Is your horse stressed?

Horse owners often think their equines have an easy life – but in fact, stress could be negatively impacting on their horse’s health and wellbeing far more than they realise. Many horses can cope with infrequent short-term stress. However, serious problems can occur with frequent exposure to short-term stressors or continuous exposure to long-term stressors (something from which the horse can never escape).

Over time, the build-up of the stress hormones constantly being released into the body can lead to numerous health problems. The long-term release of cortisol has been implicated in conditions such as laminitis, Cushing’s disease, reduced growth,immunosuppression, recurrent airway obstruction, a range of skin conditions and allergic reactions as well as increasing the risk of gastric ulceration and colic.

Horse magazine have kindly agreed for me to share my article looking at stress, how it effects the horse and how to reduce your own horse's stress to help him lead a happy, healthy life.

You can read the full article here.