the time you need. I know you're a complete klutz; I'll just stand here til you're up." Once I was up, Chloe turned her head to inspect my leg, looking at it  rather indulgently. Then she set off. She's very careful not to unseat me, and at first she stops every step or two, as she can feel my wobbliness. (Tall person on short pony makes for an unstable situation.) She walked over to the gate where the other horses were and stopped. I got off and asked her if she wanted to go in, but the other horses were crowding the gate, and she didn't want to.

For a little while, I pottered about doing other things. Chloe wandered down the drive a little, and when I went to see what she was up to, she seemed to invite me on board once more. So I scrambled on. Chloe turned to inspect my leg again and then carefully walked up to the gate. This time the other horses were out of the way, so when I got off and opened the gate for Chloe, she went right in.

I don't know what Chloe's plan was, or even if it was a plan. But it sure seemed like one.

Watercress

Good for horses!:
http://holistichorse.com/equine-therapy/herbs/474-combat-cancer-with-watercress
Good for you!:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-436358/Daily-bunch-watercress-cut-cancer-risk.html
Grow it at home!:
http://www.clarkarty.com/at-home/how-to-grow-watercress-at-home/
Most seems to be grown in the UK:
http://www.thewatercresscompany.co.uk/process.php
What is this? Is it for real? Is it safe to buy chemicals from China?:
http://www.ebiochem.com/product/watercress-extract-powder-5-1-13702
The Government says so! It must be true!:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21442676
This supplier is in the U.S.:
http://www.21food.com/products/watercress-powder,-extract,-concentrate-749858.html
http://www.npnutra.com/

More Laminitis

On Monday, I went to work on two horses who had not been trimmed since October last year. The mare was doing fine, but the gelding had waaaay long toes and was recovering from an onset of laminitis about a month ago.

You could see the "event" about 1/2" down from his hairline in both fore and hind feet. However, the hind feet, growing as they do, did not have nearly as much damage as the fores.  This horse would surely have suffered less if he had met the spring with short toes.

I quizzed the owner about his history. He is in his mid twenties and started suffering from laminitis every spring in his mid teens (as well as at other times, although never in the winter). Last spring (2012) was the first time he avoided laminitis.

When I saw him for the first time in January, 2012, he had the flat feet typical of a laminitic horse, as well as a lot of abscessing going on.

The spring of 2012 brought no laminitis, although when I saw him in June (this owner doesn't call me often), his toes were super-long again. He was doing fine in October, although very long again.

But, uh oh, this spring brought another attack.

What was different? There were no apparent changes which lead to the onset of laminitis. As to the improvement in the spring of 2012, there are two possible causes. One possibility is that the January trim put him in better shape to deal with any laminitis issues. However, given the rate at which this guy grows toe, it's unlikely that a January 6 trim would have provided him with short toes by the beginning of growing season in March.

A more likely reason is as follows. In the late summer of 2011, he acquired a pasture buddy - a young mare. The added movement induced by having a playmate can't be the reason for his doing better, or else he would have stayed sound this spring. But here's what was different ... in their pasture, there's a pond where lots of watercress grows. The gelding had never gone into the pond when he lived alone, but the new mare had no qualms about wading in. The gelding followed her example and discovered all the yummy watercress growing in the pond. It was too late to affect him in the spring of 2011, as the mare didn't arrive until the end of the summer, but he ate watercress in the spring of 2012 and was sound for the first time in years.

However, the two horses ate so much of it last year that not much grew this spring, and the gelding got laminitis again.

After hearing all this, I came home and googled - apparently watercress is a known "phase 1 enzyme inhibitor," and of course matrix metalloproteinase (MMP) is the enzyme which is a major factor in laminitis.

So - aha!?

Although I know that MMP is an enzyme, I don't know whether it is a "phase 1" enzyme. However, it seems like there's a likely connection. My unscientific and haphazard googling suggests that that MMPs are thought to be a factor in certain kinds of cancer. Also that watercress is thought to be a cancer preventative/healer due to its enzyme-inhibiting qualities.

I called the owner back with this information and suggested that she might want to try and husband her watercress by maybe closing off the pond at certain times to allow the watercress to recover so that there's enough growing in the crucial spring months. The owner is now committed to regular trimming for her horse, and I'm booked up to come back again in 6 weeks. I also left her with an old file and showed her how to keep the toes off the ground, as I think any laminitic episode is made so much worse if there's any leveraging on the toes.

How do you feed watercress to your horse? I imagine horses have to eat a whole heck of a lot for it to work, so buying it from somewhere seems out of the question. And who sells bulk watercress anyway? Most pastures don't have ponds. I wonder if there's any kind of substitute.

On that note, I have another client with two horses who are at risk for laminitis. She has ordered some For Love of the Horse MMP Stop formula to keep on hand in case either one of them start to show signs. I'm very happy about this, as for one thing I've been hoping for someone who wants to try this product, and for another thing, it puts my mind at rest somewhat, knowing that there's a potentially effective remedy on hand for these horses if they get laminitis. One of them is a recent rescue. She has had very poor nutrition in the past, and as a result has had sluggish hoof growth. She has flat, shallow feet, with a hairline "ditch" - which makes me think she's had laminitis in the past, but from the appearance of her hoofs, I don't think she's had an episode in the last year. Now that she's getting proper nutrition, her feet might take off growing, and I want to be sure that it's the right kind of growth. The last thing she needs is an acute episode, which may be a concern now that she's on grass and getting fed properly after a couple of years of near starvation.

Here's a link to some watercress info:
 http://www.botanical-online.com/english/watercressproperties.htm

I wish I had studied more science in school.

Laminitis

The learning curve in my trimming practice has recently been taking a turn for the steeper.

Normally when someone calls me with a severely laminitic horse, I just tell them to call my friend Sue, who is Very Experienced with these problems. However, the other day, a new client called and didn't tell me in advance that his two mares (sisters) were suffering from a bad bout of laminitis. So I had to deal with it.

The mares were having a very hard time walking - you could see the "ouchouchouch" at the moment when they had to break over their toes in the front. They had the tell-tale "ditch" running around above their hairline, showing how compromised their feet are - the end of the digit sinking down inside the hoof capsule.   (An ideal foot has a "muffin top" bulging out above the hairline.) Their toes were very overgrown, and taking them back did help, but I was afraid to go too far, as without x-rays you just don't know for sure where the tip of the coffin bone is lurking.

The two mares had no problems with their hind feet - which shows how much laminitis is affected by mechanical factors - that may be because as there's much less leveraging in the hoof wall of the hind feet, the weakened laminae don't come to grief in the same way. I assume that the chemical situation does not differ fore and hind.

The owner is nice, and good with his horses. But he's used to paying an Amish guy $15 per horse for a trim, and so my price is already a bit much for him, never mind me wanting to come back every two weeks to work with the mares until they're sorted. I went back once at half-price, but I fear he may not have me back anytime soon again. I also feel I missed an opportunity to really educate him about the nature of laminitis. As my friend Sue says, half the job is education.

However, the experience had some benefit for me, as it finally made me go out and buy 2" thick roofing insulation foam and Gorilla tape to have on hand for any future encounters with badly laminitic horses.

And I learned something interesting. These mares get laminitis every spring, as do their mother and another sister (who live elsewhere). So this year their owner decided they would get no spring grass whatsoever. (He does know that grass is a factor.) He kept them in a bare paddock with not a single stick of green anywhere in reach.

And they got laminitis worse than ever.

The worse part makes sense, because the paddock is very small, and the mares were therefore not able to get much exercise and movement, which exacerbates the problem. However, why did they get laminitis at all? So here's what I've been wondering: is there a light trigger?

Horses produce matrix metalloproteinase, which temporarily loosens (or whatever the technical term is) the laminar attachment in order to allow the hoof wall to grow past the structures underneath it, to which it is attached by the laminae.  Of course, the more hoof growth, the more MMP is needed. Fructans in the grass causes a rise in MMP production, and if the chemical (or whatever the technical term is) isn't dissipated (owttti), an excess of it will cause runaway detachment of the laminae.

When spring comes, bringing with it greatly enhanced nutritional opportunities, it's a good time for the horse to grow a lot of new hoof. So it makes sense that the sugary grass of early spring would trigger a lot of MMP production to allow for the extra growth. And might it also be the case that increasing daylight, which triggers shedding, is a signal to step up MMP production too?

Whatever the cause, I'm thinking let's everybody start spring with nice short toes.

Question:  has anybody out there had any experience with this product: MMP Stop, made by For Love of the Horse? I'm longing to know if it works. I tried their UVeitis formula, and it really worked. If their MMP Stop formula works, it could be a great boon to some people.

P.S. In case anyone is wondering about the roofing insulation and Gorilla tape, here you go:
http://www.hopeforsoundness.com/cms/first-aid-for-laminitis---styrofoam.html