Triple Gaits RMT

05/20/2025

Great info!!

Grazing is natural and healthy for horses — but in spring, it can be a double-edged sword.

Sugars and fructans in grass peak during the day (thanks to sunlight) and drop overnight when plants use them for growth. That’s why early morning grazing is safest — just like the old horsemen used to say: “Graze your ponies in the early hours.”

Here are a few tips for smart grazing:

✅ Turn out in the early morning, before sugar levels spike.
✅ Avoid frosty nights followed by sunny days — sugar builds up!
✅ Let horses graze taller grasses (less sugar in the tops).
✅ Watch out for clover and dandelions — they’re sugar-rich too.
✅ Limit grazing after drought-ending rain — fructans move to the leaves!

Every horse is different, and some can’t graze freely at all. Monitor closely, provide consistent hay, and ensure regular exercise. For gut support, Riva’s Pro-Colon helps restore healthy bacteria, especially after sugar overloads.

05/02/2025

When your horse doesn’t have a turnout buddy and can’t be left alone in the field without running like a lunatic… you become that turnout buddy. At least I’m getting reading done.

05/02/2025

A good read. We’re not meant to be symmetrical and neither is our horse. I remember when people tried to change a world class champion’s running form to be more efficient so they thought but it only made her worse. Sometimes an undesirable gait or conformation is whet just works for that body.

Have you ever looked at a photo or video of yourself riding and thought…Why am I always sitting just a little to the left?You adjust. You center yourself. You think you’ve fixed it.Then five minutes later, there you are again. Slightly off-center.It’s frustrating, especially when you’re doin...

05/01/2025

Now this is pretty cool. Love Secretariat!!!

More than half a century after Secretariat's record-breaking performance in the 1973 Kentucky Derby, Big Red's bloodline still features prominently in American horse racing. In fact, every horse in the 2025 descends from Secretariat.

, read more in the edition of our monthly newsletter: https://tinyurl.com/Secretariat-May2025News

04/24/2025

JP getting his PEMF session after training.

04/05/2025

Very good to know!

02/11/2025

Today is my first day back to work after an 8 week recover from a hysterectomy to remove a 14 cm fibroid, uterus, cervix and tubes. It was my first surgery but I predicted my recovery would go smoothly since I own many different therapy devices. For my first few weeks I used my red and blue light therapy pad to prevent infection, provide pain relief, decrease swelling and bruising and speed up overall tissue recovery. After 8 days I was off all pain medication which I thought was pretty incredible considering I just had a massive surgery.
At week 2 I added in PEMF treatments from my iMRS system and continued them every 2-3 days in conjunction with red light therapy.
At week 4 I added in one scar release session using Acumed’s micropoint stimulation device and another at week 6 and 8.
Today I have no pain, still some numbness as expected above scar but it continues to improve and feel zero pulling from scar site. Often scars that are not released can continue to grow like a spider web and cause pain in other areas. For example an abdominal scar may eventually cause back pain.
So glad to be able to use these modalities in my massage sessions.

02/04/2025

📢 Say it with me….

Every horse should be taught proper biomechanics.

A horse’s body is not designed to carry a person on their back. Since we have assigned them this job, the least we can do is teach them to use their bodies effectively for the task.

In the first photo, the red muscles are tense while the blue are relaxed and extended. This sets the horse up for movements with a weakened back, which would not carry a rider as effectively.

The second photo shows a horse working in relaxation with a stronger back, stretching forward. The top line is relaxed while the core is tense and lifting the back, which creates a stronger base and supports a rider more effectively.

Many of the issues that I see in horses stem from the horse’s lack of education in proper biomechanics.

While therapy modalities can relieve these issues, without the correction in their movement the horse will continue to find themselves uncomfortable.

01/21/2025

I think the myofascial system is very under rated and people are now starting to realize what an important role it plays in not only a horse’s body but ours as well!!

You cannot escape ground reaction forces - and what I mean by this is you cannot escape the way the horse's hooves interact with the floor.

Your horse's hoof shape directly influences how they interact with the floor and equally the shape of their hooves directly influence their muscular recruitment and therefore their postural development.

As an example of this, here is a diagram of the horse's superficial retraction myofacial chain. This chain supports the retraction - i.e. the drawing back - of the horse's forelimb via connections from the solar surface of the pedal bone, through the back of the forelimb and shoulder, over the ribcage and over the top of the neck.

If there is loss of development, and therefore loss of depth, in the caudal hoof - i.e. the back third of the hoof - you're effectively creating 'fascial drag' which contributes to shortening the topline of the horse's neck and compression of their ribcage.

You can visualise how, if the heel drops, the whole fascial chain is suckered down.

Creating the appearance of a hollow horse with a short neck and perhaps overdevelopment of the underneck muscles.

Now of course you can bias your training for length and elevation through the neck, flexion through the back and expansion of the ribs; but if your horse's heels are low then you will be creating conflict.

Because you're asking that horse to inflate into restricted fascia which is being further implicated by ground reaction forces.

In doing this, you will contribute towards making movement uncomfortable - which lets be honest, poor training practices already do a good job of this(!)

You will perhaps bias towards the risk of injury or reinjury - which is slightly oxymoronic if you've chosen that movement plan as a means to rehabilitate or develop healthy posture.

Your horse will be spending more time practicing poor posture, which is more time teaching their nervous system that this is homeostasis.

And since movement and emotional health are intertwined, you may also be contributing to a negative emotional state.

Fascial chains do of course work both ways, so you can bias your training for healthy movement and it may help with caudal hoof orientation, but you cannot escape the influence of the ground and so, if you're not including your horse's hoof care within that picture, you are only giving your horse half the chance for success.

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For this month's webinar, I am delighted to be joined by the wonderful Beccy Smith of Holistic Equine, where she will be discussing what healthy hoof morphology really is, the factors that influence it and what you can do to help your horse.

Beccy is an Integrative Equine Podiatrist who truly considers the whole horse with respect to hoof health. Her keen eye and attention to detail is second to none in the hoofcare sphere and I cannot wait for this webinar!

27.01.2025 19:00 GMT

Recording available if you can't make the live ❤️✨️

01/21/2025

Sometimes it’s hard to decide which horses need a blanket and what horses grow a thick coat and have the body weight to handle the cooler temperatures. Best plan is to check them daily and decide.

01/11/2025

Joining the Saugeen Track and Field Club was one of the best things I ever did. I had an incredible coach that taught me so much about training, anatomy, physiology and how to deal with injuries. She introduced me to massage when I was 12 and dealing with a hip flexor injury. Throughout my 30 plus years as a competitive middle distance runner, massage became a vital part of my training program for preventing and treating injuries.
I went on to earn a full cross country/track scholarship at Georgia State University and graduated in 1998 with a BA in psychology. My running inspired me to persue a career in equine massage so I could offer an alternative health care option for horses at a time when not many options were available for horses. In 2000 I started a mobile equine massage business, worked as a groom in harness racing and an equipment and tattoo inspector at Hanover Raceway. I eventually moved to Guelph and provided massage and red light therapy to harness racing horses and a handful of hunter/jumpers. Equine massage was a tough business at that time so two years later I went back to the D’Arcy Lane Institute and got my licence to be an RMT. For the next 16 years I worked on a handful of horses and started a new business in a busy chiropractic clinic, focusing my treatments on people, an easier more established career. In that time I also bought a harness race horse who won Horse of the Year at Hanover Raceway. Lots of fun and what better way to learn more about the harness racing industry and its hard working equine athletes. As a runner myself, I can relate to the training and injuries many equine athletes face.
I also took a canine massage therapy course at The Royal Canadian School of Massage. This all lead me back to my true desire of a business more focused on dogs and horses, an exploding and more widely excepting industry in today’s world than when I first began in 2000.
So today I love the variety of a mobile business that provides a massage based service for people, horses and dogs.