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When BIGGER isn´t better

29/3/2015

 
A debate that seems to get taller every year, that of the size of the horse!

Breeding trends have seen most horses get taller.  Pura Raza Española were, for centuries, close-coupled elegant dancers standing the very most on tippy toes at 15.3hh.  These days you often see 17-handers craning their necks over the stable door and frankly, quite out of place at the local Romeria.  Thoroughbreds have gone from a solid 15hh balanced running machine to upwards of 16.2/16.3, yet the majority of top performing stallions (and the off-spring they produce) are at the original 15.3h mark.  The facts being the short guys success rate being 12 to 5 over their bigger brothers*.  Sport horses in general are just enormous - people want to jump higher and wider!

But, the very humans that want these changes and so breed for these changes, wont take the time to “wait” due to these changes.

These bigger horses are later maturing.  Bones, ligaments and tendons requiring more time to develop and strengthen to carry their larger body mass.

Horses the size they were meant to be, whether as nature dictated or bred by our ancestors (who for the most part really did know what they were doing), don´t carry that extra mass.  Therefore, obviously, don´t have the same strains on their joints and bones as their larger cousins.  Basically it is so much easier to keep a small horse sound because everything is in balance.

Though we must also consider in our smaller breeds; it takes the tibia up to 3.5 years to mature, the femur up to 4 years to mature, ossification of the pelvis is not complete until around 5 years and the posterior physis of the vertebrae can take over 5 years to mature.  So, all tje people who want their 17hh horse to enjoy a long and healthy life should wait until he is at least 7 years old before they begin to ride!


*source; Blood horse magazine.

Sticks and stones may  break my bones....

2/3/2015

 
...and words will never harm me.

Unfortunately, whilst "absurd dogmas are continually uttered with all the confidence of well-ascertained truths, and afterwards, though plainly confuted, have persisted through pride in maintaining them.  And it is lamentable to think of the hundreds of young men that have been thus misled by these teachers, and of the thousands of horses which have been punished...." words do harm and will continue to do so.

It is long overdue that people think for themselves, that they don´t accept their farriers or vets "word for it".  I have always been more than ready to explain, and talk through everything I do, along with providing facts to support it.  In the 12 years I have been developing the Whole Horse Protocol... yes, developing, as it is constantly upgrading every time a new validated and relevant study comes to light, or technology brings new materials for hoof boots or ways of providing necessary minerals etc... I have continued to learn.  I didn´t sign off when I completed a nutrition course, or massage therapy course.  I don´t wash my hands of ´it´, believing there is nothing more to know.

The paragraph in inverted comma´s are the words of Dr. Bracy Clark, veterinary at the London Veterinary School in the early 1800´s.  Nearly 200 years ago he provided proof that the Vets and students were learning about the equine hoof from deformed specimens, deformed by metal shoes, believing them to be anatomically correct in their contracted and stretched state.  He was not alone in that period proving that the unshod hoof was far healthier than its shod counterpart.  Academic peers, the likes of J.C. Gross and A. Lungwitz all shared his view, un-beknowingly to each other. 

"where nonsense is taught by authority and widely disseminated..." will never be so at the Whole Horse Protocol.  Our words will never harm

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