1. July 2011 by admin.

I have had two more horses at the farm for the past week and another horse is coming to stay on Sunday so it is still all systems go here at the farm.  I had emailed yesterday saying that I had nearly finished this blog and did have every intention of sending it in last night but the heavenly evening sun was just too tempting and I went riding instead.

Lucinda and I took Skupla and Myrtle for a glorious hack through my fields and down a quiet country lane to the neighbouring village of Priston.  We stopped at the pub for a lime and soda and then re-mounted and turned for home.  One mare reared in excitement and skipped and zoomed her way down the lane and the other mare was impeccably behaved and walked and trotted in perfect balance all the way home.  It would be easy to think that the lively mare was my four year old Cob but no, it was Skupla that behaved like an over exuberant youngster even though she is now in her teens.  I need to read her the rules for Le Trec as control of paces is a rather integral part of this activity!  Have to say though I do love riding a forward going exuberant horse and my laughter was probably not helping matters that much.

Our hay has been cut as we are meant to have a few days of dry weather and I can hear the tractors turning the grass in the upper fields.  I shall go out onto the yard and work with the horses then walk all the dogs when the weather is cooler.  What a lovely start to another busy weekend.

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1. July 2011 by admin.

The weekend was a great success as we combined the Equine and Companion Animal Practitioners in a two day catch up clinic.  We had a party on the Saturday night celebrating our tenth anniversary at Tilley Farm and it is certainly something that I will do again next year as it was a very valuable experience for everyone on the course.  Myrtle was second in her showing class and third in her dressage test.  It was blisteringly hot and she was a little shut down in the ring due to the weather and perhaps being slight over whelmed by the experience.

Cobs can internalise anxieties which can be easily over looked so we will take her out again next week to build up her confidence although I am sure that being black the sudden, intense heat probably took the edge off her performance.  She was beautifully behaved though and I can’t ask any more than that from a young horse at their first outing.  I am thrilled with the results and looking forward to a summer of competitions.

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1. July 2011 by admin.

Tina has been in Holland teaching for a week and my schedule is even more ridiculous as I have been covering the four days that she does on the yard as well as my usual office duties and working with horses and canine clients. The day in Monaco is a dim and distant memory but Tony and I did manage to spend a day together at the Thermae Bath Spa.  We floated around in the warm waters, indulged in some treatments and had lunch at the Spa. We were just debating whether the asparagus soup we had ordered (and initially seemed quite pleasant) was made from fresh or tinned asparagus as the colour was a little pale when Tony found half an elastic band in his bowl. It answered the question but needless to say it put us off!  I dread to think where the other half ended up.

I also shot up to London yesterday to teach on Dogs Trust International Training Programme and I have a Practitioner Weekend organised for the end of this week so have been doing more planting and tidying whilst Jon is frantically finishing the next phase of the projects at the farm.

It has been a week of early starts and late nights but it’s been jolly good fun and I love being at the yard when it is quiet.  If I am covering I like to be on the yard by 6.30 am so that everything is done when Shelley and Vicki come in which gives us all more time to work with my own horses.  Shelley has been riding my Icelandic mare Skupla and we have been hatching plans to take her out to compete in Le Trec which I think the mare would love.  She is extremely intelligent and very forward going and I think she would enjoy the experience.

Myrtle is off to her first competition at the weekend although sadly I cannot go and watch as we have 33 people coming for the weekend activities. Lucinda has been doing a lot of fittening work with Myrtle and the mare is looking good.

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1. July 2011 by admin.

Lucas and his owner have left.  It’s been a wonderful three days and I miss them. Lucas came with his equine companion and I have a great student here at Tilley Farm called Vicki who worked with Lucas’s friend.  Both horses had more freedom through the body when we had finished our sessions and they are going to come back in July for a few more days.

Lucinda balanced Lucas’s teeth this morning and recommended that Lucas wear a bit and be grazed in hand once his gums have healed following the extraction of the wolf teeth to help improve the movement through his tongue and TMJ as he was very locked on the right hand side.  This is an excellent way of encouraging horses to soften their mouths when bridled and Mouth Work can also go a long way to helping the tongue remain relaxed when the horse is under saddle.  If the tongue is tense (many horses draw it back when bitted) it will limit the movement through the entire body and can cause the bottom line to over develop. It will also trigger the horse to brace through the neck and lean into the bit.

Freedom of movement through the jaw, tongue and upper part of the neck is vital as this enables the horse to lengthen and soften his top line and engage his hindquarters.   A tight chin can be indicative of a tight mouth and tongue and cupping the chin in your hand to soften the jaw can also help horses to release in the TMJ and upper part of the neck.  The aim is to encourage to horse to relax into the hand but many horses that are braced in the mouth and neck will find this seemingly simple exercise extremely challenging at first.  Some horses find it easier if you support the head just behind the chin with your thumb and forefinger.  If the horse accepts this you can then slowly move the head slightly forward and to the left and to the right to encourage further release in the jaw and upper part of the neck.

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1. July 2011 by admin.

The situation with the horses of Corbeanca continues.  Talks are in place with the owner and whilst some of the stallions may be returned the charity are keen to ensure that the older and more emaciated mares remain in their care to ensure that they are protected from further suffering.  I have written a report on the value of the horses and have enlisted the help of Linda Tellington Jones as the owner seems to believe that the horses are worth between 4,000 and 5,000 euros.  One old mare is going to be claimed by another member of the family and is going to be sent to the slaughter house.  She is still a bag of bones and has the sweetest disposition so the charity are going to step in and pay slaughter money for her so that she can have a happier end to her life.  I am not against horses being put to sleep obviously but when you have saved a horse from unnecessary suffering and have nurtured the horse through terrible neglect over several months it is hard to watch that horse being led away and loaded up onto a slaughter truck.  I am really glad that the charity are going to save her.

I have a delightful cob staying at the farm for a few days.  His name is Lucas and he is a real clown.  He adores people and has come to stay for a few days as he has a history of bolting.   Taking a case history is important as it helps to establish a pattern for the behaviour if indeed there is a pattern but studying the muscle development, posture and bracing patterns can give you more even more information.  Lucas had classic cold patches over his hindquarters even though he had been standing in the sun prior to my initial assessment and was very tight in the tail both of which are common patterns with horses that shoot forward.  Watching the horse move in hand is also important as any behaviours that the horse shows on the ground will be exacerbated under saddle.  Lucas was very braced on the right side of his body.  This is a common trait that I see in all quadrupeds but this natural pattern is exacerbated in horses due to our own habitual handling of the horse.

After talking through the situations that triggered each explosive reaction there wasn’t a specific pattern in terms of external stimulus.  The bolting had occurred in an open grassy area, after a really good schooling session and also out on the road.  In my experience this ‘random’ behaviour is linked to pain. It may be pain that comes and goes or low level consistent pain that builds to a point where it becomes intolerable and it can also be linked to problems in the mouth.  I am lucky to have an excellent Equine Dental Technician here at Tilley Farm called Lucinda Stockley who found Lucas had wolf teeth.  These ideally should have been removed before the horse was started under saddle but many people are unaware of the discomfort that these small teeth can cause.  Lucinda had been booked to do Lucas’s teeth tomorrow but as the wolf teeth needed to be extracted under sedation my lovely vet Nicko was able to come over this morning and remove the offending teeth. 

Lucas is lucky.  He is owned by a wonderful woman who has continued to search for the right help for her horse.  Dental issues are so common in many horses with behavioural problems and I know that we are on the right track. Many horses that are given away due to behaviour have serious dental problems - it is therefore important that you always look a gift horse in the mouth.  We still have a lot to do as Lucas has developed patterns of bracing over the years (he is now eight) and has learnt some habitual behaviour but I am confident that we can certainly improve his posture and therefore his behaviour both in hand and later under saddle.

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1. July 2011 by admin.

There is a benefit to being so incredibly busy most of the time.  The three hours that I spent by the lagoon yesterday afternoon, and a leisurely lunch with Tony and Katie on another terrace at the hotel actually felt like a real holiday.   It was heaven.

We went to the awards ceremony in the evening then walked back along the coast to the hotel for a night cap.  Even though we are now heading back to the UK I do feel that I have had a good break. I am not quite sure whether this is a good thing or not.  Either I am easily pleased or I am seriously in need of more time out!

I had managed to persuade Tony to get up before 7 am so that he too could experience the delights of the pool. We spent some time swimming around the landscaped water area and under the bridge that leads to the indoor heated pool which extends out from the hotel spa to join the somewhat cooler waters of the lagoon, had more fresh fruit for breakfast and are now in the lounge at Nice airport waiting for our flight back to Heathrow.   We are meeting friends for supper tonight which is a very pleasant thought as a relaxing meal in the company of friends and our daughter Daisy will extend my ‘holiday’ nicely.  This was our first trip to Monaco and it would actually be a really good place to fly to for a short break once in while.  I am not that good at long beach holidays as I prefer to be active but a few days here and there at the Monte Carlo Bay Hotel would be perfect. 

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1. July 2011 by admin.

I am in sunny Monte Carlo.   Tony and I flew out of Heathrow early yesterday evening with Katie McGrath as Merlin has been nominated for an award at the Monte Carlo Television Festival and we have just had a breakfast of fresh fruit on the terrace of the Monte Carlo Bay Hotel over looking a rather sumptuous swimming pool and the Monaco coast.

Tony is off to do a series of press interviews and I was going to go with him but now that I have seen the pool I have decided to wave him off, swim all morning and meet up for lunch.  This is because the pool is a more than a regular swimming pool.  It is in fact a lagoon complete with a sandy bottom set in beautiful landscaped gardens, with cascades of water, bridges, Jacuzzis and open sun terraces lined with loungers that face the sparking blue waters of the Mediterranean Sea. I am not usually one for swimming and sunbathing but today I am going to make an exception and I plan to spend at least three hours doing very, very little.

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7. June 2011 by admin.

I do not feel as though I have time to catch my breath these days.  The story of the horses of Corbeanca continues with negotiations still taking place. When we know the outcome I will let you know what happens but there is another meeting scheduled with the owner tomorrow and I have now involved Linda Tellington Jones who has come up trumps with a second report and a further valuation of the horses in case the subject of money comes up as it probably will.  I am covering all bases here and hope that we can all come to a resolution that helps the owner, the charity and above all the horses.

In between texts and emails with Raluca, Tony and I managed to get away to London to celebrate the annual Dogs Trust Honours and to watch Emily in a one night performance of a fantastic play called DNA.  Tony helped to direct the production and I really hope that the company get the chance to put it on again. It was brilliant.

I gave another talk on TTouch at the local Hydrotherapy Pool on Sunday in between feeding and mucking out the horses at the farm, saw more new clients in the week and have booked in some other horses that need to come into the farm for a few days.  I did a photo shoot for Your Cat magazine yesterday and also finally managed to take some library pictures of the work on horses for the leaflets and articles that I am in the process of putting together. 

We were going to spend two days working on stock photos with my lovely friend Bob Atkins but he got a last minute booking for a photo shoot with a show jumper so we only had a short time but as it has rained on and off all day it is probably a good thing and we aren’t in any rush.  At least I have been able to catch up a bit more today and locate my passport which had found its way under the bed along with other paperwork from Romania as Tony and I are off to Monte Carlo for a few days at the end of the week.   It is Sight Hound morning tomorrow and I need to finish the article on TTouch for cats before I pack but I am definitely looking forward to a few days away.

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7. June 2011 by admin.

Tony and I spent the morning in Bath celebrating the opening of a great new project in South Gate.  It is called Endangered Madagascar and it has been opened by a friend of ours, Adrian, who is a vet specialising in breeding programmes involving endangered species from Madagascar.  The aim is to highlight the plight of animals in Madagascar and he brought along some divine Streaked Tenrecs, some chameleons, two tortoises, frogs, fresh water crabs and a tarantula.  The animals are obviously not for sale as the project is more of a mini-exhibition even though it is in the shopping centre. They are all well handled and won’t actually live in the shop.  It is well worth a visit if you ever come to Bath. Tony and I fell hopelessly in love with another animal that was there but which wasn’t on show.  She is a baby Lemur and was abandoned by her mother so is being hand raised by Adrian with the help of his own mother.  She is tiny and so, so sweet.  We held her whilst she was fed and I will try to find a picture of us with her but as Tony and I were constantly pulling ‘oooooo’ and ‘aaaaaahhh’ faces I suspect that we will look totally nuts.  If this is the case - the pictures will not be in this blog!

The week has been filled with paper work, a trip to Cornwall to give a talk on TTouch for members of the BVNA, horses, and dogs.  And of course more correspondence with GIA regarding the horses of Corbeanca.  The charity met with the owner in the middle of last week. They told him I had been out and showed him my report.  They were concerned about the meeting but in fact the owner was courteous and thanked Raluca and the other members of the charity for caring for his horses.  He has agreed that he will only take two or three of the better bred mares, and the stallions bar the two that I was working with so this is all good news so far. 

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7. June 2011 by admin.

Tony and I have had a lovely weekend but the horses in Romania are really playing on my mind.  We drove up to Stafford on Saturday to join friends from Over the Rainbow and I spent Sunday working on the yard.

I have written a report on the horses as the charity are now in talks with the owner.  It will not help anyone, least of all the horses, if there is conflict between the parties.  To be fair to the owner, the older mares and some of the stallions are confident and friendly and even though the majority had to be sedated to be moved and were traumatised by the whole experience and obviously extremely mal nourished, he has obviously handled some of them well in the past.

It is my recommendation that the stallions be returned, with a question mark over the two more difficult stallions, and two of the mares. The rest I have suggested remain in the care of the charity.  I cannot imagine that the owner will be able to feed and care for so many neglected horses and whilst I know that this case is symptomatic of equine welfare issues across the globe cannot bear the thought of these horses suffering any more.  It is the star fish story.  Saving even some of the horses will not change the world but it will change the world for those horses that we might be able to help.   

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