Equine Nutrition Australasia (ENA)

12/12/2025

Dressage Hub
Thanks

Going forward I will be responding to comments by number for the sake of efficiency.

Dressage Hub “How They Treat Their Horse Based on How They Treat Me” Index

A scientifically petty scale from 1–10.

---

1 – The Mildly Confused Supporter

Comment toward you: “I don’t fully agree, but okay.”
Horse treatment: Braids their horse for fun. Apologizes when their saddle pad shifts 3mm.
Abuse likelihood: 0%. Their horse thinks they’re a golden retriever.

---

2 – The Passive-Aggressive Polite One

Comment toward you: “Interesting perspective… I guess.”
Horse treatment: Gives treats for no reason and feels guilty doing literally anything.
Abuse likelihood: Slight. The only thing they mistreat is common sense.

---

3 – The Low-Effort Eye Roller

Comment toward you: “Lol okay…”
Horse treatment: Probably a bit clueless but tries. Horse lives like a retired spa guest.
Abuse likelihood: Minimal. Mostly abuses emojis.

---

4 – The Beginner Who Thinks They’re a Judge

Comment toward you: “Actually, REAL dressage is…”
Horse treatment: Horse is basically a lawn ornament because groundwork “is enough.”
Abuse likelihood: Low. Horse is just bored, not abused.

---

5 – The Wannabe Trainer Who Knows Nothing

Comment toward you: “I’ve been riding for 30 years” (they started last week).
Horse treatment: Too scared to canter yet lectures you online.
Abuse likelihood: Moderate. Horse is mostly abused by bad riding advice.

---

6 – The Clueless Critic With Big Opinions

Comment toward you: “You OBVIOUSLY don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Horse treatment: White-knuckles the reins like they’re waterskiing.
Abuse likelihood: High. Their horse has considered faking an injury.

---

7 – The Keyboard Crusader

Comment toward you: Writes a whole essay about how you are ruining dressage.
Horse treatment: Rides like they’re trying to hack into the Matrix through their horse’s mouth.
Abuse likelihood: Very high. Horse requests a union rep.

---

8 – The Holier-Than-Thou Bit Police

Comment toward you: “THIS is abuse!!! YOU are abuse!!! EVERYTHING IS ABUSE!!!”
Horse treatment: Secretly rides with every gadget known to man.
Abuse likelihood: 95%. Their horse is plotting an escape route.

---

9 – The Chronic Personal Attacker

Comment toward you: Attacks your riding, your voice, your hair, your existence.
Horse treatment: Uses spurs, leverage bits, draw reins, and questionable morals.
Abuse likelihood: Extremely high. Horse is writing anonymous emails to PETA.

---

10 – The Deranged Stalker Troll

Comment toward you: “YOU’RE WHAT’S WRONG WITH THE SPORT!!!”
Says it daily. Maybe hourly.
Horse treatment: If they treated their horse the way they treat you, that horse would have emancipated itself.
Abuse likelihood: 100%. Their horse is drafting a memoir titled “Surviving My Rider.”

---

12/12/2025

American Farriers Journal Thanks

Thrush is a common bacterial infection that can cause headaches for horse owners and farriers alike.

12/12/2025

Integral Equine Nutrition Thanks

I posted yesterday about how you can't "carb load" horses effectively. And more than that, a lot of horses, even performance horses simply don't need as many "carbs" (ie starchy grain) as has traditionally been thought. The cons really outweigh the pros in a LOT of cases.

New research adds more fuel to that fire.

A new metabolomics study looked at what actually changes in a horse’s bloodstream when you feed a high-starch concentrate compared to a forage-only diet. Six race-trained Standardbreds did both diets for 29 days each (forage haylage only, then haylage plus a high-starch oat-based mix, in a crossover design). After the adaptation period, the researchers measured 52 different blood metabolites.

The difference between diets was surprisingly clear. The forage-only diet produced a much more distinct metabolic profile, mostly driven by hindgut fermentation. Horses on forage had higher levels of hippurate (a classic marker of fibre fermentation), dimethyl sulfone or MSM (a microbial metabolite often linked with anti-inflammatory and antioxidant activity), and higher levels of acetate, propionate and 3-hydroxybutyrate. These are all fuels the horse can use for steady aerobic work. They also had increases in things like citrate, myo-inositol, methionine and proline, which tie into energy pathways and general tissue metabolism.

On the high-starch diet, far fewer metabolites changed. Glycine was the main one that increased, but overall the metabolic “signature” was much flatter, with fewer indicators of active hindgut fermentation and fewer alternative energy substrates circulating.

The overall takeaway is pretty consistent with what many of us see in real horses: forage doesn’t just “meet roughage requirements”. It drives a very different metabolic engine. A fibre-first diet supports stronger microbial fermentation and produces a broader range of fuels that the horse can use during work. High-starch feeds definitely have a place when calories need to be pushed up, but they don’t create the same metabolic activity we see on forage.

It’s also worth noting that this study didn’t measure performance at all. There were no exercise tests or workload outcomes - the horses were in race training, but the researchers were only looking at changes in the bloodstream. So while the forage-only diet produced some interesting shifts in fermentation-derived fuels, this study doesn’t tell us whether that translates into better or worse performance. However there IS previous research comparing forage-based diets and more traditional grain-heavy racehorse diets that has shown either no negative impact on performance or, in some cases, slight improvements in things like recovery or behavioural steadiness. So this new paper fits neatly into that broader picture: forage changes how the horse fuels itself, and it doesn’t seem to come with the performance drawbacks people have often assumed.

It’s another nice reminder that forage-first isn’t just a wishy washy philospohy!

12/12/2025

The Whole Horse Journey Thanks

Before we begin: This is a nervous system lens to support understanding and safety. It does not replace training, veterinary care, or professional guidance. A horse in a freeze–fight state can still be dangerous, and safety must always come first. Recognising the why does not remove the need to manage risk. It simply changes how we interpret behaviour and how we support the horse toward regulation.

What is the essence of freeze–fight?

Freeze–fight is one of the most confusing patterns in the equine nervous system. It is the horse who looks internally flat or absent yet reacts outwardly with intensity. The horse who braces deeply through the fascia, loses orientation, and shows defensive behaviours without clear triggers. The horse who appears both gone and explosive.

People describe it as:

“He is shut down but he is also aggressive.”
“She looks numb until she suddenly isn’t.”
“He feels like a ghost and a grenade.”

Researchers might describe this as dorsal vagal activation with sympathetic mobilisation, or similar mixed defensive states. We use the term freeze–fight because it is accessible, descriptive and recognisable.

This is not simply a training issue or a temperament flaw. It is a nervous system capacity issue.

What is freeze–fight really?

Freeze–fight appears when the horse cannot flee, cannot fully fight, cannot orient, cannot process and cannot find safety. The nervous system does two incompatible things at once. It shuts down and mobilises.

The freeze element reduces presence and sensation in a dissociation-like way. The fight element adds tension, defensiveness and abrupt reactivity.

The horse is braced, overwhelmed and under-connected all at once.

What is freeze–fight not?

It is not disrespect.
It is not stubbornness.
It is not defiance.
It is not disobedience.
It is not a training failure.

But behaviour from this state can still be dangerous and still requires skilled management.

Understanding the nervous system does not excuse a behaviour. It helps us respond in ways that reduce escalation instead of increasing it.

Why can a horse be tight, braced and reactive while also shut down?

Freeze–fight breaks the usual assumption that freeze means still and fight means active.

In this mixed state, awareness narrows or collapses. Sensation shifts through processes like stress-induced analgesia. Orientation disappears. Learning capacity shrinks. Defensive responses increase. Movement becomes reactive instead of relational.

The horse is not making conscious decisions. The horse is reacting to internal overwhelm. This is survival, not strategy.

Why do conflict behaviours appear?

When the nervous system sends the internal messages move and do not move at the same time, we see behaviours such as:

defensive biting
kicking
striking
balking then bolting
rearing
head-tossing
refusal paired with panic
delayed responses followed by sudden explosions

These behaviours are expressions of internal contradiction, not intentional defiance.

Why is this state so misunderstood in training?

Every training method relies on the horse being able to perceive, interpret, orient, process, respond and learn. But in freeze–fight, the horse may temporarily have limited access to these capacities.

Pressure-release may create more load than the horse can interpret. Positive reinforcement may help if the horse can remain connected enough to process the marker, but many cannot in this state. Counterconditioning may not land consistently.
Cooperative care may stall.

None of these methods are wrong. They simply rely on capacities the horse may not currently have access to.

So training does not stop working. The nervous system simply cannot use the training yet.

What does behavioural science help us see?

We cannot directly measure a horse’s internal experience, but we can observe reliable markers:

fixed posture with sudden reactivity
impaired habituation
delayed or inconsistent responses to familiar cues
breath holding
rigid musculature
reduced blink rate
narrowed orientation
quick access to defensive reflexes
heaviness alternating with abrupt movement

These outward patterns reveal the internal state.

How does pain, trauma or learned helplessness relate to this state?

Freeze–fight is frequently seen in horses with histories of early shutdown, chronic pressure, inconsistent handling, punishment for fear, musculoskeletal pain, ulcers, trauma and environments where expression was unsafe. Pain can create or intensify freeze–fight patterns, so veterinary evaluation should be an early step, not a last resort.

Freeze–fight is not helplessness. It is the horse fighting from inside shutdown when other strategies are unavailable. With skilled, patient support, horses do recover from this state.

Does understanding freeze–fight replace training?

No. Training still matters. Structure still matters. Boundaries still matter.

Every approach positive reinforcement, pressure-release, classical, liberty, biomechanical and neurobiological can work beautifully once the nervous system has enough capacity for learning.

Understanding freeze–fight simply means:

we do not increase pressure the horse cannot interpret
we do not expect softness the horse cannot access
we do not offer reinforcement the horse cannot connect with
we do not misread defensiveness as defiance
we regulate state before shaping behaviour
we build boundaries once the horse can process them

Timing matters most.

How should we reframe these horses?

Freeze–fight is not a bad horse. It is a horse at the edge of capacity.

It is the nervous system saying:
“I am overwhelmed. Help me feel safe enough to return.”

Most people recognise their horse instantly in this description. Not because they failed, but because the horse is carrying more than the system can hold.

What do you do if you recognise this state in your horse?

Start here:

prioritise safety
reduce environmental demands
lower the load, not the behaviour
increase predictability
allow more processing time
slow your own system
support orientation
assess for pain
seek skilled guidance if needed
expect non-linear progress

Freeze–fight is not permanent. It is a state, not an identity. When a horse feels safe again, the fight dissolves, the freeze softens and the horse returns.

If at any point you feel unsafe, uncertain or overwhelmed, stepping back or involving a professional is not failure. It is horsemanship.

If you want the practical HOW TO for supporting a horse in freeze–fight the moment it appears, including step by step guidance, what to do first, what not to do and how to help the horse return safely, the full breakdown is in our subscriber group. This is where we share the application, not just the understanding.

12/12/2025

HI-PERFORMANCE Muesli is an exciting elite equine 🐎 performance feed.
Supporting energy, muscle development & recovery to your equine athletes whilst in full training & racing.
Manufactured in Western Australia 🇦🇺 by Thompson & Redwood (T&R).
Exclusively distributed by Mitavite Asia (MA) in Malaysia 🇲🇾

11/12/2025

At Thompson & Redwood, Australia 🇦🇺 (T&R) they produce high quality horse feed that is affordable & nutritionally balanced to suit all horses & ponies. Made in Western Australia, their horse feeds only contain the highest quality ingredients sourced from local farmers to ensure the feeds are healthy, natural & fresh.
Mitavite Asia are the exclusive distributor of Thompson and Redwood equine products in Malaysia 🇲🇾

11/12/2025

Progressive Equine Services Thanks - Wayne Turner Thank You

11/12/2025

Dr Shelley Appleton Calm Willing Confident Horses
Thanks

The Horse Who Never Forgets

Horses are always learning. Always. Even when you are thinking nothing much is happening because you only meant to pop on for a quiet plod and not create a lifelong psychological file in your horse’s mental filing cabinet.

Sometimes what they learn is lovely. They discover that you are a reliable, comprehensible human who speaks in signals instead of static. You build trust. You build clarity. You produce a calm, willing, confident partner who follows your guidance because you have made sense to them. Congratulations. You have created a good file.✅

But then there is the other sort of learning. The crappy sort. The sort you did not mean to teach. The sort that appears when your timing is off, your communication is foggy, your saddle is pinching, your horse is footsore or you let your frustration leak out of your pores and into your hands. The sort that happens when you try to impress someone or obey a coach who says things like “Kick harder” with the moral authority of a tax auditor.

This is where you accidentally teach your horse that something with you is a very bad deal. Maybe the thing felt threatening. Maybe they felt confused. Maybe they bucked or reared or reefed the reins or snapped a lead rope. The behaviour solved the moment for them, so into the filing cabinet it goes. Humans like to call these files “evasions”. Horses prefer to call them “I learned this because of you”.😣

Once learned, the file does not evaporate. It sits there forever like an unfortunate photo album of your teenage fashion choices. You can close the file with good training. You can rewrite the association. You can build a stronger partnership. You can absolutely improve things. But here is the part that is extremely inconvenient. The file never disappears. It stays in the mental drawer with a big neon tab that reads Caution.☢️

Two things can fling it open again.📂

1️⃣. Breaking trust. If you solved your horse’s bit anxiety and restored their confidence, then one day get frustrated and jab them in the mouth, the file leaps open like a jack in the box and screams Surprise. Now you are back to square one except the square is stickier and far more expensive to repair.

2️⃣. Time. If you float train your horse beautifully but do not revisit it for months, the confidence file grows dusty. The old file of panic reopens the moment you approach the ramp. Your horse is not being dramatic. You were simply absent from your duties as the keeper of their learning history.

The moral is clear. Once a horse has a file, it becomes your responsibility to keep it closed. It might not have been your fault when they learned the crappy thing. Life happens. Feet get sore. Saddles slip. Humans occasionally behave like humans. But it is still your job to respect that the file exists. Horses do not “get over it” because you wish they would because it is inconvenient to you. They get over it because you help them.

There is something even better. You can prevent many files from ever being created. Learn how horses learn. Become thoughtful about timing, clarity and comfort. Notice pain. Notice confusion. Notice your own emotional plumbing before it bursts. Teach well and teach kindly and you will create a horse who files you under Safe.

And that is a file worth keeping.❤

This is Collective Advice Entry 101/365 of my challenge of sharing good ideas and insights. They are for you to hit SHARE or SAVE. But please no copying and pasting and plagarising my work‼️

11/12/2025

Starwood Equine Veterinary Services, Inc.
Thanks

Try familiarizing yourself with your horse’s baseline digital pulse while they are sound so you can better identify irregularities. To achieve this, take your horse’s pulse before exercising for at least a week, then transition to periodic checks to maintain ongoing awareness.

On an average healthy resting horse, you should be able to feel a subtle digital pulse in the arteries at the rear of the fetlock or pastern. An exaggerated digital pulse should prompt further investigation. When calling your vet, it is helpful for them to know whether only one or multiple limbs are affected, and whether you have noticed any signs of lameness or other abnormalities.

Having trouble? One of our Starwood Equine team members would be happy to demonstrate next time we are out to see your horse!

11/12/2025

Amy Skinner Horsemanship Thanks

Tempo -

Being in a steady rhythm is essential for the horse to be able to let go of their back. But you can't discuss rhythm without getting into tempo, which is the rate at which those steps occur.

When I was learning this years back, I rode six or more horses with my teacher in a day. In the first lesson, she would encourage me to get the horse into a longer stride. In the second lesson, I would warm this next horse up in the last lesson's tempo, and my teacher would say "woah! Don't run this horse off his feet! Slow the tempo!" I was very confused at first, thinking there was a perfect recipe for each horse. But what I learned through these lessons was that each horse was unique in their ideal tempo - and that this tempo could change over time.

The correct tempo helps the horse develop engagement, elasticity, and connection into the bridle. It is essential in helping the horse relax by creating correct swinging over the back.

With the wrong tempo, a horse can feel rushed, stiff, "soggy" and unengaged, nervous, heavy, or behind the bridle.

So how do you know what the right tempo is?

Riding is part art, part science. In a nutshell we are looking for downward flexion of the joints married with forward impulsion. This recipe has never steered me wrong in my guesswork. Too fast or too slow stiffens the joints and you lose joint flexion. If the stride is too slow you obviously lose forward impulsion.

But here are some ways to guage if you are riding in your horse's best tempo:

-the rhtyhm is very steady. The correct tempo makes pure gaits: a four beat walk, a two beat trot, and a three beat canter. Too slow or too fast makes the gaits scrambled, and you will not be able to count a clear repeating rhythm

-Your seat can feel and follow easily. Too slow and your seat will feel like shoving, closing off your hips. Too fast and you will not be able to feel the hind legs due to tension and rushing. The just right tempo feels like your seat wants to just settle right in.

-the horse is now in its own power - you don't feel like you have to pedal or restrain constantly, because you have the circuit of energy connected

-if you're riding on contact, the horse feels soft but connected to both reins - not hiding behind, not bearing down on, but right with your hand

-the horse is calm but focused. In the wrong tempo they can feel distracted, spooky, or evasive.

-You can give a half halt and it goes through easily. If you are in a regular cadence in the correct tempo for your horse, your aids go through easily, just like ice cream melting over a warm piece of pie. It is not jerky or resistant, but wonderfully connected.

This is of course a complex topic - many people try to relax their nervous horses by restraining them in too slow tempos, and this can drive some sensitive horses crazy. Alternately, many hypermobile horses are driven way too fast beyond their safest range of motion.

Feeling for their focus, breathing, and elastic swing through the back as evidence of correct tempo will never steer you wrong.

11/12/2025

Katie Jones- Equine Nutrition Consultant Thanks for sharing

Iron. You may see this in a feed or supplement ingredient listed as ferrous oxide, ferrous sulfate or even iron amino acid complex.

There can often be some misconceptions about iron in a horse's diet like,
"Adding more iron gives a horse more energy."
"More iron will make horses run faster."
"Adding more iron creates more red blood cells."

We all know this jug that has been in everyone’s feed room at some point over the past 50 years to add iron…. 😵‍💫😵‍💫

While it is a very important and essential mineral in the equine diet, iron needs are almost always already met with forage, water, and is naturally occurring in many feed ingredients. In fact, horses are more likely to be OVER supplemented with iron rather than deficient. Is more, better? Not usually so in this case. At some point, as with many straight minerals, you will eventually reach a toxicity. (This one specifically is just more abundant)
All vitamins and minerals interact with one another. It is important to have correct amounts to create mineral synergy-- as too much iron can inhibit absorption of other essential trace minerals such as zinc and copper.

If your horse is iron deficient (anemic), it may be time to dig a little deeper with a full veterinarian exam including scoping for ulcers and addressing parasite control. Signs of anemia in horses may include poor performance, lack of energy, weakness, lethargy, loss of appetite, and depression. Adding an “iron supplement” is only a bandaid for the real issue.

Bluebonnet feeds have no additional iron added, only what is naturally occurring in ingredients.

11/12/2025

MK Horsemanship Many Thanks