Tuesday, February 18, 2014

Mental and Physical Health

Melissa and I have done several posts on the mechanics of transitioning horses to our set up when they first arrive at our farm. Today I’d like to come at this topic from a slightly different angle by talking about how the right physical settings can help adjust a horse’s mental state by minimizing stressors. This is particularly relevant for us as quite a number of horses that arrive here come with considerable mental and physical baggage. 

Like some people, some horses adapt to changes quite readily and are instantly happy in nearly any situation. Other horses don’t handle situations they perceive as stressful quite so well. Some horses may “voice” their distress with their current stressful situation in a number of fairly dramatic ways. This sometimes includes showing physical symptoms such as gas colic, ulcers, fussy eating and various stereotypical behaviours. 

Horses that arrive here with a history of physical symptoms partially or wholly caused by stress can take a year or more to fully transition into their groups. We are frequently told that the horse in question is IR (insulin resistant). I find it interesting that many of the horses that are described as IR are the ones who, whether it was obvious or not, struggled mentally in their prior living arrangements. Often they arrive with long lists of medications and supplements and pages of instructions on managing feeding and medicating to minimize symptoms. Believe me we take these notes very seriously when these sorts of horses first get off the trailer. As I tell all of our prospective clients we can have any problem at any time, but the most likely time for a problem that requires veterinary assistance is during the first several weeks of transition. 

One of the more dramatic symptoms that often presents itself in these situations is the unpredictable and sometimes rapid weight shifts that occur as the horse’s mental and physical conditions begin to stabilize. We have learned over time that rapid weight gains and losses during transitions with these sorts of horses are actually a good sign but it does not change the fact that everyone, including us, still finds them pretty stressful. The good news is that through the years after at least a hundred transitions we have never not have a horse come out happy and healthy on the other side.  However we have had a couple that we really wondered for awhile whether they were ever going to get there or not. 

There are countless stressors that can have an impact on horse health and it is beyond the scope of this blog to attempt to address them all in an adequate manner. It is also beyond the scope of this blog to identify all that we do to minimize stressors on our horses. However it’s the 80:20 rule writ large. There are a few stressors that are easy to identify and easy to correct. By solving them, we manage to eliminate most of our problems. In my opinion perhaps the biggest and most overlooked stressor in horses today is also the most obvious and that is boredom.  We address boredom and minimize a lot of other stressors by keeping our transition program simple and consistent, starting with the way we feed. 

Free choice, moderate quality pasture and hay actually addresses both physical and mental needs. Horses in the wild eat many small forage meals throughout the day and because they are prey animals they especially like to eat at night. Having forage in the guts all the time helps regulate acid production which has a lot of beneficial effects at controlling metabolic diseases AND ulcers. One of the things I tell clients with “ulcery” horses  confined to stalls is to boost the amount of forage (and reduce the quality if necessary to prevent weight gain) in their horses diet until he/she is refusing 5-10% of it. This is particularly important during the overnight hours as that is when horses really want to eat.

Having forage available all the time also eliminates the worry associated with not getting enough to eat and discourages bolting feed which can, at times, lead to impaction colics. Lots of forage also helps regulate acid production after grain feeding….important in horses with ulcers. Because so many of our horses are IR or Cushings we use a feed that is high in energy but fairly low in NSC, while being quite high in fibre. This also has an impact on reducing acid production which is good for ulcers and helps limit and control many other metabolic conditions. 

How we feed is also important. Everyone gets fed in feedbags on pasture. We soak all the feed and then add supplements and medications as necessary. Feeding in feed bags ensures that nobody can steal from one  another and at the same time we can treat, feed, supplement and medicate every horse as an individual. Because one of us stands with them in the pasture while they eat we get a real feel for their normal eating speed and eating behaviour. In addition to checking for injuries at every feeding, by standing with them it is easy to notice any off behaviors and other conditions at a very early and treatable stage; stuff that would get missed in any other feeding situation. 

Horses are very much wired to be a part of a herd and it is rare to find a horse that is truly happy when it perceives that it is alone. It has been our experience that having one or more companions to groom and play with ranks highest on most horse’s wish lists, whether or not they’ve ever shown signs of wanting friends before they arrived here. Strangely the hardest horses to transition, the ones with the most mental and physical problems are the ones that always end up becoming extremely herd bound. Along with grazing, playing and grooming take up a large amount of a horse’s day on this farm and this activity helps to keep them mentally alert which, conversely, also calms them.

While most horses do well in groups they also very much have a need for their own space. In rare instances introducing horses into a group in small paddocks where it’s not possible for them to have their own space separate from the group can create more problems than it solves. Groups work here because our pastures are big enough…20 acres or more…that horses can choose to interact with the group or with their own special friend(s) at will. They can always choose to have their own space whether that means being twenty feet from the group, two hundred feet from the group or sometimes a few thousand feet from the group. 

As the horses graze and play throughout their day they get an awful lot of low impact exercise. We have put pedometers on some of the horses and it is surprising how much they walk and run over the course of a 24 hour day. In addition to promoting a reasonable and healthy weight as well as overall fitness there is no doubt that continuous movement also greatly aids the digestive process in horses. Continual low impact movement also helps work off excess energy and is mentally calming for the horses. I say that because at times one or more horses will go from quietly grazing to exploding into a full gallop, do a lap or two (maybe equivalent to a mile or two) around the pasture and then immediately go back to quietly grazing. 

I would be remiss in this discussion if I did not quickly mention teeth and feet. This post is getting long and I won’t go into great detail here but it is truly surprising to see the poor state of both teeth and feet on many of the horses that get off the trailer on this farm. If the horse cannot eat comfortably and cannot walk comfortably everything else doesn’t matter very much. Melissa has done several posts on teeth and feet and we have probably said enough on these topics.

Melissa and I take what we do very seriously. We have learned over time that it is quite possible to feed a diet that is nutritionally adequate and correctly balanced while still struggling with an unthrifty, unhealthy horse. As we try to work through and make sense of what we are seeing we often wind up becoming more of a detective than anything else. I have listed some of the most common stressors we see and what we do to address them. I hope you can find some good in my post and I hope some of it is relevant to your situation. 

______________________________

Trigger and Moe


Tony and Hemi


Thomas, Levendi and Homer


I was pretty sure that was Maisie on the far left along with Cuffie and MyLight in the shed . . .


. . . but I had to zoom in and confirm I had the right bay mare. It was, indeed, Maisie napping hard.


Walden, Fabrizzio and Merlin were looking very alert


Griselle, Timbit and Miracle


Clayton was having the perfect afternoon, napping while Walon groomed on him


Leo, Trigger and Grand

9 comments:

EvenSong said...

Thanks, Jason. You and Melissa have discussed many of these things in previous posts, but it's nice to see how it all fits together.
One question: do you have to limit access for any of the [easy keeping] horses when the rich green spring grass comes in?

Anonymous said...

THINGS I DIDN'T KNOW.BUT THEN ALL I WANT TO DO IS TO JUST SIT AND WATCH THEM ALL DAY BECAUSE THAT'S WHAT OLD GRANNIES DO. [SIT]///////

GRANNY [FLORIDA]

Melissa-ParadigmFarms said...

No, we have never had to limit a horse on spring grass. The #1 factor in managing IR is continual, low-impact movement and the horses here get a tremendous amount of that. Most IR horses that come here lose weight and need a feed increase thanks to their new lifestyle that is much more suited to managing their condition. Keep in mind our "small" pasture is 20 acres and you could not achieve this effect in small turnouts (less than 10 to 15 acres).

cheyenne jones said...

Great post! Spot on with the ad lib hay/grass.

Lori Skoog said...

This is an excellent post Jason. Very informative and I totally agree with what you have written. It's nice to know that when horses go to a facility like yours, that they are being managed by very knowledgeable people. Your physical set up and philosophy are both incredible. Thank you for sharing.

Anonymous said...

Thanks Jason! Great post!
Where do you get the feedbags?

RiderWriter said...

This was really interesting! It makes me so sad to think of the thousands (millions?) of horses that do not get enough exercise and "just being a horse" time. I am all for riding and keeping horses in a situation where it's convenient for you, but if I'm boarding I'm going to be a nut about turnout... although, I've heard of some horses that don't LIKE turnout!

I'm a bit shocked that you see bad feet and teeth on horses that arrive. Seems to me that in order to desire and afford your retirement care, the owners would have had the financial wherewithal to afford good teeth/feet care. Is it lack of knowledge, do you think?

Anonymous said...

Most of the owners spent a small fortune paying professionals to care for feet and teeth. The problem is that without specific knowledge of both an owner that doesn't spend his or her days watching horses has very little information on which to judge the quality of the work. there are a lot of high priced shysters out there who take advantage of this.

Jason

lytha said...

Great post. There was a study quoted on another blog about movement - horses on 100 acres moved more than horses on small acreage who also were exercised by humans. So my question is, at what point does that even out? At 15 acres does a horse stop moving more than its artificially excercised counterpart? At 10 acres? I wish I knew! (Now I see Melissa's comment seems to answer this with regard to IR - 20?)

Most horses in Germany are on their Winter paddocks during the day now and stalled at night. Oct-May they get almost no natural movement because the Winter paddocks are not big enough to encourage movement. There are very, very few people who sacrifice a field in the Winter for the benefit of the horses.

It makes me especially perplexed to look out my window and see how the horses live across the street. They are over their ankles in mud and they stand there all day long, just turning around to get water. For some reason only the geldings get silage during the day, the mares just stand there watching. Since several have scratches from the mud, they have been put on temporary concrete runs - 2 horses to a run sized 10 meters by 10 meters, and it's all electric wire so they have to be careful when they push each other around.

When I talked to one of the owners there about it, she said, "The worst part is, the fields are too rich in summer and our horses can't handle the grass that the landowner is so concerned about protecting all Winter." So while Summertime is heaven for some of the horses, for others it's just more restrictions.

Thankfully in Germany there is a movement to build so-called "Aktivstall" which is when landowners build a paddock paradise system, with computerized feeding stations and dispersed resources. It's brilliant. Very pricey though.