When a Moose has Wings!

The usual expression of disbelief is, "When pigs fly!" but I have to say that it is just as amazing to watch a Moose fly ... in this case, Fezzywig (named Moose by his former mother). Yup, that's right, he can fly.

If you have been following my blog then you know that Fezzywig is my roach-backed warmblood gelding. He suffered an injury when he was quite young (he is now a coming 5 year old) and developed a roach back as a result. Although is very well-bred for dressage or jumping, his injury has limited his athletic ability during the time he has been with me.

Now he has wings!

From Stuck to Soaring

How did Fezzywig learn to fly? Literally via "trial by fire." Although I had done a lot of bodywork on him, and equine veterinarian extraordinaire Dr. Madalyn Ward had done a deep bodywork session on him last September, he was still stuck.

When I rode Fezzy he was stuck in his feet and could not move out well. He walked and trotted slowly, and getting him into the lope was a challenge. Internal adhesions and his funny roach-backed posture seemed to be hindering him.

I decided to try jumping him over some significant jumps to see whether stretching his body over jumps would break loose some adhesions and free up his gait. It turns out that jumping Fezzy is no easy task. He knocks over every movable jump and delights in taking them apart and dragging them into the ditch at night.

The solution? Jumps made of concrete blocks, barrels, heavy poles, and other similar immovable objects. Aha! Now here are some jumps that Fezzy has to really try to get over since they don't come down so easily!

The result? He has learned to soar, and his gaits are getting much freer with each jumping session. Being a pretty big galoot, it took some good-sized jumps to get his attention. We started at 2'3" and moved up to about 3' because he didn't bother picking up his front legs over the 2' jumps.

What's Next for Fezzywig?

Now that jumping has freed up his body, I am going back to doing a lot of the lateral work that I could not get him to do previously. He simply didn't have enough "steam" to do side-passes, leg yields, or haunches in. Now, after having jumped quite a bit, he does.

The ability to move freely forward at the walk has made those lateral flexing exercises so much more possible!

In addition, Fezzywig continues to be on his program of Horse Goo (made up of blue-green algae products and this healthy juice) to keep him limber. I've been giving him double doses on the days I jump him so his muscles and joints don't tighten up. It seems to be working well for him, as he moves better after every jumping session.

Stay tuned for more on the Flying Moose!

If you enjoyed this post, please consider leaving a comment or subscribing to the feed to have future articles delivered to your feed reader. Also, check out my ebook for wacky horses and humans, or holler at me if you want to know how I fund my horse addiction ... and you can, too!

Horse Health Care: Roach-Backed Horse Tests the Waters at his First Show

This past Sunday Fezzywig and I attended our first hunter/jumper show. Being that Fezzywig just started jumping, we attended this show just to test the waters and see how this big guy liked the show ring. The plan was that if he liked it, I would continue him in jumper training. If not, I would need a new plan.

We entered in the ... wait for it ... cross-rail division! Oh don't worry. I was prepared for the laughter as I entered the arena on my giant 16.2 roach-backed whale of a horse, going up against a bunch of kids on ponies.

The Results of Fezzywig's First Show
As you can probably already see, Fezzywig did great. He and I ended up with a first and two second-place ribbons, plus the Championship for the cross-rail division. Too hilarious, since he bucked in the flat class.

No matter. He LIKED jumping and was quite willing to trot over teensy-tiny cross-rails. He was also quite amenable for a Wood horse personality type, which tends to be very competitive in my mustang mare, Valentine. Apparently, when you put a Wood in a warmblood, it turns out to be a lot mellower!

What I Brought with Me to the Show
Although Fezzy and I did not hop over any jumps taller than 15", which was a total no-brainer for a 16.2 hand horse, he does have a history of back problems. So here's what I brought to the show, in addition to all the normal gear:

• Eleviv: To keep Fezzywig in his normal healing parasympathetic nervous system
• Homeopathic Arnica: In case he hurt something trotting over these teensy poles
• Horse Goo: To keep everything from his gut to his mind functioning normally (it has mangosteen juice, blue-green algae, probiotics, enzymes)
  

I gave Fezzy a double dose of the Horse Goo plus 2 Eleviv capsules starting the day before the show, and also the day of the show. Being a Wood horse personality type, Fezzywig was not fearful, but he did occasionally get a little goofy on me (like spooking at the same jump over and over again). Wood horses love mischief. But, between the Eleviv and the Horse Goo I think we more or less kept his mischief under control!

See? Even the most chronically hump-backed horse CAN be healed. For more thoughts on healing, click here.

If you enjoyed this post, please consider leaving a comment or subscribing to the feed to have future articles delivered to your feed reader. Also, check out my ebook for wacky horses and humans, or holler at me if you want to know how I fund my horse addiction ... and you can, too!

Horse Health Care: Hope for Those Helping Horses in Pain

This article is dedicated to all those equine addicts who are also the patron saints of horses in pain.

This article is for those kind people who take in ill, injured, or otherwise hurting horses, and try to help them regain health.

If you are one of those people, I hope this article gives you the faith and patience you will probably need to nurse an ailing horse back to health because it's a marathon, not a sprint. And along the way, we horses lovers can become impatient, frustrated, and downright cranky about the process.

This article is to give you hope.

Helping Horses in Pain: Diagnosis
The first step in the journey is, of course, figuring out what's wrong because there may be multiple causes of pain. Take Fezzywig, for example, my adopted warmblood gelding (picture above from mid-March, 2010) who came to me with a roached back in November of 2009. The initial diagnosis, made with the aid of my holistic veterinarian Madalyn Ward, was that he had:

• stomach adhesions
• sore stifles from moving around with the roached back
• a stuck sternum
• stuck withers
• overall poor muscle development
• an injured left hind leg from a fall

All of these factors were contributing to his roached back. That was a lot to deal with. To alleviate these problems, I did the following:

• bodywork almost daily
• fed him double doses of my horse goo
• backed him daily to help him develop his hindquarters

This program alleviated the stomach adhesions, sore stifles, and some of his muscle development issues. However, he still looked and acted like many horses in pain. He would not move around much, and had difficulty lying down and getting back up. Like any horse owner, I was starting to get impatient!

Helping Horses in Pain: Peeling the Onion
Luckily, Dr. Ward reminded me that healing horses in pain was a marathon, not a sprint, especially with horses like Fezzywig, who had had a chronic condition for a few years. To deal with his sternum and withers, which were still stuck and lower than his rear, we used the trailer to literally stretch him out.

I would walk him into the trailer, turned him around, and have him step his front feet on the ground. His hind feet remained in the trailer, which gave him a big stretch in his shoulders, withers, and sternum area. It literally "broke something loose" in those areas. He gave huge releases, with licking and chewing, and after a few sessions his withers actually rose by two inches or so.

Now I felt I could start ponying him and giving him short workouts. I ponied on a local trail, and did some short hill work. Fezzywig was shockingly out of shape, and became winded very quickly.

Aack! At this point I didn't know what to do with his horse health care regimen. Another call to Dr. Ward produced a further diagnosis. Now that we had fixed his hind end, withers, and sternum, we could see that he was still stuck in his diaphragm. In fact, Dr. Ward noted that his diaphragm was probably one giant adhesion. It was so stuck that he literally couldn't catch his breath.

More Horse Health Care Exercises
To deal with Fezzywig's diaphragm adhesions, I started backing him down a fairly steep hill, which he loved. This exercise shifts the weight of his organs off his diaphragm and down toward his tail. In turn, his diaphragm is freed up and he can take deep breaths, which he does. He loves walking down hill and does it with his nose on the ground, breathing deeply and licking and chewing.

The net effect of this horse health care exercise is that Fezzywig is breaking up the adhesions on his diaphragm with each deep breath he takes. After three days of this exercise, Fezzywig felt so good that he literally bucked, reared, ran and spun when I turned him back out. Now I know I'm on the right track.

To speed his recovery process, I also added 2 Eleviv to his diet. This herbal supplement helps bring horses back into their healing, or parasympathetic, nervous system. This supplement is especially important for horses who have been stuck in a chronic health condition for a long time.

I felt the Eleviv would help Fezzywig "get over the hump" and move through recovery more quickly. I know he needs this supplement because he eats it straight out of my hand. I also see an overall improvement in his attitude, hair coat, and more. Read more about how to use Eleviv for humans and horses in the free Natural Solutions ebook.

Helping Horses in Pain: The Ongoing Journey
Fezzywig sure looks a heck of a lot better than when I got him, but he still looks like a funny, lumpy giant horse. Sometimes when I see him in the pasture, I can't believe that anything has changed because he still looks so strange. But people who do not see him regularly are shocked at the changes in him. And when I see him running and playing now, I know that he is no longer one of those horses in pain. He still has health issues, but he's not in major pain.

If you are trying to help a horse in pain, don't worry if the journey seems to be taking longer than forever. Here are some lessons I've learned along the way with Fezzywig ... maybe they will help you, too:

1. Horses are Great Self Healers
You are just a channel. Don't worry about fixing your horse, just be a channel who delivers supplements, lays on hands, or simply comforts a horse in pain.

2. The Healing Methods Will Keep Changing
As soon as you think, "Aha! I've got the solution," your current healing approach will stop working. Don't panic. It usually means you've healed one layer of the problem, and now need to "peel back a layer of the onion" and deal with the next layer. You may go through 15 different healing modalities before you can truly heal horses in pain.

3. Get Help from a Professional
Chronically ill or unhealthy horses can be difficult for the amateur owner to treat alone, so you might need help along the way. While you may not be able to afford to have your vet or bodyworker out every week to work on your horse, try getting help every 6 months from a professional. You can do a lot by yourself, but sometimes the help of a professional can move the healing process forward by a quantum leap.

4. Listen to Your Horse's Native Wisdom
If your horse absolutely hates a certain supplement, chances are that he doesn't need it. This isn't always the case, but is mostly true. Fezzywig wasn't that interested in Eleviv early on in the process, but now he scarfs them down. Horses will tell you what they want if you pause long enough to listen.

5. It is Working? Document the Journey or Ask Someone Else
You see your horse every single day so sometimes you miss the progress that is occurring right before your eyes. If you don't trust that the healing process is at work, take pictures and write notes along the way to document your horse's progress. Look back at your old notes and pictures, and try to see differences.

Then check in with your buddies, the ones who don't see your horse everyday. They will be able to see marked changes even when you can't. Getting this kind of external validation will keep you from getting frustrated during the long healing process.

Helping Horses in Pain: It's Never Too Late
I like to think that it's never too late to have a happy childhood. I also think it's never too late to heal horses in pain. A good horse health care regimen, a huge dose of patience, a hunger to learn more about healing, and pure love can work miracles on these horses.

Most horses in pain want help but are somehow "stuck" in their illness. If we can do little things here and there to shift them, even half a degree, we have started the healing process. A half degree here, a couple of degrees there ... and voila! You've got healing. One more item of note: just about any change in pattern is a sign of healing for a chronically unhealthy horse. Movement is life, so a shift from one pattern to another is a sign of progress.

Good luck, have patience, and just love your horses. It's good for them ... and so good for you!

If you enjoyed this post, please consider leaving a comment or subscribing to the feed to have future articles delivered to your feed reader. Also, check out my ebook for wacky horses and humans, or holler at me if you want to know how I fund my horse addiction ... and you can, too!

Horse Health Care: Using the Trailer to Help a Roach-Backed Horse

Roach-backed horses can be very difficult for the average owner to treat, especially if they want to use a do-it-yourself approach. These horses have a "hump" in their spine, usually where the hips join the rest of the ribcage.

This hump is usually caused by some sort of accident or traumatic event, and is difficult to resolve because so many parts of the body are involved. The necessary adjustments can often be difficult for a horse owner to perform.

Fezzywig: A Case in Point
Fezzywig is my roach-backed adopted horse. He jumped out of a tall corral as a youngster, and thereafter had a hump in his back. Although his horse health care program involves a lot of daily bodywork, I still could not free up some of his lumbar vertebrae myself. He would also get continually stuck in his withers, so that in addition to his roached back, he had a downhill posture with a large dip behind his withers.

Adjusting him so that he stays in the correct posture is extremely difficult. For one thing, he's 16.2 hands and not always very cooperative when I want to adjust him. Second, he is so stuck that even if I do manage to adjust him (using Equine Touch, Bowen, network chiropractic, or stretching), his muscle memory flips him right back into his roach-backed posture within an hour or two.

Talk about frustrating!

Enter the Trailer for Horse Health Care Bodywork
At the height of my frustration, I called Dr. Madalyn Ward to help me. We decided that we needed to use some "tools" to shake his muscle memory loose ... and we needed to do it in a way that wouldn't cause my body to be too sore. She suggested that I continue my backing exercises, but also start backing him up a steep hill.

While we do have a steep hill in the neighborhood, it's about a mile away, and I needed some horse health care approaches I could use daily that were easy and convenient. I had tried to use some of the Linda Tellington-Jones approaches, such as having Fezzywig walk over poles of different heights to shake loose his muscle memory, but being a Wood horse personality (learn more about horse personality typing here) he just knocked them over and walked through him. No use.

Then Madalyn came up with the brilliant idea of using the trailer as my "hill." Instead of backing Fezzy up a hill, she wondered whether I could back him into the trailer. I decided to give it a try, since I don't have access to a chiropractor here, and I love to do my own horse health care.

The Trailer as a Bodywork and Body Awareness Tool
Our first attempts at backing into the trailer were less than useless. Although Fezzy understood what I wanted, he couldn't seem to manage it. So I broke the exercise down into smaller pieces to see what was getting in the way.

Walking In and Backing Out
First I walked Fezzy into the trailer so that all four feet were in. Next, I asked him to back out of the trailer, which is different than how we normally exit the trailer front feet first. It took him quite a while to get organized enough to back out. At first, he could not seem to hold his weight on one hind leg while stepping to the ground with the other. After about 5 tries, he was able to so, although his muscles quivered a bit. We did this exercise several times successfully, and he showed many releases. He licked and chewed, yawned, and moved his tongue around.

Then I tried a different variation. I walked him into the trailer so that only his front feet were in the trailer while his back feet remained on the ground. I praised him. Next, I asked him to step one foot at a time into the trailer. I was surprised that he had a lot of difficulty doing so.

He grunted and had to sort of "launch" himself into the trailer to get in. This told me that his stifles and hindquarters were still quite weak, despite the backing we had been doing. That was a good diagnostic piece of information. When he was able to do this exercise successfully a few times, I stopped and moved on. I did not want him to strain his stifles, which had been quite sore when I got him (though they are not sore anymore).

Walking In and Walking Out
Next I tried the opposite variation. I walked Fezzy into the trailer front feet first and with all four feet in the trailer. Then I turned him around so that he was facing the back of the trailer. From there, I asked him to step only his front feet to the ground and halt. This left his hind feet in the trailer.

This posture achieved the same kind of position I would look for had I been backing him up a steep hill-the position that would free up the stuck lumbar vertebrae. The posture also clearly knocked some of muscle memory loose. Fezzy was happy to stand there for 5 minutes or more. He licked and chewed and dropped his head straight to the ground. I had him rest alternate hind feet on the toe so that his pelvis would shift back and forth a bit, too. He was fine with holding his hind end on one leg while resting the other leg, both ways.

Finally, I asked him to back up and bring his front feet back into the trailer. This was considerably more difficult for him than stepping out of the trailer. He had to spend a few minutes getting organized and thinking through how to accomplish this. He finally managed to do so, with a bit of stumbling and bumbling. I showered him with praise. We then repeated the exercise several times. I can see that this maneuver works his core muscles ... a lot! This excites me because Fezzy has always appeared pot-bellied with a bulging bottom line. I believe this maneuver seriously engages his core abdominal muscles and will help him build strength in his hind end as well.

Wow, what a tool for my horse health care toolkit!

What I've Learned from the Trailer Exercises
Based on the responses Fezzy gave me during these exercises, I concluded that he does not have the strength in his hind end yet to back into the trailer by himself. However, I do think that the intermediate exercises that he was able to do will make changes to his posture and start engaging the correct muscles for movement. I also believe that daily use of this exercise will shake free some of the stuck lumbar vertebrae, as well as the areas stuck between his sternum and withers.

Fezzy certainly likes these exercises, and I noticed a great deal more movement across his hips after I turned him loose. I will continue to work with these exercises as a form a chiropractic adjustment and muscle retraining. Using a big immovable object like a trailer forces Fezzy to think about where his body parts are placed, and how to use them in a coordinated manner to complete these exercises. While he normally looks quite balanced in pasture, his inability to properly engage the right muscles in his back, abdominals, and hindquarters due to his injury means he is actually quite unbalanced.

I love the continuing journey of bodywork. I love the innovations, the learning, the growth, and the increasing bond I have with Fezzywig, who, despite being a Wood horse personality, tries really hard and fights me very little. Amazing. More updates to come, of course!

If you enjoyed this post, please consider leaving a comment or subscribing to the feed to have future articles delivered to your feed reader. Also, check out my ebook for wacky horses and humans, or holler at me if you want to know how I fund my horse addiction ... and you can, too!

Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/sskennel/ / CC BY 2.0