And Their Worm Shall Never Die

I just got a great question by email concerning the use of wormers. Once again we fall into the problem of definitions and misuse of terms. What most people hate about natural horsemanship is a practice that is not even natural horsemanship at all. Ignoring discipline and control is not natural horsemanship. It is neglectful training. Ignoring health problems in horses is not natural horse care. It is neglectful care.

Worming strategies are complicated by the threat of parasite resistance to the major classes of dewormer drugs. The development of parasites that are completely resistant to these drugs is the greatest threat looming on the horizon for horses in America. We have to come to view deworming drugs the same way that we view antibiotics--as something to be used with care so that they will continue to have any use whatsoever.

The ideal situation is to worm horses after conducting a fecal egg count in order to determine the need for worming. The old practice, still unfortunately advocated by some vets, is a bi monthly rotational system of worming. Such a system encourages the development of super worms that cannot be treated by existing drugs.

I consider such a practice unethical. The eggs of the super worms will reach other horses and the super worms will slowly spread as horses are bought, sold, competed, and transported across the country. Unfortunately, few horse owners are aware of this threat.

The purchase of wormer is my second largest expense after hay. It is absolutely necessary for nearly all young horses, nearly all old horses, and perhaps 25% of adult horses that are still in their prime. The young, the old, and those with poor immune system self protection against parasites serve as breeding farms for worms and make it harder for healthy adult horses to fight off infestation.

My horses have a much lower incidence of infestation as a result of some management changes that I have made in the past two years. I keep foals and weanlings away from the main herd. The foals and weanlings are thus unable to constantly re-infest the larger herds. Nearly all of my hay is now fed in round bale holders and or nets. This reduces potential for contamination of the hay. Unfortunately, we now experience summer droughts as a regular part of our weather cycle. My horses are not receiving as much pasturage as I prefer. The only positive aspect of this is that fewer parasite eggs are consumed because there is less grazing available.

All of this brings us to my most controversial idea concerning proper stewardship of horses. I have been asked, often in a rather hostile tone, "Do you think that you know as much about your horse's health care needs as your vet?"

I most certainly do and if you do not your horse is at risk. This is not because of any fault of the vet. Your vet only sees your horse for a few minutes each year. Your horse cannot tell him where it hurts. If you have the proper relationship with your horse you can tell the vet where he hurts. I like my vets. I admire my vets. They are a great resource, but they are not around my horses several hours each day as am I. I am always the first responder and I owe it to my horses to be a qualified first responder.

To become a qualified first responder takes work and research. The answers are at your finger tips if you are reading this from a computer. Stay away from fake science. Stay on the cutting edge of medical equine research. Focus on digestive maladies because that is what is most likely to kill your horses. Horses can recover from the most horrific injury would that one can imagine with little human intervention yet they can colic and die from a stomach ache of so little severity that if we had the same symptoms we would not even miss a day of work.

Use science. Do not get your information from an established horse world that lauds the cutting edge research of 1986 while desperately trying to sell you something.

Give yourself a quick self test to see where you stand as a first responder.

Answer the following:

Does ivermectin kill tapeworms?
Which clears sand from the digestive tract best wheat bran or psyllium?
One horse has slightly visible ribs. The other has a crested neck and fat deposits at the base of its tale. Which is at the greatest health risk?
Can a horse's mineral needs be met with the use of a trace mineral block in the pasture?
What is best used to put weight on a horse increased fat or increased simple carbohydrates?
Does a coggins test prevent sleeping sickness?
Are stitches the preferred way to treat large surface wounds above the knee?
You have a perfectly healthy acting month old foal that can sit up but not rise. When helped to its feet it happily canters off. This goes on for days. Is his problem nutritional or joint related?
Your horse eats non toxic tree bark and even entire non toxic trees the size of baseball bats. What does he need more of in his diet? Is there a problem that he does so?
Does adding a supplement of psyllium in the amount of a few spoonfuls daily prevent sand accumulation?
Your horse has hoof cracks. Which is most likely the solution--better supplements or changes in hoof trimming strategy?
What is a horse's natural body temperature?
When are the best times of the year to treat for tape worms?
At what time of the day is the sugar level highest in pasture?

This is just a quick list off of the top of my head. Your horse would really appreciate it if you knew the answers to each of these questions.

In Two Weeks We Start Playing Again

Mill Swamp Indian Horse Views: Spring Planting: Of course my little riders can do more than just train wild horses! This picture is from a benefit for the local homeless shelter program t...

Destabilize Your Horse If You Care About Him

Like Joe Camp says, stick with the science of the matter. Another study has come out linking the stabling of horses with increases in incidents of colic. Colic is the leading cause of death of adult horses. The healthier horses in the study were those who remained outside 24/7. The saddest part of this study is that it will not be publicized widely enough. The next saddest part is that it is necessary to do such a study in the first place.

Why doesn't everyone already know this? Because there is no money to be made in telling people that natural horse care works and is the only humane way to care for horses. Stables, supplements, expensive tack and gear--none of these are about horse health. Their sole purpose is to produce income for the hucksters that peddle them.

The Devil invented stables because he could not get horses to smoke cigarettes.

Eqqus Sapiens

We are social animals. Humans cannot be happy without warmth, closeness, and friendship. The perverse irony, and the cruelest aspect of our existence, is that the loss of one who is close hurts much more than the gaining of another with whom one might be close. The result is not merely a zero sum game. That would be bad enough. The result is a game in which we always loose, because the pain of loss trumps the pleasure of gain.

I have no solution, only a strategy. The more people one cares about the more pain one is assured of having. However, the same is not true of horses. The only thing that a horse can do that causes me pain is to die, and that only happens once. The pleasure of becoming close to a horse trumps the pain of loosing one. The result is a game in which we have a chance at winning.

The bottom line is that one must be very careful about inviting anyone into your life that does not eat hay.

Immersion

Here is a practical note for everyone involved in trying to teach kids to ride. The biggest problem that kids face in learning to ride is fear. Unfortunately modern society and the modern parenting model does nothing to help a kid overcome fear and instead encourages kids, especially boys, to admit fear and give in quickly. I suspect that one day we will find that this is one of the major causes of our epidemic of anxiety disorder among young adults.

Success trumps fear. However, if a kid only rides weekly it takes a long time to ring up enough successful, safe rides to over come that fear. I am in the early stage of a new scheduling system for young riders that is really encouraging so far.

I am working on a new model in which the kids ride as often as possible for a three week period so that the skill and confidence needed to become a safe rider falls into place in a month instead of nearly a year. So far I am seeing dramatic increases in skill level by riding several times a week. I am only in the first week of this experiment and if it continues to pan out I will use it for all new students.

The simple reality is that riding is very easy to learn. Heels lower than toes, toes in front of knees, sitting on your pockets, arms relaxed and not bent, back slouching and sagging, eyes focused on where you want to go, not where you are afraid that you will end up, escalate pressure until the horse responds then immediately release pressure, never pull both reins at the same time, "whoa" is produced by exhaling and gently pulling the left rein toward the left knee.

Visualize the perfect outline of a rider--an exhausted, chain smoking, alcoholic, old cowboy with tuberculosis is the outline that your horse prefers. Sitting up straight and rigid is for horse shows. Riding like we do is how horse show riders would look if the horses wrote the rules.

It is that simple--but nothing can be achieved while the kid is locked in terror. I may be on a path that unlocks the door for modern kids.

The methods used to motivate boys when I was little seem a bit out of place now. I cannot just say, "Shut up whining. If you think this is bad wait until you get bigger and the Viet Cong are pumping bullets at you."

(Raising boys was much simpler in the days before Phil Donahue and soccer).