Pampashire Animal Manual Therapies

29/01/2026

🐴 Watch episode 1 of the Listening to the horse documentary here: www.listeningtothehorse.com Visit our equestrian bookshop, with lots of educational horse & pony books for all ages: www.elaineheneybooks.com AD

24/01/2026

Absolutely 100% agree

The Scapegoating of Novice Horse Owners 🐴

I have had these comments on my posts enough to write about it. It will be something along the lines of “people should have to take a test before they’re allowed to buy a horse!” or “if these novice owners didn’t buy horses we wouldn’t have these problems”.

They frustrate me for two reasons
1) It completely disregards the whole point of my posts which are always talking about the systemic issues that run through the entire horse industry from the top down
2) Novice/inexperienced horse owners are some of most conscientious and clued up when it comes to behaviour and welfare as they haven’t spent decades being indoctrinated into the industry norms

The “people should have to take a test” ones make me laugh, a test from who, who would be judging this test? I’m not going to name organisations but I cannot think of one in the UK I would trust to uphold high welfare standards given what goes on. If we’re looking at the five freedoms model of welfare most “approved” livery yards struggle to meet those standards. So who would be judging whether you’re fit to own a horse and based on what exactly? It reeks of elitism.

What about the high-end competition rider who’s horses get 4 hours of individual turnout per day and spend the rest of their time alone in their stables, do they pass the test?

What about the rider who has owned horses for 50 years, feeds their horses cereal mixes and lunges them in tight side reins, do they pass the test?

Neither of those people are novices.

Most of the novice horse owners I meet have their horse’s needs very high on their list of priorities, they have done their research and are very aware of what those needs are. They also tend to be the type of horse owner who really just love their horses for who they are and want to build a good relationship. They’re in a much better position to be making good choices for their horse’s welfare.

When I’m posting about client horses who have been seen by different professionals and nobody has recognised that the horse is struggling or in pain, its interesting that its the owner who was seeking help who is blamed for not knowing enough, and not the professionals who are meant to support them.

Novice or inexperienced horse people are not the problem here. The entire industry has normalised high-stress and pain behaviours to a degree that we do not recognise them, some of the most traumatised horses I meet have come from high-end competition yards or from people who have had horses in their family for generations. Traumatised horses are the norm, shut down horses are the norm, horses in pain are the norm, we describe them as “fine” as long as they still comply.

I am very defensive of people who are trying their absolute best. Scapegoating them as just some “novice idiot” who has no business being around horses, when in reality their horses are more likely to better have their needs met, have much lower stress levels and have a better quality of life.

Time and time again I am meeting clients who perhaps are fairly new to horse-owning and are surrounded by very “experienced” people telling them they’re being too soft and their horse is taking the mick. Of course when I go out to assess the horse we discover a very stressed horse with pain/discomfort issues, which the owner already suspected but kept being told otherwise by the very “experienced” people.

If I was a horse I would very much like to be purchased by a “novice” person who wanted to learn all about me and build a relationship with me rather than passed through yards where the most important thing is that I perform and everything else is an after-thought.

I think its so exciting how much information people can access online now and how we can all seek out information for ourselves. I have met many clients through them reading my posts on here and recognising their own horses behaviour in them, I think that’s really cool and is a huge reason why I continue to write. I want to reach the people who are looking for a different way.

Are you new or new-ish to horses and have felt dismissed by people who’ve been around horses longer than you? 🐴

15/01/2026

12/01/2026

This is why we put sheets on our donkeys. They are NOT horses!

The "Raincoat" Mistake: Why a Donkey is NOT a Small Horse.

We see it all the time: A horse and a donkey standing in a field during a cold rainstorm. The horse is grazing happily. The donkey looks miserable.

Many owners think: "If the horse is fine, the donkey is fine."

Wrong. Biologically, you are looking at two completely different animals.

🌵 1. The Desert DNA Horses (Equus ferus) evolved on windy, rainy temperate plains. They are built for bad weather. Donkeys (Equus africanus) evolved in the African Desert. They are built for dry heat, not wet cold.

🧽 2. The "Sponge" Effect Run your hand over a horse in the rain. The water beads up and rolls off. Why? Because horses produce sebum (natural grease) and have a dense undercoat that acts as a natural raincoat. Donkeys do not have this. Their hair is coarse and lacks that protective grease layer. When it rains, water doesn't roll off a donkey—it soaks in. A wet donkey is wearing a soaking wet wool sweater against its skin. It sucks the heat right out of their body.

⚠️ 3. The Danger Zone Because they lack this waterproofing, a donkey can enter hypothermia in temperatures where a horse would be perfectly comfortable. Without shelter, this leads to:

Pneumonia (a leading killer of donkeys).

"Rain Scald" (severe skin rot).

Immense stress (look for the "hunched" posture).

📚 The Science: According to The Donkey Sanctuary (UK), the world's leading authority on donkey welfare: "Donkeys do not have a waterproof coat like the horse."

The Rule: A horse can stand in the rain. A donkey MUST have a roof.

Be a pal. Build the barn. 🏠🫏

(Thank you to “Voices of the Wild Earth” for sharing this.)

11/01/2026

As professionals part of our job is to educate our clients on the consequences of using tack incorrectly, not just because it will bring problems with their horses but also because the lack of truthful information is passed within that client and friends… spreading the word of something that again will keep affecting others and difficult to change

09/01/2026

I should probably add my own photos on this

08/01/2026

08/01/2026

Did you know? Horses don’t follow the laws of physics!?

Apparently, there’s an idea floating around that once you say the word biotensegrity, biomechanics and physics quietly leave the room. It keeps popping up as comments on my posts discussing biomechanics.

The universe obeys physics. Galaxies do. Stars do. Fluids, bones, tendons, bridges, trees and tectonic plates all do.
But horses? No, horses are apparently exempt. Because… biotensegrity.

Let’s clear this up.

Biotensegrity does not replace physics.
It does not invalidate biomechanics.
It does not allow a horse to ignore force, moment, leverage, or gravity.

Biotensegrity is how living structures cope with physics, not how they escape it.

Physics describes what forces exist.
Biomechanics applies those laws to biological structures. Joints, tendons, bones, motion.
Biotensegrity describes how living tissues distribute, store, redirect, and tolerate those forces over time using tension, elasticity, and redundancy.

That’s the hierarchy. Not three competing belief systems.

A tensegral structure still obeys Newton’s laws. It still has centres of rotation. It still experiences moments. It still fails when loads exceed capacity. Just often later, and more creatively, than rigid structures.

Yes, horses are non-linear systems.
Yes, forces are distributed.
Yes, tissues store and release energy.
Yes, compensation exists.

None of that means moments stop existing. None of it means equilibrium stops mattering. None of it means geometry, leverage, or load paths become irrelevant.

In fact, biotensegrity only works because biomechanics is obeyed. It is a buffering strategy. A way of surviving imperfect alignment, uneven terrain, fatigue, growth, and injury within the rules of physics.

And here’s the key point that keeps getting missed

Compensation is not a design goal.
It’s a survival mechanism.

A biotensegral system can tolerate imbalance, for a time. But persistent imbalance still loads the weakest link. Tendons still strain. Ligaments still fail. Structures still collapse when limits are exceeded. Otherwise horses wouldn’t get injured!!!

So when we talk about biomechanics, equilibrium, moments, and balance, we’re not denying biotensegrity. We’re describing the force environment that biotensegrity is responding to.

Horses are not magical beings that transcend nature.
They are extraordinarily well-adapted biological systems operating within it.

And understanding the physics doesn’t reduce that complexity, it explains why it exists.

06/01/2026

This is exactly why I can’t see my profession or doing my job without combining it with natural horsemanship, with treating a horse more like a horse and less like an instrument for our ambitions.

I dream with an industry where the perspective could be changed, where absolutely everyone could understand more of what a horse really is and how they really work,

I dream with an industry where trainers and especially coaches decide to educate themselves more not just on behaviour, anatomy and biomechanics but also train they empathy, get rid of their high egos and learn to be more humble to accept they do harm horses with their techniques

Client story - inappropriate training 🐴

These stories are shared with permission but names have been changed to protect their privacy.

I was called out to see a horse, lets call him Harry, as they were having issues with him rearing in hand and under saddle. His owner had purchased him 6 months earlier from a home where he had hunted and competed heavily for several years and she just wanted to enjoy some hacking and low level dressage. As he had settled in his behaviour had become more unmanageable, he would seemingly randomly become extremely stressed in his paddock and gallop around until he was dripping with sweat, he was rearing and napping under saddle and had now started to rear on the short walk in from his paddock to the stable.

This horse had very recently been seen by a bodyworker who found “no issues” and cleared him to be ridden, and a saddle fitter who happily fitted a saddle to him. The owner was having fortnightly flatwork lessons with a local dressage rider and had also had a horsemanship trainer out to do some groundwork with him.

She showed me a video of her dressage lesson where she was being made to ride him on a 15m circle around the instructor in trot while he constantly tried to yank the reins out of her hands and his tail didn’t stop swishing, he was struggling so much that he looked extremely lame and was on three tracks. The instructor told her she just needed to work through it and he was trying to get out of it because she was too soft with him.

She then described the horsemanship lesson she’d had which involved chasing him around with a flag, making him back up, disengaging his quarters etc until he stopped protesting. She said he initially reared a lot and was very explosive but after about 20 minutes he seemed to settle and comply. She then tried to emulate this every day for 2 weeks afterwards like she’d been told, but every day he would come out really explosive before eventually settling. His owner just didn’t know what to do.

Upon seeing Harry, it was immediately apparent that he had a very weak, compromised body. Despite being a healthy weight, he had an extremely sunken appearance all through his neck, spine and back-end. There is no way it was appropriate for this horse to be ridden in this condition and I expressed my disappointment and concern than not one of the professionals involved with this horse had flagged this at all. These conversations are difficult, but I have to advocate for the horse.

We had a long conversation about healthy posture and musculature, the potential pain and discomfort issues and how this would affect his behaviour and how we can start to move forward.

We discussed his management first and foremost, if it was possible for him to stay with his pony companion in turnout and add enrichment to his stable. As with most behavioural issues this horse was extremely chronically stressed and our first port of call to help with this is to get our management the best we can.

We then took him into the arena and turned him loose with some empty buckets, we encouraged him to move from bucket to bucket by throwing low value food into each one, he was initially quite tense but started to relax into it. All of his associations with people and training had been so stressful that he naturally felt unsafe with people so it was going to take a while for his nervous system to calm down. We did maybe 10 minutes of this then took him back next to his friend to eat some hay. We then repeated it and took him back again.

We also taught him some basic nose targeting and did some treat scatters, just lots of low pressure, fun things to engage his brain and build positive associations with people again. At one point he spooked at something behind the hedge and froze, after about 5 seconds he touched the target with his nose and was back to being engaged with us. His owner couldn’t believe he hadn’t exploded.

Given how he presented and what had been going on I obviously referred the owner on to the vet for some investigations. Harry was diagnosed with stomach ulcers and arthritis in his neck, spine and hocks and his lovely owner immediately decided to not try to bring him back into ridden work. She medicated as appropriate and we worked with a physio on developing his body to help keep him comfortable. This looked like shaping movement and postures with positive reinforcement and enrichment games, not drilling over poles or up hills while he braced against us.

Harry now enjoys turnout with his pony friend, lots of hand walks with his owner and some quiet liberty work in the arena. His lovely owner has found a new joy in enjoying his company without riding him and would never have continued to do so if she knew he was in pain, but she just kept being told to push on.

Harry is a very sweet, gentle horse. At no time when I was there did he rear or explode, not because I am some magical horse whisperer, but because I didn’t put him in situations he couldn’t cope with. I can only imagine how painful being ridden or being chased and pulled around might have been for him. He was shouting out but nobody was translating this to his owner. This is such a huge issue within the industry, we have highly qualified and recommended people who do not understand behaviour and we are constantly pushing horses through pain.

I’ll leave you with this thought, if the training is causing your horse to be explosive, rear, pull back, try to get away from you or it just generally feels like a fight, it is not good for your horse regardless of what the end results looks like. I see so many compromised horses who are trying to communicate that they are struggling, and maybe that comes out as “bolshy” behaviour. We are then taking these compromised horses, hassling them into submission and calling it good horsemanship.

If training feels like a battle we are doing something wrong. 🐴