Mark Todd Acupressure Pad

Our Tictac Equestrian boss Jenny has recently bought a Mark Todd Acupressure Pad for everyday use on her horses and is very impressed overall with the pad and recommended myself and Lauren to give it a try on our horses J

The pad is made up of three layers of 100% natural latex which ensures optimum weight bearing and shock absorbing qualities and also ensures that it moulds perfectly to the shape of your horse but will still retain its original shape (making it ideal for Jenny and her five horses!J) It has little tunnels through the latex which act as a vacuum to suck the hot air away from your horse’s back and replaces it with cool air which evaporates sweat more efficiently than a regular cotton or gel pad.

The pad is carefully designed to gently massage your horse’s muscles, increasing blood flow, making riding a more pleasant experience all round for your horse. This makes it especially effective for a young or more sensitive horse. Having a non-slip lining and also wither relief makes it suitable for any shape of horse, whether it is for a high withered thoroughbred type or one of the rounder variety that you have trouble keeping their saddle in place.

You can read more and purchase the Mark Todd Acupressure Pad at www.tictacequestrian.com for the special price of £59.99, down from our regular price of £69.99. You will also receive a free gift with your order - bonus!

If you have any questions you would like to ask our team, we would love to hear from you! Contact us on or Facebook or Twitter.

Grooming Tips & Tricks

In the Tictac Equestrian office today, we have been swapping advice on how to keep our horses squeaky clean and looking lovely for upcoming shows. Ever wondered how to get your horses socks white? Or even their body if you own a grey J Well we’ve put together a few of our tips to help you out!

At Tictac Equestrian, we stock a large range of quality shampoos and sprays to help you take those nasty stains out of your horse’s coat and make the most of their natural colouring. One of my favourites that I use on Honey’s socks is Carr & Day & Martin Stain Remover Spray which is very effective in removing those stubborn yellow stains, yuck! I also use Gallop shampoo by Carr & Day & Martin that you can buy for greys, chestnuts or black horses which is specially designed to bring out the natural shine and highlight the tones in your horse’s coat.

If you’re looking for something that you will have at home to use,  I really like using green Fairy Liquid on white socks to get them sparkling white. A girl that keeps her horse at our yard uses vanish soap bars on her skewbald! It does work but I would definitely advise testing it on a leg first to make sure it isn’t going to irritate your horse’s skin J

To view our full range of grooming products,visit our coat and skin care or mane and tail care section on our Tictac Equestrian website. If you have any useful tips or advice for our team and customers on some ways to get your whites white, we’d love to hear from you! Contact us through Facebook or Twitter.

Does Your Horse Over Reach?

In the Tictac Equestrian office today, we have been chatting about how some of our horses overreach and what we do to prevent it. Overreaching is a very irritating problem that can cause serious injury to a horse and also cost us all a small fortune in shoes!

For anybody who doesn’t know what overreaching is, it’s when a horse reaches its back foot too far forward and clips the back of the front foot.  Some of the main reasons that cause overreaching are fatigue, poor conformation, lack of balance, poor muscle tone, poor shoeing (loose shoes) or overgrown hooves.

My horse and Lauren’s horse both overreach quite regularly, so we both invested in a pair of Mark Todd Competition Overreach Boots. They are a top quality boot made from neoprene, covered with a tough tear resistant outer. They have a little bulb on the inside which stops the boot spinning around like other cheaper rubber bell boots. I would highly recommend them to anybody looking for a pair as they are definitely well worth the money at £18.99! You can read more about or purchase these boots online on our Tictac Equestrian website. You will also receive a free gift for your horse with every order J

If you have any questions you would like to ask our team or if you have any advice for our customers, we would love to hear from you on our Facebook or Twitter.

Rachael’s Corner: New Gatehouse Conquest ZC Riding Hat with Swarovski Crystals

In the Tictac Equestrian office today, we are all very excited about one of our new hats that we are selling at an amazing introductory price. The Gatehouse Conquest hat is a stylish, comfortable hat and now you have the option of adding a little bit of sparkle with the genuine Swarovski Crystals lined along the centre panel of the hat. It is definitely on my wish list for this summer!

I have the Gatehouse F1 riding hat which is very comfortable and looks very expensive, even though we have it on offer just now for only £49.99, so I’m definitely buying the Conquest when I get paidJ At our amazing introductory price of £214.99, you can’t go wrong!

Rachael’s Corner: Hoof Abscesses

One of our Tictac team, Lauren, recently had the unfortunate experience of her pony Goldie developing a hoof abscess. Poor Goldie was in a lot of pain, and for a few days we were all very worried that she may have seriously damaged a major tendon in her leg as her pain was dramatically worsening day by day. It can be a very situation to be in so we thought we would use Goldie’s abscess to help all of you understand the symptoms that your horse would show if they have a hoof abscess and also some treatments that a vet would use to treat one.

A hoof abscess is a bacterial infection within the hoof wall. A horse’s hoof cannot expand so unlike if we had an infection anywhere in our body and it would swell, the pressure will just build up inside the hoof because it has nowhere to go causing severe pain to the horse L If an abscess is left long enough without treatment, the infection will take the path of least resistance to relieve the pressure. This means that it will leave the hoof at its weakest point which is usually the coronary band.

Signs that your horse may have a hoof abscess may include:

·         Bearing very little or no weight on their leg

·         Heat in the hoof and lower leg

·         Swelling of the leg due to congestion of blood vessels

If you are worried that your horse might have a hoof abscess, you should ring your vet straight away so that your horse will receive prompt treatment; the earlier you treat an abscess the better! When the vet came out to see Goldie, he used hoof testers to test if her hoof was sensitive to pressure at any point. As soon as he squeezed at a spot on her sore hoof she nearly hit the roof! The pain must have been absolutely horrible – poor Goldie! He dug a hole into the sole of her foot to let the puss drain out and for a week afterwards her hoof had to be soaked in salt water every night for ten minutes and then dressed with a poultice to help draw out the rest of the infection and keep it squeaky clean! She was also on antibiotics and pain killers to keep her more comfortable and to kill off any of the remaining bacteria.

If you have any stories or advice for any of our team or our customers, we would love to hear from you

Rachael's Corner: Colic in Horses

Colic is, unfortunately, a relatively common issue with horses throughout the year but especially as the seasons change and our horse’s diet and routine change dramatically. It is very important to gradually introduce a new routine to your horse as a dramatic change in diet or exercise levels can bring on a bout of colic.

Our Tictac Equestrian boss Jenny owns a little two year old filly (named Filly) that seems to be very prone to colic due to a weakness in her gut. This means that Jenny has to be very careful with what she is fed to avoid the inevitable as it can be a life threatening issue depending on the severity of the colic.

We found a very helpful web page to help you understand a little more about colic and hope that it helps you to keep your horses safe and well as we come into the summer months. It is the University of Liverpool’s colic page, telling you all there is to know about causes, prevention and treatment - www.liv.ac.uk/equinecolic.

At Tictac Equestrian, our team hope that all of your horses stay safe and happy in the coming months with the changing weather. If you have any stories you would like to share with us and our customers, we would love to hear from you!

Rachael's Corner: Show Season Essentials!

With the summer show season fast approaching, are you fully prepared and stocked up for you and your horse to perform and look your best? Here in the Tictac Equestrian office, we are continuously looking for quality, new and exciting products that our customers will love - all at competitive prices of course! J because we believe that being well prepared, feeling and looking your best, allows you to perform well.

At www.tictacequestrian.com, we stock a large range of quality products from lots of new and exciting brands such as Mark Todd, Le Mieux, John Whitaker, Pikeur, Fal Pro, Botanica, Dainese, Equino and many more; keeping our customers in the equine community stocked up with all of the latest trends and supplied with quality horse care products to keep your pet happy and healthy!

So whether you and your horse enjoy dressage, show jumping, cross country or just hacking and a trip to the beach, we will continue adding quality new products to our impressive range J

If you have any questions or issues you would like to share with us, please don’t hesitate to contact us on our Facebook or Twitter – we are more than happy to help!

Rachael’s Corner: Coat, Mane and Tail Care

All of our Tictac Equestrian team love Carr & Day & Martin Mane and Tail Conditioner to keep our horse’s tails in perfect condition and very easy to maintain. The results last up to two weeks which means that it makes it a lot easier to brush through between uses, preventing you from damaging the tail anymore than necessary.

I’ve used Canter Mane and Tail Conditioner, along with Canter Coat Shine on my horse’s for years and would highly recommend it to keep your horses looking healthy and shiny (even in the miserable winter months! J) It also contains citronella so repels flies and smells

- amazing!

We stock a large range of Carr & Day & Martin products on our website at www.tictacequestrian.com at low prices. If you have any tips you would like to share with our team and our customers, we would love to hear from you either on our Facebook or Twitter.

Rachael’s Corner: Travelling Horses – Partition versus Full Length Bar

In the Tictac Equestrian office today, we have been chatting about how we travel our Tictac ponies to and from competitions, the vet or the beach. I have a trailer but Lauren and Jenny both have a lorry. When I bought my newest horse Honey, we had a nightmare of a time trying to even get her home. She definitely didn’t like the look of Lauren’s big scary lorry! When we eventually calmed her down enough and got her home, I started to try and get her used to walking in and out of the lorry with no luck for the first while, until it came to the day we moved yards and I tried her in my trailer without the partition and just a full length breast bar. The box was a lot less scary with a little bit more space to move around for Honey the worrier! Sometimes loading a horse is just that little bit less stressful on us and the horse if they feel comfortable after a little bit of practice.

At first I was worried about travelling her without the partition in case she lost her balance and toppled over, but it was the complete opposite. She was so much more relaxed and content in her spacious trailer and managed to balance herself a lot more easily than in the lorry or the trailer with the partition. My other horse that was sadly put to sleep in October was the total opposite of Honey. She loved feeling secure with either the lorry or trailer partition there to lean on if she did lose her footing (she was a little bit clumsy sometimes!)

If your horse is very nervous about travelling or loading, I would recommend trying NAF Instant Magnesium Calmer which you can buy from our website. It is an effective, affordable option to consider to make the experience a lot less stressful on us and our horses. It helps to relax them and over time it definitely pays off. I have used it a few times and would highly recommend it. It made Honey relax and realize that a horse eating monster didn’t actually live in my trailer!

How do you travel your horses and ponies? We would love to hear your opinions and experiences about this. When I was asking some of the girls’ at the stables about this, their opinions were very varied. Would you travel your horse without a partition? Let us know on our Facebook or Twitter.

Rachael's Corner: “Look beyond Wealth and You May Just Find a Gem”

In the Tictac Equestrian office today we have been chatting about a post that we saw on Facebook that we thought would be nice to share with all of our customers. The post was by William Sheret, a British show jumper and trainer who we thought portrayed a very valid point with his post about how you don’t have to buy yourself success in the equestrian scene!

In his post, he writes about two little ponies that were both placed in the recent Pony of the Year Show in England. One of the ponies called Foxy Lady VI was bought from travellers for only £50! The other called Hole in One II was rescued from being sent for slaughter for not much more than that. He goes on to say that nobody should be moaning about how they cannot afford a horse to compete; “good horses are everywhere and money doesn’t always buy success!” He then praises their owners for rescuing them and “showing that a good eye and a little TLC can really pay off,” ending the post with “well done to the people involved with saving these ponies and giving them the chance to shine. You're a credit and an example to the sport” J

Do you agree with this great post? We think it is very true and a great motivator for people on a budget! I have personally known a lot of little horses bought for very little money giving horses bought for tens of thousands a run for their money! Do you have any views or stories you would like to share with our Tictac Equestrian team and our customers? We would love to hear from you J

Rachael's Corner: The War Against Flies

We’re getting to that time of year again! At the Tictac Equestrian office, we are all looking forward to the summer months, for us and our horses. A break from mucking out every day and our horses can run about without rugs and act like horses instead of being wrapped up all year round (we do live in sunny Scotland after all!) But along with all of the perks that the summer brings, we have to deal with the flies! L

Summer fly prevention for our Tictac horses is the same every year! I use NAF citronella or NAF deet spray for all over Honey’s body and NAF deet gel on her face and around her ears. The gel saves the drama of trying to get near her face with a spray bottle (she is a big woos!) You can buy all of these on our website at www.tictacequestrian.com Deet is and effective, alternative ingredient to citronella. It is used in some top quality fly deterrent products for humans.

A few years ago, citronella was banned from being used in any products to deter flies as it was discovered that it can damage the skin. Chemists still sell citronella oil, but will only sell it to be used for other uses, like making candles. Before, I used to make my own with citronella oil, cold tea, vinegar and some other things that are cheap and easy to come by. This was also really effective and I still do make it sometimes if I run out. You can find a lot of instructions for homemade sprays online.

A good quality fly rug and/or fly mask are also an effective way to keep your horse happy in the field. I would recommend the Hy Guardian fly rug as it covers all the way up to your horses ears and doesn’t slide down like some others. It also comes with a fly mask! Bonus! You can buy this on our website at www.tictacequestrian.com; along with a wide range of other quality rugs and masks from Mark Todd, Jhl and others.

The Tictac Team wish you the best of luck with your fly prevention over the summer months and hope all of your horses are happy! Do you have any useful tips or advice for any of our customers? We would love to hear from you.

Rachael's Corner: Magnetic Therapy for Horses

All of our Tictac Equestrian team are strong believers in how effective magnetic therapy can be. Whether you use it to aid the recovery of an injury, to help reduce swelling for an older horse or even just before and after exercise to help promote circulation, we would definitely recommend giving it a try!

Magnets work exactly the same as a copper bracelet would work on a human, they can help repair scar tissue, reduce inflammation, swelling, stiffness, muscle cramps and even ease arthritis pain. Equine magnetic products range from stable chaps, tendon or brushing boots and even rugs!

I have used the Equilibrium Stable Chaps and would highly recommend them to anybody looking to try magnetic therapy. I used them on my thoroughbred mare with arthritis for years and they helped her tremendously! Her legs got very swollen and she was very stiff after being stabled for a short period of time. Using the chaps at night time reduced her swelling and she was a lot less stiff too! Lauren also uses the chaps on her little 14.2 who has previously broken both of her back legs in separate incidents so she also suffers from severe arthritis and swelling. These chaps also helped her out dramatically too! J

If you’re looking for something that you can use whilst you are riding, I also use a magnetic therapy band. This is a thin magnetic band with a Velcro strap that fits comfortably around the fetlock and comes in black and fluorescent yellow (which is very useful for hacking!) My mare had an injury to her right hind leg before I bought her and she always seems to be very stiff through this leg. I find that using the band helps to loosen her off a lot more quickly than without.

At Tictac Equestrian, we stock a large range of quality and affordable magnetic products, including the Equilibrium chaps and fetlock bands J To see our full range, visit www.tictacequestrian.com

 If you have any questions or any advice you would like to give to our team and our customers, we would love to hear from you!

Rachael's Corner: Does Your Horse's Saddle Fit?

Coming into the summer months, when we will hopefully be able to ride our horses more as our miserable UK winter weather improves, it is very important that your horse’s saddle fits well. Uneven pressure or pinching can make for a very unhappy and uncomfortable horse so keeping your tack in working order and fitting well will keep your horse pain free and happy throughout the season.

Your horse will change shape throughout the year as they gain and lose weight, and also as they grow if you own a youngster, so it is advised that you have your saddle checked at least once per year by a qualified saddle fitter to ensure it fits well and also to check for any damage to the tree.  Your horse will also benefit from having their saddle re-flocked every two to three years if you have a wool flocked saddle, this will ensure that your saddle is able to mould to the shape of your horse as they move.

I, unfortunately, bought a felt flocked saddle for my horse which means that if she changes shape then I will have to sell it on and buy a different one as these cannot be adjusted. Felt flocked saddles are also very expensive to re-flock as the saddle has to be taken apart to do it.

I’ve owned several Wintec saddles over the years, all of which have had Cair panels. This means that instead of the panels being flocked with wool or felt, they are filled with air which can be adjusted to suit your horse’s shape and moulds to the shape of your horse as they move a lot more effectively than wool so it doesn’t need to be re-flocked! They also have the adjustable gullet system, allowing you to quickly and easily adjust your saddle at home as they change shape, saving time and money! J

At www.tictacequestrian.com, we stock a wide range of quality tack from brands like Mark Todd and many more!

Rachael’s Corner: Tasty Homemade Horse Treats

In the Tictac Equestrian office today, we have been looking at some interesting recipes to make your horse some yummy treats easily and with minimal cost!  One of the easiest ones that we found is called carrot and apple cake. Yum! J

You will need:

·         1 carrot

·         1 apple

·         1 cup of molasses

·         2 ½ cups of oats

·         2 tablespoons of oil

To start, preheat the oven to 300 degrees, grate the carrot and apple then mix with the oats, molasses and oil. Divide the mixture into bite size balls and place the mixture on a baking tray. Put the tray in your oven and bake for forty minutes until golden brown then cool for at least four hours in your fridge to make sure they’re nice and cool for your horse to munch.

There are lots of homemade horse treat recipes online to save you money and also give your horse something a little different from the norm. Most of them you can make with things that you just have in your house. A lot of them sound good enough to eat yourself J If you prefer to choose the easier option and buy your horse some treats, at www.tictacequestrian.co.uk we stock lots of treats, licks and stable toys to spoil your horse or pony from brands like Likit, Gold Label, Equiglo, Spillers, Uncle Jimmy’s, Pettifers and Stubbs.

Do you have any recipes you would like to share with our team and our customers? We would all love to hear from you.

Rachael’s Corner: Get Involved in Our Exciting Sponsorship Competition

Over the past few weeks, our Tictac team have been working hard to bring our customers an exciting new competition; giving one lucky person the opportunity to win a year sponsorship by Tictac Equestrian, along with lots of fabulous horsey goodies!

We are giving you the chance to win a Mark Todd blouson jacket, a Mark Todd saddle cloth and a hoodie, all embroidered with our lovely Tictac Equestrian logo and also 20% off of all of your orders from www.tictacequestrian.com for a full year! Wow!

To enter, we would like you to like and share our facebook page then post a small paragraph on our page, along with a picture of your horse or pony, stating why you think you deserve to win this amazing prize and sign up to our Tictac newsletter on our website (easy peasy!) After a short time, our Tictac team will select the top twenty people that we believe to be the most deserving to be put forward for this prize. Our quarter finalists will then be sent a short list of bio questions that we would like you to complete and submit, along with a few more pictures of you and your horse. We will then post the interview questions for all twenty finalists onto our Tictac Equestrian blog and from then we will select our top four contestants.  We will then make profiles up for our final four contestants on our website as products and our customers will decide from there by adding the person they believe is the most deserving to win to the shopping basket. We don’t want it to be a popularity contest – we want it to be fair and for the prize to go to a hard-working, dedicated person J

Our team wish you the best of luck and look forward to reading your stories. If you have any questions about our competition, please don’t hesitate in contacting us, either through our facebook page, on the chat on our website at www.tictacequestrian.com or call our office on 07866 412 529.

Rachael’s Corner: Protexin Probiotic Gut Balancer

Does your horse suffer from colic, get grumpy, need antibiotics, shy from food or lose weight easily? Well at Tictac Equestrian, we think we have the answer!

Protexin Gut Balancer is a formulation containing high levels of probiotics (protexin’s highly concentrated probiotic Saccharomyces cerevisiae), prebiotics and yeast on a new and improved palatable grass meal base to encourage normal digestive function and efficiency. It is ideal for:

·         Promoting general wellbeing

·         Improving digestibility

·         Horses prone to losing condition

·         Horses or ponies susceptible to colic

·         During periods of stress (e.g. travel, competition)

·         During periods of antibiotic usage'

 

Our Tictac boss Jenny uses Protextin for her little two year old filly who has a weakness in her gut and Is susceptible to colic. Since Jenny started supplementing Filly with Protexin, she has not had colic since! J Have you used Protextin Probiotic Gut Balancer before? Would you recommend it to our customers? We would love to hear from you! 

Rachael's Corner: Spotting and Treating Equine Herpes

After the recent outbreak of the Equine Herpes virus down South, our Tictac team have been researching the signs and symptoms of this horrible, infectious virus to help spread the word to all of our customers and keep your horses safe and happy during the upcoming show season. After some researching, we found out that you can have your horse vaccinated against the Equine Herpes Virus (EHV) and it can be given at the same time as their Tetanus and Influenza Virus Injections; prevention is better than cure after all! You are advised strongly to have broodmares vaccinated yearly, and if your mare is in foal, they should be vaccinated in the fifth, seventh and ninth month of pregnancy to reduce the risk of abortion due to the virus.

There are five strains of EHV, the two most common being EHV1 and EHV 4 which can cause:

• Abortions
• Paralysis
• Respiratory and neurological disease

After reading this, all of our Tictac team are definitely booking all of our horses in to be vaccinated. Don’t just shrug it off and think that it won’t affect your horse: you never know where the next outbreak may be.

Educating ourselves a little about EHV could reduce the risk of a massive outbreak and keep our horses safe. Some of the symptoms of Equine Herpes Virus (EHV) are:

·         A high temperature

·         A watery nasal discharge

·         Ocular discharge

·         Enlarged lymph nodes

·         Coughing

·         Loss of appetite

·         Depression or looking lethargic

If you are worried that your horse might have EHV then phone your vet as soon as possible to have it officially diagnosed, treated and contained. If you have any stories or advice for our team or our customers, we would love to hear from you J

Racahael's Corner: The Importance of Good Conformation

When buying a horse, one of the most important things to look for is good conformation, or that the horse is “well put together.” This means the degree of correctness of a horse’s bone structure, musculature and the proportions of its body in relation to each other.

I myself know all too well about how poor conformation can affect a horse’s wellbeing, if not in the early stages of life, it can take its toll as they get older! It can also affect their ability to perform certain tasks. I bought my horse Angel as a four year old from a friend who had owned her for just under a year. She was full thoroughbred and even though several people had advised me against buying her, she had been sound and happy in that space of time so I bought her with no hesitation. Her knees and pasterns were slightly offset. My farrier informed me that it was called “Z leg.”

She was sound for a good two years, until she was around seven years old when she started to become intermittently lame. A pattern soon appeared that she seemed to be sore after jumping or hacking on hard or uneven ground. My vet advised me to have her taken for x-rays to judge the extent of the damage to her joints because of the uneven ware. It was found that the damage was too severe for anything to be done about it and my farrier was to shoe her as normal. She would be sore every now and again, so I had just to give her some Danilon to keep her comfortable.

I owned her until last year when she was eleven, going on twelve when she sadly had to be put to sleep due to an internal infection in her hock. I was absolutely devastated but I knew she had had the best life possible. In the end, she was basically retired for the last year of her life due to arthritis in her knees, pasterns and hocks. As a ten year old! I couldn’t believe it. She was on some top quality supplements throughout her life like Cortaflex, NAF Super Flex and I even fed her Bluechip Dynamic on top of these. They all dramatically helped but she was still never going to be able to perform to the level I bought her for.

Here at Tictac Equestrian, we would advise you to have your potential new horse vetted, even to the lowest stage, to ensure they are fit, healthy and up for the job you would like them to do.  We wish you the best of luck and would love to hear if you have any advice or stories for us and our customers. We stock a wide range of quality joint, muscle and bone supplements and also a selection of natural pain relief supplements that you can buy from our website at www.tictacequestrian.com

Rachael's Corner: The Pros and Cons of Rubber Stable Matting

In the Tictac Equestrian office today, we have been chatting about rubber stable mats and how they can dramatically reduce the cost of keeping your horse, both in the winter and also over the summer months.  Saving a little bit of money each week adds up over the space of the year! Most stable mat retailers estimate that it will take just under a year to pay for them in the money you will save in bedding. A cost effective investment! J

Personally, I would highly recommend stable matting.  I have used it with all of my horses. It is particularly cost effective if your horse is very wet or dirty in the stable as it allows you to use a small amount of bedding and you don’t have to worry about your horse hurting themselves if they lie down on the rubber instead of a concrete floor.  It does help if you use shavings or another absorbent bedding though, if you use straw it can get a bit smelly underneath the mats. It also helps towards keeping your horse nice and warm in the winter months!

In the winter, I still give Honey a nice deep littered bed on top of the mats. It still means that at the front of her stable where there is no bedding, there is less of a chance of her slipping on the concrete when she comes in all wet and soggy from the field on a miserable day. They are equally as beneficial in the warm summer months when you can throw your bed up and let your horse stand on the mats instead of a cold, slippery or uneven concrete floor.

Lauren doesn’t like them though and likes giving all five of her horses a nice deep littered bed all year round, because it is a very smelly and unpleasant job lifting and cleaning the mats come spring time. Yuck!

Do you use rubber matting in your stable? If you do, would you recommend our customers and the rest of the Tictac team to use them? We would love to hear your opinion.

Rachael’s Corner: Tying Up In Horses

Today in the Tictac Equestrian office, we have been discussing horses that are prone to tying up, or developing Rhabdomyolysis syndrome as it is more commonly known. This is a condition in which the horse develops stiffness in the lower back and thigh area. The episodes of stiffness can range from mild cramping to a severe problem where muscle destruction occurs. In these cases, the urine will darken due to the muscle fibres breaking down.

My horse Honey has tied up now on three occasions, which can be pretty frightening if you do not know enough or anything about it at all!  Her episodes, so far, have been very severe. In every case she has been unable to walk and she starts to become increasingly distressed the longer she is left untreated. The first time this happened, I called my vet straight away and he came out to treat her. He gave me enough pain killers to keep her comfortable for the week, and due to the severity of her pain he thought on that occasion that it would be kind to mildly sedate her to help relax her muscles. He also took blood to examine in case it was something else underlying causing her problem, this came back negative. In the following two occasions that she has tied up, I have been able to treat her and keep her comfortable without having to call out the vet. I have given her two weeks off of ridden work afterwards to ensure her muscles have fully recovered before bringing her gradually back into work.

It is advised to keep your horse warm and not to move them if it is possible as this can cause further damage to the skeletal muscle fibres. Although, be careful not to over-rug as due to the stress, sweating can occur. In Honey’s case, she tied up after strenuous exercise but in some cases, horses are known to tie up with no sort of strain put on the muscles at all. This could be caused by an electrolyte imbalance which can be resolved by supplementing your horse’s diet with electrolyte salts which can be fed with hard feeding or dissolved in your horse’s water. You can buy these from our website. This can affect horses more frequently in hard exercise or in the summer due to excessive sweating in which they lose too much salt.

In the 1990s, research was carried out which suggested this condition could also be brought on by a defect in a horses carbohydrate metabolism which can affect the skeletal muscle fibres. Equine Polysaccharide Storage Myopathy (EPSM) is when a horse is unable to effectively break down carbohydrates. This is one of the reasons my vet suggested to me that Honey persistently tied up. I stopped feeding her hard feed which contains high carbohydrate and starch levels, and started feeding her Dengie Alfa A Oil and British Horse Feed Fibre Beet which contain high levels of fibre and oil which my vet told me would prevent further problems. Since I changed her diet, she has not tied up again! Thank goodness! Prevention is always better than cure after all. A good quality supplement such as NAF Vitamin-e, Selenium & Lysine will provide your horse with the vitamins and minerals that they will be lacking to cause this problem. You can buy this off of our Tictac Equestrian website. Honey has been supplemented with this for just over a year now and I believe that this has also prevented her tying up again.

If you find yourself in the situation I did and feel that your horse may be tying up, phone your vet as soon as you can and explain their symptoms. Keep them as comfortable and calm as possible until your vet arrives and also keep yourself safe! Horses can become very distressed and unpredictable in this situation. We hope that this never happens to your horse but if it does, we’d love to hear your experiences and any advice you have to give to our customers and the Tictac Equestrian team. Good Luck!