Great Heights Stable

02/12/2025

🐈 Cats Deserve Self-Selection Too!!

Innate self-medication for all animals.

Any animal, wild or domestic, will have this ability. It would literally take tens of thousands of years to loose such a vital survival instinct.. (somehow, we've managed to loose it though!)

Animals have an innate ability to select remedies that bring themselves back into health. They mediate this by using their superior sense of smell and taste.

Self-medication is animals knowing which plant extracts to select, how much, at what does, and for how long to bring themselves back into health- bringing their whole bodies back into homeostasis.

It is true individualized medicine at work- as long as the plant is part of that species evolutionary history they will have the innate knowledge of how/when to work with it.

We need to appreciate our pets and not deny them of this beautiful medicine. The alternative is chemicals produced and isolated by us, that often only treat one aspect of a problem, leaving the body with unwanted side-effects. For instance, why give a chemical pain killer when a perfectly natural pain killer is available and could be selected by your animal.

These botanicals work in harmony with your pet's body, they are broken down efficiently. And everything is done on the animal's terms- they select, they decide.

We just facilitate the opportunity.

Why wouldn't we start here for all our pets?

02/11/2025

These two❤️

This relationship has been in the making for years- for those who have met Orion, trust is not something he gives freely, nor is his giant heart.
But man- when you finally earn these there is no feeling like it. I think he has given this young girl both.

Can you see it in their faces?❤️

Proud doesn’t quite cover it! This young gal is going to be a wonderful voice for the animals. Her compassion and willingness to learn is bottomless.

02/11/2025

❄️ I have been loving the Winter Rub 💞

When I use it at night and leave it on, the aches and pains that have been plaguing me are gone.

When I forget to use it (...I mean scientifically 'not' use it for contrast 😉 ) the pains are horrid.

🙋🏼 Who wants to learn how to make this magic mixture?

02/07/2025

02/06/2025

🌿🐾 What Is a Self-Selection Botanical Practitioner & Why Should You Hire One for Your Pet? 🐾🌿

We all want our pets to live a full, vibrant life, but how do we help them achieve that?
The answer might be simpler than you think—allow them to choose their own healing path with the help of a trained Self-Selection Botanical Practitioner! 🌱

So, what is self-selection? It’s the practice of allowing animals to tap into their innate ability to select and dose themselves with the therapeutic properties of plants and other natural substances-nature's medicine cabinet. This ancient, life-sustaining instinct is present in all creatures, from the tiniest insect to majestic elephants. Its well documented too- so not as 'woo-woo' as you might think!🐾🌍

🪄 Here’s where the magic happens: A trained self-selection practitioner carefully observes your pet’s unique, nuanced behavior while offering them a range of plants and compounds, allowing the animal to make choices to self-heal.

🍃🌞 🍂 🌨️What our bodies need changes seasonally and practitioners are here to guide you in adjusting your care.
Problems- whether physical, emotional, or even spiritual- soon melt away and your pet returns to balance.
Gentle. Effective. Powerful.🦋🍃

⚕️ These botanicals act as a safe, holistic whole-package solution for a variety of issues:
- behavioral challenges (like anxiety, fear of fireworks, cribbing)
- physical health concerns (such as skin irritations, joint pain, digestive issues, laminitis, or EMS)
-support during changes of season

They even provide a gentle way to transition pets through different stages of life, like aging or the arrival of new family members.

Self-selection isn’t just for effectively treating ailments—it empowers your pet to take charge of their well-being, improving their longevity. Imagine your pet guiding you to their perfect natural remedy for peace of mind, body, and spirit. 💖🌸

Self-selection is an ability your animals naturally have- our job is to enable them access to nature's medicine cabinet and support the body's to handle the demands of seasonal changes.

Why consider a Self-Selection Practitioner?
🔹 Holistic Care: Safe, whole-body support that marries harmoniously with traditional vet care.
🔹 Prevention: Help your pet thrive long-term with the power of plants, adjusting with seasons.
🔹 Behavioral & Emotional Support: Alleviate those problems by getting to their root
🔹 Physical Health: Address those issues that occur as a result of our well-intentioned management practices (stalls, pastures, walks on leashes) and modern food offerings (processed kibble and high sugar grains causing gut issues for instance)

Whether it’s helping your pet adjust to a new home, supporting your senior pet through their golden years, or assisting with long-term health/behavioral challenges, we’re here to empower your pets on their wellness journey. 🌟🐶🐱🐴

Ready to explore this transformative practice for your beloved animals? Let’s bring balance and vitality back into their lives! 💚🌿

👀 Keep watching our page to continue learning more! 👀

02/05/2025

It takes hours to keep the arena groomed so we can ride year round!
We get snow out, drag to help break up ice chunks and keep it level, and more!

But look at this lovely space to keep training on this sunny (but windy day!)🥰

02/04/2025

Making the boys (Nova mostly but we will see if he likes it) some tea to go with their Pine tea offering.

🫖 Tea:

Slow simmer of:

🌟 ashwagandha and crushed ginger
🌟 hawthorn berries
🌟 tumeric & rosemary & black pepper

🧐Did you know: Rosemary is just as effective at enabling access to the curcumins in tumeric as black pepper

🌟after cooling, marshmallow root

🌿🐴 Winter Bodies need special attention!

❄️These herbs support all the things my crew needs most in winter: heart and circulatory systems optimized, reduce inflammation, adaptogenic properties for blood sugar, cholesterol and thyroid support, and gut support!

🥰What special routines do you do for your health or your pet’s health to help with winter?

02/04/2025

🌿🐾 What is Applied Zoopharmacognosy? 🐾🌿

It’s not as scary as it sounds, promise! 😄

Applied Zoopharmacognosy is the field of science that shows how all animals instinctively know which plants and minerals they need to stay healthy — even using them for medicine! 🌱🐒

Think of it as their ability to access nature’s pharmacy! Animals have evolved to seek out the right "remedies and doses" for their health—no prescriptions needed! 💊✨

In simple terms, "zoopharmacognosy" comes from the Greek words for animals (zoo), medicine (pharma), and knowing (cog). So basically, it’s the science of how animals know what’s good for them! 🧠💚

When we add the word "Applied" we are referring to allowing the animals in our care to select these natural medicines on their own, without our intervention. Since they cannot forage for them on their own, we have to bring a wide selection of plants to them. (More on this later!!)

Isn't Mother Nature amazing? 🌍🌿

Let us know what your pet's "natural remedy" is in the comments below! 👇

Do you ever see them seeking out grass? Gnawing on sticks? Rolling in your garden? Snitching leaves?

01/29/2025

Orion has a joke: 😂

“How do you know I have the most blessed hay?”

👇 Guess answer below!!

In other news:
⛄️❄️
What a great snow day to have a lesson- isn’t Atlas striking against the white!! Meanwhile Roman blends in.

01/23/2025

🌿What is Zoopharmacognosy?🌿

Broadly speaking, this is the interface between evolution and health. Animals have evolved to roam the wild to seek out plants and minerals they instinctively need, both for nourishment and for medicine.

⚕️ 🫏 🧠 Simply put, this lovely big word is made up of the Greek roots meaning the science of knowing (cog) medicine (pharma) for animals (zoo).
So animals knowing their medicines....Easy-peasy!

Other ways to describe this:

🌟 Innate Botanical Selections
🌟Self-Selection

👀 Watch our page for more information on what this amazing field is and most importantly... how it can help you and your pets!

01/23/2025

🕰️ It is Time Wonderful Families! 🕰️

❄️ While it’s hard to imagine Summer with this cold snap and snow… many folks are already thinking summer scheduling for their children!

We’re excited to announce that our 2025 Summer Horse Camps are coming soon, and we’ll be offering even more weeks of camp than in previous years!

🌻 Here are the dates:🌻

June 23-27
July 21-25
July 28-August 1 *already 3 sign-ups
August 4-8
August 11-15 *already 3 sign-ups

I am happy to say camps are 7+.

Camps run from 9-3 Monday through Friday each week.
We can accommodate early or late stays, this just requires an additional fee.

✅ I am offering an early bird discount:

1. If you sign up and pre-pay before March 1st: normally $650/week we are offering $600 for this limited time ⏰Ω

🏅 Our camps will align with our Levels Program, so campers can look forward to a progressive approach to both mounted and unmounted horsemanship. Each camper will be working on benchmarks within their level, learning exactly what they need to in order to make the most progress possible. Ribbons, anyone???

🐴 We’ll also be introducing a new liberty curriculum! This means campers will have the chance to work on specific benchmarks during the week, earning badges to celebrate small wins and ribbons to celebrate mastery once they've completed all the necessary steps—though please note, this process typically takes more than one camp week to achieve. So please feel free to sign up for more than one or all of the them!

🌿 As always, we go beyond this within our days here and this year a big emphasis will be on connecting your child to nature. We will be playing forest games, doing grounding and breathing techniques that they can use during the busy and often stressful academic year; we will be sneakily working on literacy and writing, a bit of math and lots of science (natural world).

🌹 We will also be working more on plants and how these relate to our animals, with lots of foraging, gardening, and making teas, sniffing essential oils, and understanding how these help us all feel our best.

To ensure we have enough campers to run the program, we’ll need a minimum of 4 participants per week. As long as this requirement is met, we’re good to go! If you have signed up for a week that cannot run, we will try to move your student to another week that works with your schedule.

Please don’t hesitate to reach out with any questions.

🗓️ Message now to reserve your spots:
*Let me know the date(s) you are interested in and the camper(s) names

*If you would like to pre-pay to secure the discount ask and I will send you methods of payment

We look forward to an amazing summer of horsemanship, fun, and learning!

01/20/2025

Snow day tips!

🌨️ There is nothing prettier in New England than fresh, fluffy white snow. 🌨️

BUT.....

at some point all of that fluff is going to cause issues. Either we get a deep freeze and it stays there with ice chunks 🧊 for a potentially annoying amount of time or... worse... it will make MUD **gasp*** 🌊

💡 So I have some tips on how I work to prevent/minimize the future mud-tastrophe!
After all, the fine print of owning horses is being an expert in water management and mud prevention!

1. Get That Snow OUT: plow out the main areas, included under overhangs, by the water troughs, around hay feeders, and the major paths. ☃️

2. Clear out Drainage Routes: during the year, observe how your land handles water. Where does it go? Does it follow a particular path? I obsessively notice and gently influence this. So when we get snow I make sure the snow is cleared of those low areas that create bowls for water to accumulate. Bowls of standing water = mud.. NOOOO! So keep those spots clear. If you clear the gates, make sure the snow behind and around it aren't just going to melt into this lovely cleaned area and then make a puddle of mud. Gross! 🌞

For us, the most important spots are around the manure pit, by the gates, and making sure the roof melt has places to go that pull water away from the barn and walking areas.

3. Long term Management: just because you plowed today, doesn't mean you are done. As things melt and get stepped on, I like to make sure that there is textured, yet smooth surface everywhere the critters go. This helps with less slipping, but also less ankle rolling on chunky, uneven surfaces. Not just for the horses too- it also helps with us humans, particularly when pushing those wheelbarrows! 🦵

🫏 Donkey would like to add, that creating zoomie paths is a MUST. How else will a little fella get his exercise?
But seriously- weird shaped paths, loops, and twists make the best instant track system. There is something about a path that just makes a body want to walk down it. Horses (and donkeys) and dogs definitely agree! The paths encourage movement, which stimulates the lymphatic system (immune system center) among other things, equating with so many health benefits so it's a no brainer! Just because it's cold does not mean we should shut our animals up in a cozy cell.. I mean stall... Movement is so unbelievably important, particularly for horses, that we risk so many other complications if we neglect this piece.

If they are stuck inside... get them out on a good hand walk a few times a day to get that blood pumping, body stretching, and mind engaging. 🏃 Both of you will feel better after!

4. Adding Winter Appropriate Forage: 🌲 Now is the perfect time to start adding bark- tree branches and logs to your paddocks for horses to browse through in addition to their hay. This, plus some of the coniferous tree needles are a great way to add some slow seasonal appropriate nibbles to their day. 🌲

🍭It is NOT a good time to load up on grains, sugars and other high content carbs. While it might seem like a good idea to us (ask me how I know this 🙈), it is not how your animals was designed to handle winter. See... Robin's been studying since last year.....🤓 📚
Their entire system, from stomach and gut, to immune and vascular system, works differently (and importantly slower) in winter and if you load up on those sugary yums now, you can seriously impact their ability to handle the spring grass and sugars and actually deal with the cold.
So- hay in slow feed wander about style (nets and various stations), diversity of branches to strip bark from, and herbs or teas if you can can positively compliment their simplified winter food. 🪵 🌿

Anyone do anything that helps their animals thrive this time of year?

These are some of the tips that took me A LONG TIME with lots and lots of mistakes mixed in to learn. I hope this helps someone out there do better for their pets!

💞 If we know better, we can do better and thus feel better after all! 💞

01/20/2025

01/19/2025

100%
Not only this but understanding why our animals have changing needs in the winter is unbelievably helpful in informing our care.
Just since diving deeper into the physiology changes in winter for horses, I have a theory about Nova’s cough. This helped me adjust a few things out there and 2 days in and he is (whisper and knock on wood) NOT coughing!

01/17/2025

🌿❄️🐑🐑🐑🐏

I got to work with Sheepies today!! See these fluffy little pilllows melt my heart!

My friend’s sheep is very ill with what could be anaplaosis. She’s not responding well to regular antibiotics, so we decided to explore marrying western and eastern medicine to support her in every way possible.

My friend, a skeptic, had her mind blown 🤯 when she personally felt drawn to rosemary and peppermint oil. Having a sickness that impacts her muscles that was flared up that day, I was not surprised. But after our session my friend felt so much better herself she started asking questions! Sometimes experiencing this stuff first hand is where we open up to a whole new world out there 🌎

Back to sheep: 🐑 We have done three sessions so far. The first session, sick sheep engaged very little. She did breath in a lot of St. John’s Wort, a cursory sniff at calendula and then rosemary essential oil. She spent a good bit of time sniffing Oregano oil. Her healthy friends and a barn cat loved nettle, calendula, and a slew of other herbs and oils, nibbling, licking, and sniffing away happily.
Day 2 sick Sheepie finally started to chew cud but was still not eating, only drinking water.
By day 3, sick Sheepie actually ate nibbles of calendula and then a few mouthfuls of nettle!! She then promptly stopped and ate walked away. I opened the oregano oil and she looked at me across her paddock- I went over and after I knelt down and opened the bottle she stomped over and grabbed the dropper, taking a good ol’ lick! That’s strong stuff! But very very good for infection!
When I left Sick Sheepie was EATING hay!!!

Wonder if the herbs helped her forgive me for helping give her shots? She’s so fluffy we had to cut a patch of wool off to access her skin!

💕💕💕🌿🐑🌿💕💕💕 Wowzer