Hi Malcolm,

I wanted to ask your advice about a potentially stressful situation.

Next Friday a friend and I have hired a lorry to take our horses to the beach. Tara has never seen a beach before and she doesn't have much experience in the loading dept. either. I don't want to give her Sedalin and would like to try to get her through it with Cool, Calm & Collected. Can you let me know how much I should give and if you don't think the Cool, Calm & Collected will do it, can her normal dose be taken with one of the herbal syringe type calmers ?

It should be noted that I intend to take a spare set of clothing just in case I end up in the Irish Sea !!!

Thanks,

Pauline.

Our reply and advice:

Hi Pauline,

This is a really tricky question. The way Cool, Calm & Collected works is that it enables the brain to work as nature intended. It does exactly the opposite of sedatives which stop one nerve cell talking to another so impair brain function.

When suffering the sort of nutritional deficiencies that Cool, Calm & Collected fixes the brain often reacts inappropriately to external stimuli - like a different and exciting environment like a beach. Your earlier reports suggest that Cool, Calm & Collected is having the right effect. Had Tara always been on Cool, Calm & Collected she would presumably never have been exposed to situations that scared her silly and probably would take to beaches in an inquisitive rather than threatened way. However she no doubt does have some bad experiences in the past and the unanswerable question is how much they will affect her when you take her to the beach for the first time.

My suggestion is that you make sure she has plenty of Cool, Calm & Collected in her for the whole day. That means giving her some 45-60 minutes before loading and more during the day (if she will eat). You can't overdo it in the short term. I have no problem with her getting 3 days worth in one day. I might take some Sedalin but only use it if she really loses the plot on the day.

Finally I think you need to take care on the day. It might be great to splash through 2 feet of salty water but that would probably be too much for her on her first visit. A few years ago my wife and I had a ride on some top endurance horses in New South Wales (Australia). These horses lived by the sea and were trained in the sand dunes every day - despite that most were not very keen on getting their feet wet!

Have a great day out and please send me the photos!

Malcolm Green

Pauline's report

Hi Malcolm,

My girl was a superstar !!! I have sent you some photos.

She loaded and unloaded, stood still to mount, went for a walk around the car park, then a two hour hack along the beach, then a wee wander through the dunes, a munch at the grass and then home. She wandered off into the water herself without much encouragement from me. When she came out she had a little jump because she's not used to her feathers slapping off her legs ! She had a trot in the water too. We mostly walked and trotted with a couple of little canters. She behaved beautifully throughout. Very light in the hand and no pulling or getting strong. She absolutely loved it. We met millions of scary things. Bins, buckets, seaweed, children's playground ! We also passed four horses going in the opposite direction but they just had a little look and went passed. Tara was splashing about so much in the water ( with her massive feet ) that Alison and Timmy got soaked.

The lorry was late so we rugged them up and let them graze in the car park for a while till it came. All the cars were slowing and looking, kids waving etc. but she hardly looked up from the grass ! She was slightly reluctant to go back in the lorry but only because she didn't want to leave the grass !

You would have never thought that her and Timmy had never seen a beach before. In fact Tara has only been in a lorry a couple of times.

I drove behind the lorry and both horses were sticking their noses through the little windows and having a good sniff - they got a few strange looks.

So we are saving up to hire the lorry again next month and go again.

Even my very best scenario didn't play out as well as the actual day went. I just love my horse !!!

Pauline & Tara ( the seahorse !) x

EquiFeast's comment

We love stories like this but we would hate readers to think that every horse will behave this well.  Tara had been on Cool, Calm & Collected for four months by the time this trip to the beach occurred.

Every horse is different and while Cool, Calm & Collected expands the comfort zone of most horses it does so in lots of little increments over time so we generally encourage people with spooky horses to take things slowly, go for lots of little gains rather than one big one. Sometimes you will get it wrong and push the horse too far. Once it pumps too much adrenaline it will get stressed whatever supplements or drugs you are using. Set backs like this are inevitable but not generally a major problem.

Of course spooking on hacks is trickier to deal with than spooking in a school. In a school the 'scary objects' can be repeated time and time again and on Cool, Calm & Collected most horses become more confident after a few repetitions. On a hack every scary object is new and some are quite unpredictable so a greater level of sensitivity is required during the training process. Cool, Calm & Collected will help enormously to reduce spookiness and improve trainability.

Please ring us and talk about your specific horse. We are always happy to give you the best advice we can.