HEALTH & EDUCATION

Health & Education

We all want the best care possible for our horses. The Heath & Education section covers both Learning Institutions, Organizations as well as many sources for equine assistance including Veterinarians and Farriers.

For those who want a to formally study horses, the Education section includes College Riding, Equine Studies, and Veterinary Schools. Learn about the wide variety of horses in the Horse Breeds section. Supplements and Treatments Therapy are also included in the section.

Everyone can learn from Fine Art and there are some specialty Museums that might surprise you.

Horses as a therapy partner enrich the lives of the disabled. These facilities are listed in our Therapeutic Riding section. To help children and young adults build confidence and grow emotionally, please see the resources available on the Youth Outreach page.

Looking for a place to keep your horse? You can find it in the Horse Boarding section. Traveling? Find a Shipping company or Horse Sitting service if your horse is staying home!

Want to stay up to date with the latest training clinics or professional conferences? Take a look at our Calendar of Events for Health & Education for the dates and locations of upcoming events.

Do we need to add more? Please use the useful feedback link and let us know!

by Nikki Alvin-Smith

The bountiful benefits of the sun’s rays bring joy to the hearts of horses and humans, especially for the winter weary residents of colder climes.

But the sun is not good for everyone. Staying sheltered out of the heat and burning beams can be especially important for creatures great and small, especially the young, the elderly, the fair-skinned and the cancer prone. Here are some shade ideas that offer an economic method to address the issue of too much sun.

Give A Horse A Choice

The shade of the spreading chestnut tree may work in poetry for Longfellow (actually it was rather appropriately a horse chestnut tree that shaded the smithy), but it’s not so brilliant as a shelter for horses in an large open field. Even if we forget the risk of lightning strike during a storm, the presence of large trees within a pasture that are neither harmful to horses due to possible ingestion of their toxic fruit, seeds, leaves, or bark are few and far between.

A hedge provides almost no benefit at all in regard to avoidance of the sun’s rays, save for a limited time of possible shade provision early morning or at sunset, neither time being particularly helpful as these times are certainly not the hottest part of the day.

The sun climbs high in the sky during summer months, and avoiding its harsh focus is impossible without a roof under which to hunker down.

For the horse, walking freely out of the paddock directly into a cool horse stall through a Dutch door is heaven indeed. Not only does the sun disappear from view, the incessant buzzing and biting insects usually halt at the doorway and ‘buzz off.’ A double win.

This week’s episode focuses on the new strain of rotavirus that has been uncovered by the UK Gluck Center. Dr. Emma Adam goes into depth about the discovery, research and current treatments for this possible life-threatening type of foal diarrhea.

by Dr. Eleanor Kellon, VDM

"Performance horse" makes us think of things like speed work, endurance, upper level eventing and showing, but it's much more than that.

Let's define performance horses as those being asked to perform work in excess of their regular activity.

Feral horses travel as much as 20 miles per day in search of adequate food, water and salt. If you consider that as a baseline, horses grazing on good pastures or standing around in a stall or paddock all day have a long way to go to match it. Not so for a horse being ridden.

Keeping things at the walk for a moment, the feral horse is doing a lot less work than one carrying a rider. If you doubt that, try going about your daily activities wearing a back pack containing 1/5 of your weight. Carrying weight roughly triples the energy burned. An occasional stroll through the fields is one thing but if your horse is regularly doing trail rides, he's a performance horse. So is a horse or pony taking care of beginner riders several hours a day.

Obviously there is a difference between those horses and a horse in endurance training or any other extremely strenuous effort but they are more alike than you might think in the ways their bodies have to adapt.

As always, calories is the easy part. Increased calorie requirements depend on the individual metabolism (e.g. Thoroughbred versus air fern Morgan), duration and intensity of exercise. Your, or your trainer's,. experience with the individual and work type will determine how much to feed. The bottom line is always to maintain an appropriate body condition score.

However, when the speed of the work increases to trot or canter on a regular basis, this requires an adaptation of the muscle metabolism above and beyond what is needed by a feral horse moving around primarily at the walk. Carrying weight and advanced movements also increase demands on the muscle compared to what the horse's genetics provide at a baseline.

A robust response to the demands of exercise is facilitated by a targeted blend of key amino acids, minerals, vitamins and metbolites plus adaptogens to support a balanced stress response. Some horses struggle in specific areas such as breathing or have muscular challenges like meeting training milestones or muscular bulk.

by Dr. Eleanor Kellon, VDM

It's never bad to be aware of things that may be toxic to your horse, but precautions can be carried too far if you don't know the details. Yes, selenium is a potentially toxic mineral (they all are) but deficiency is much more common.

An owner contacted me because she had a hay selenium assay done which showed she was feeding about 3 mg per day from the hay, but she was horrified to realize the horse had been receiving another 2 mg per day on top of that. The bare minimum requirement for an average size horse is 1 to 2 mg/day.

However, bare minimum requirements are a long way away from toxic and even the 5 mg/day is considerably below any intake that would be dangerous. It is estimated an average size horse would need to take in at least 20 mg/day to be at risk for chronic toxicity - i.e. toxicity that takes weeks to months to show up. Acute toxicity takes over 1500 mg/day.

Naturally occurring chronic toxicity can occur with hays having over 5 ppm selenium ( = 50 mg in 22 lbs of hay) but this is rare. Natural toxicity is more likely in animals grazing on very high selenium soils where wild selenium accumulator plants, which contain several hundred ppm selenium, are growing. The highest selenium soils in the USA occur in pockets of Wyoming and South Dakota. These soils are high saline shales with an alkaline pH.

Acute toxicity causes a neurological derangement called "blind staggers" and is fatal. Chronic toxicity, "alkali disease", causes loss of mane and tail hair plus disrupted hoof growth resulting in separation of the hoof capsule at the coronary band. Another symptom of selenium toxicity is a DMSO or garlic-like odor on the breath. Recovery from chronic toxicosis takes up to 10 months if the hooves slough off. Again, both of these are rare.

Does omeprazole have any benefits?

Yes, particularly for ulcers that are found in the upper squamous region of the stomach that is not protected by a mucus layer. Short term usage is usually not problematic as long as care is taken to wean the horse off of it, lest there be a rebound acid effect.

But usage beyond 4 weeks, or giving your horse omeprazole for other reasons, is not a good idea. Firstly, it almost completely eliminates stomach acid. Stomach acid should not be treated as a nuisance and removed! It is absolutely necessary for protein digestion. Without it, your horse can experience protein deficits, which can result in loss of muscle, depressed immune function, poor digestion, and hormonal imbalances.

In addition, stomach acid is your horse’s first line of defense against damaging microbes that he may pick up off the ground.

Furthermore, omeprazole inhibits calcium and magnesium absorption, as well as other minerals, potentially damaging metabolic pathways and bone health.

But there is a better way

Tetanus: Your Horse’s Risk May Be Greater Than You Think — Photo courtesy of Zoetis

By Kevin Hankins, Senior Veterinarian, Equine Technical Services, Zoetis

Unvaccinated horses face a fatality rate of 75%

All horses are at risk for being exposed to tetanus. If your horse has exposure to soil, other animals and manure, he is at risk. Tetanus is easily transmitted, and if contracted, can be devastating to horses, with a fatality rate of 75%.¹

What is tetanus?

Tetanus is a bacterial disease caused by the invasion of Clostridium tetani in puncture wounds, open lacerations, exposed tissues or surgical incisions. Present in the intestinal tract and feces of horses, other animals and humans, the bacteria can be abundant in soil and can survive in the environment for years, creating a constant risk for horses and people. Clinical signs begin with hyperresponsiveness to noise or movement and progress to a horse having erect ears, third eyelid prolapse, flared nostrils, elevated head, stiff or erect tail, and a stiff-legged gait. Symptoms can advance to muscle spasms, convulsions and death by asphyxia.

“I’ve recently seen tetanus cases in a few horses, and it is devastating to lose a horse from a disease that is very preventable,” said Leslie Schur, DVM, Desert Pines Equine. “Whether you have a young foal, a recently purchased horse or a horse with an unknown vaccination history or a horse that isn’t current on their annual vaccinations, their risks for contracting tetanus significantly increase.”

It is crucial to work closely with your veterinarian to ensure your horse has received protection against tetanus.

by Eleanor M. Kellon, VMD

Equines with uncontrolled Primary Pars Intermedia Dysfunction (PPID) are often more prone to high parasite burdens related to immunosuppression from the disease, so diligent deworming — and control of ACTH — is essential. The fecal egg count (FEC) has become the method of choice for determining when to deworm a horse but there are many shortcomings.

Most labs do simple flotations, which means manure is mixed with a concentrated sugar or salt solution then allowed to sit. The eggs will float up and attach to a microscope slide at the top of the container.

The first problem with FECs is they were designed to reduce contamination of the environment, not to make sure the individual is parasite free. Eggs passed in the feces is how parasites spread from horse to horse. However, only adults pass eggs so you know nothing about other life stages, or parasites not laying eggs, or eggs not mixed evenly into the manure.

Any of the following can be undetectable or easily missed:

Immature or tissue forms of parasites
Tapeworms
Bots
Pinworms

Carole Herder, President of Cavallo Horse & Rider, shares her thoughts.

Q: Carole, you often talk about leaning on your horses during times of stress. The constant news about COVID has me worried and downright fatigued. What’s the best way that you have found for horses to help during this ongoing pandemic?

A: Horses provide a quiet connection to nature and help us all connect and quiet our minds. We live in the country and enjoy a rural setting. We all have our animals to keep us from feeling too much isolation. They are often the best companions anyway. During this time of pandemic, people are out riding their horses, and they are calling us for advice about how to keep their horses moving and feeling great.

Pandemic Panic

Unfortunately, not everyone is doing as well. For example, my neighbor is negatively affected by this pandemic. By the news, the fear, and the anxiety around COVID. She's not alone. Constantly judging the correct distancing and checking to see whether people are wearing masks has many people upset.

These folks are placing their frame-of-reference on the external forces around them and forgetting to nurture their own internal states. They're letting the news run the show. My friend has a hard time looking inward and is continuously being distracted by the media. She lost her horses last year, and I now see how important they were to her happiness. They helped her focus, be quiet and connect with nature. That's what horses do.