Content

Is this you and your horse? Start here!

Deep dive - the science behind those symptoms

1. Intro - From symptoms to solutions - restoring your horse's health naturally
2. Connecting the dots - addressing the root causes - equine gut health, detoxification, and more
3. Identifying the four root causes that drive equine health challenges
4. Breaking free from traditional assumptions
5. Chronic infections - the silent energy thieves
6. Environmental toxins - the cellular blockers
7. Nutrient deficiencies
8. Emotional stress and trauma
9. The common mistakes that we make
10. And then there's feed ...
11. The path to rejuvenation - gut health and the mitochondria connection
12. The gut:mitochondria connection
13. Stabilising the gut
14. The major organs
15. The detox pathways
16. Summary
17. The gut is the core of equine vitality
18. The OptimaPLUS wellness programme
19. Finally, could it be KPU? Understanding Cryptopyrroluria in horses
20. Supporting your horse's wellness naturally

Ever felt like you're in your own private echo-chamber?

At your wits' end, insurance maxed out, feeling like you're in last-chance-corrall, and despite heroic efforts on your part, nothing's working?

Thing is, everything's wrong because every-thing is connected. And there's only one way to go to see some light at the end of that tunnel ... alleviate, detox, & fortify. Or to quote Juliet Getty, Getty Nutrition:

"The only way to fix your horse is to help them return to their natural state. Feeding your horse in a manner that is contrary to their innate physiological needs is making their body scream for help."

Fact: those chronic issues aren’t random -  they’re connected. Here’s how to join the dots.

Symptoms to Solutions in a nutshell – start here

If your horse feels like “everything’s wrong” - from fatigue, pain and laminitis flare-ups, to mood swings, ulcers, skin or respiratory issues - it’s rarely one problem in isolation. These are downstream symptoms of a bigger disconnect between the gut and the body’s energy system (the mitochondria). Until we stabilise that connection, chronic issues keep resurfacing.

The root cause

Four hidden drivers sit beneath most chronic conditions:

• Silent infections (parasites, bacteria, fungi) draining energy and nutrients.
• Environmental toxins clogging cellular pathways.
• Nutrient deficiencies that leave the body depleted despite good feed.
• Emotional stress or trauma that locks the nervous system in “fight or flight.”

Together, they create a vicious cycle of pain, inflammation, and exhaustion.

Does this sound like your horse?

• Constant fatigue or lack of sparkle
• Repeat abscessing, laminitis, or “footiness”
• Ongoing skin, respiratory, or allergy issues
• Poor topline or sudden weight/muscle loss
• Stiff, sore, or moody with unexplained pain
• Chronic ulcers, bloat, faecal water, or grass sensitivity
• Reactive, anxious, or shut-down behaviour

If you’re ticking several boxes, you’re not alone - this pattern is something we see every day.

How to support your horse

The pathway back to balance is simple, structured, and always the same:
🌿 Alleviate – stabilise pain, inflammation, and stress so the body can focus on healing.
🌿 Detox – clear toxins and parasites, restore gut:mitochondria communication, and reopen drainage pathways.
🌿 Fortify – nourish with species-appropriate forage, balanced minerals, and targeted support to rebuild resilience.

🚩 Red flags – don’t ignore

• Maxed-out insurance with no progress
• Vets suggesting random meds “to see if they work”
• Recurring ulcers despite treatment
• Horses labelled “dangerous” or “unrideable” due to pain or behaviour
• Rapid decline in muscle/weight with no clear cause

If you’re here, it’s likely because the conventional route has run out of answers. That doesn’t mean your horse can’t come back.

Bottom line

Surface-level “band-aid” fixes don’t work for chronic issues. To truly turn things around, we need to alleviate, detox, and fortify - addressing the whole system, not just the latest symptom.

Next step?

Explore our OptimaPLUS Reset Programme for a simple, structured way to bring your horse back into balance.

Deep dive: the science behind those symptoms

If you’d like the full story - the functional medicine science, case insights, and why these issues connect the way they do - open the sections below to explore more.

Intro - when everything’s wrong: real horses, real stories

Here at EquiNatural we get so many enquiries from owners whose horse is in dire straits - chronic pain, chronic fatigue, complete loss of energy, repeat abscessing or laminitis, mystery fat pads/inflammation, sudden mood changes ... the list goes on. And despite months (or years) of the owner's heroic effort, nothing shifts.

Often the gut is so sore it can’t be touched; horses are in real pain, stressed, and with a history of stomach ulcers. Some lose topline and condition within weeks, going from healthy to hat-rack. We see every type - from the ex-racer so wired with stress they barely resemble a horse, to the family pony carrying the scars of a rough start.

Owners have usually tried everything: endless supplements, vet visits, and maxed-out insurance. Some horses get labelled “dangerous.” We even hear of vets resorting to random meds “to see if they do something” - or giving up completely with a PTS suggestion. Understandably the owners are heartbroken, and at an absolute loss as to what to do.

This is when people tend to find us, usually courtesy of a referral when there's no-where else to go and the vet's out of ideas. Their stories are very sad and aren't always pretty - their horse has really been through the wars, with so many red flags that sometimes it's difficult to know which one to put at the top of the flagpole. Recent cases include an unbearably itchy mare allergic to almost everything, locked in pain and anxiety; and a 4yo imported sports horse so traumatised he was deemed unhandleable, with PTS as the only option. Both were considered hopeless - until we stepped in.

So how do we approach situations like this? Well, firstly, from the Functional Medicine viewpoint, we look at the body as whole - “How and why is this happening now?” and not "A pill for every ill," as the saying goes. I'm absolutely not here to knock conventional - our conventional medicine system excels at crisis care, but it's really poor with chronic conditions, going round in circles on solution after solution, with a different 'ologist' for every part of the body and not getting anywhere. Whereas here at EquiNatural, by following the Functional Medicine 'whole body' approach and connecting the dots, we’re committed to empower horse owners towards a place where they can manage their horse’s health on their own, and get results.

Trouble is, we don't see what's going on down there until it presents as a 'symptom' on the surface, by which time we almost always find the same thing: deep, embedded inflammation in the cells, triggered by the three I's - irritation, infection, inflammation. It stays hidden until it rises to the surface, by which time the fire has travelled from cell to tissue to organ to system.

That's why we start by looking downstream, because to start the reset, as the saying goes, we have to Fix the cell to get well. So let's dive in and go through how we go from symptoms to solutions.

Connecting the dots: holistic health for chronic equine issues

- Addressing the root causes - equine gut health, detoxification, and more

Let's start at the beginning and ask a simple question - do any of the following sound familiar with your horse?

• Exhaustion/fatigue
• Lack of focus/brain fog
• Stress/anxiety
• Mood swings
• Poor immunity
• Joint pain/arthritis
• Inflammation
• Swollen sheath/mammary region
• Skin issues
• Not liking to be touched
• Respiratory allergies
• Ongoing cough that just won't shift
• Lyme disease
• EMS/elevated blood glucose/insulin
• Footy
• Repeat abscessing
• Gas/bloat
• Under-belly cow kicking
• Faecal water
• Food sensitivities
• Gastric ulcers

Quite a list isn't it, and I've probably missed a few symptoms too. But Newsflash - if your horse has any of these, they have a disconnect between the gut:mitochondria connection. And I'm just going to throw it out there - what price are you and your horse paying – what are you both missing out on? What can’t you both do together anymore while you’re compensating for these issues?

Trust me when I say I can completely relate to this, as this was me and our four horses back in 2006/2007, who all got sicker in front of me and took my horse world to a very rocky edge …

For years, we’ve been led to believe that low energy and chronic issues are tied to adrenal fatigue, or hormones, or nutrient imbalances, or or or ... You’ve no doubt done every blood test available, food intolerance tests, even genetic tests, and tried every supplement out there. You’ve done all these things thinking these were all the root causes, but nothing’s worked, and you’ve stayed going round and round on that hamster wheel.

But – those aren't the root cause. They're just more symptoms of the root cause. Which means we need to go one layer deeper to get off that hamster wheel. And here we go:

Identifying the four root causes that drive equine health challenges

Understanding the underlying causes of chronic health issues in horses can be eye-opening. Here’s a closer look at each:

• Infections: From seemingly minor mouth issues to gut infections, infections act as hidden drains on your horse’s energy. For example, low-grade infections can trigger inflammation that disrupts nutrient absorption and immunity, resulting in recurring health setbacks.
• Environmental Toxins: Exposure to common stable chemicals, pesticides in grazing fields, and even certain horse-care products can accumulate in a horse’s system, disrupting cellular function and hormonal balance. Over time, these toxins lead to systemic fatigue and complicate recovery from illness or injury.
• Nutrient Deficiencies: Horses need a balanced array of vitamins and minerals for optimal energy, immunity, and digestive health. Deficiencies, whether from low-quality forage or unbalanced diets, can leave your horse vulnerable to a range of conditions such as muscle weakness, poor coat quality, and decreased resilience.
• Stress and Trauma: Horses are highly sensitive creatures, and unresolved stress or past trauma can significantly impact their health. This can manifest as heightened anxiety, digestive issues, and impaired immunity—issues that require both physical and emotional care for true recovery.

In order to fix these, it’s actually very straightforward:

• Stabilise and repair the gut, in order to ...
• Restore the cellular energy required for boosting the physical energy, which will ...
• Restore immunity strength and your horse’s health back to normal again.

Breaking free from traditional assumptions

If our clients’ emails are anything to go by, understanding our horse's health can be a minefield, often feeling like piecing together a complex puzzle. So, let’s explore in more detail:

• The four underlying root causes of our horses’ chronic health challenges,
• The causes behind low energy,
• Why these causes deplete the body,
• And the common mistakes we make in trying to resolve it all.

1. Chronic infections: the silent energy thieves

First up, when we talk about an ‘infection’, we’re not necessarily talking about the typical high-fever, full-on flu-type infection. What we're actually looking at are stealth bacteria, fungi, and parasites, that silently come along and ‘infect’ the body without an invitation. And half the time we don't even know they're there because their respective symptoms and/or diseases don't show themselves until there’s an almighty weakness in the immune system.

These guys can colonise anywhere - the mouth, sinusus, gut, bladder, liver, lungs, joints … Their effect is much like plugging in your hairdryer and unexpectedly causing a massive power surge, blowing a fuse in the process. These 'infectors' do the same – they’re huge energy thieves, and they put a massive workload on the immune system’s defences.

On top of this, they also skim off the top, stealing the nutrients. To quote the Oxford Dictionary:

“A parasite is an organism that lives in or on another organism of another species (its host) and it benefits by deriving nutrients at the other’s expense.” 

A parasite doesn’t just ‘visit’ its host - it robs the host's nutrients for its own benefit, leaving the host depleted. A classic example is iron deficiency – it’s actually near impossible to be iron-deficient, unless something inside the body is consuming the iron, or there’s a GI bleed. An iron deficiency is not necessarily caused by a lack of iron in the body, but more likely caused by parasites robbing the iron for themselves.

In short, parasite/bacteria infections can be a hidden, but very active, energy thief, so the first step to restoring vitality is clearing these silent invaders out of the body.

2. Environmental toxins

No question - we live in a world full of hidden toxins. We’ve got heavy metals, all the 'ides' in crop-spraying - pesticides, herbicides, fungicides, and don't forget fertilisers, then there's air pollution, radiation from phone masts, chemicals in our water, etc etc. They’re also prevalent in many horse products, and we've also got them in our everyday products such as deodorants, dry cleaning, non-stick pans ... the list is never-ending.

Like parasites, toxins are also energy thieves, operating by clogging up the cellular pathways where energy gets delivered to the mitochondria – the cells' energy-creating powerhouses (think battery). Learn to love the mitochondria - you know how the last decade has been about the gut microbiome? Well this next decade is going to be all about the mitochondria, so give them a google.

Back to those toxins, and once they've blocked all the entrances to the cells, they then spill over into the extracellular spaces like a clogged drain about to overflow. Result? The mitochondria can’t generate the energy needed for healing because they haven’t received the energy nutrients. Cue starved cells and fatigue, and inflammation as the toxins continue to overflow around the body triggering a myriad of other health issues.

No prizes for guessing that shifting toxins out of the body is essential to keep up with our horse’s energy needs. Which links us nicely to …

3. Nutrient deficiencies

While nutrient deficiencies are often blamed on depleted soil, processed foods, or poor digestion, there’s more to it. Even if you’re feeding a quality balancer alongside a healthy grass-forage feed regimen, the body is going to require extra nutrients to manage the damage from those parasites and toxins, typically extra protein for tissue repair, and fatty acids and healthy carbs for cellular energy to ramp up production of the healing molecules such as platelets, white blood cells, cytokines and growth factors.

And remember, those parasites and toxins are skimming these vital nutrients for themselves before our horse’s cells even get a chance to use them, like the iron deficiency we talked about earlier.

Pulling this together, the first two root causes – parasites (infections) and toxins, are the very reason for this third root cause – parasites + toxins = nutrient deficiency, by blocking the cellular nutrient receptors so the mitochondria can't produce the energy the cells needs to do their job.

This means that no matter how much good stuff we feed, our horse can remain malnourished. This can can drive food cravings, making the brain think the body is hangry, resulting in our horse becoming exhausted, moody, sluggish ... and all the while developing chronic health conditions on the side. And rest assured, we can't feed our horse out of this - food alone is not going to fix this. The root causes of the nutrient drain must be addressed to restore balance.

Finally, let’s move to the final hidden roadblock …

4. Emotional stress and trauma

For those who’ve followed our blogs over the years, you’ve no doubt heard me talking repeatedly about how ongoing chronic stress and trauma keeps the body locked in a sympathetic nervous system response of fight/flight - picture a rodeo horse broncing in terror - that's the sympathetic nervous system causing a horse to react. Just like that clogged drain, unresolved trauma creates a freeze response, making 'normalising' the stress response even harder. Sadly, we as our horse’s carer have little control over whether the stress is coming, like that imported 4yo mentioned earlier; we can only help to support how our horse reacts once it's there.

We should never underestimate the impact of how stress and trauma makes the brain and body feel. Whether human or horse, all trauma - from birth - imprints on the brain, manifesting in fatigue and low energy, eventually escalating to more complex nervous system, gastrointestinal, neurological, skin, and joint challenges. To reach a place where we can truly help our horse, we must work to restore the parasympathetic nervous system function – the 'rest, digestion, repair, and resilience' state, and not the ongoing, chronic 'tired and wired' cycle.

Think of it like the gears in your car. The parasympathetic nervous system is like 5^th gear - more efficient and humming along happily, compared to when you’re in the lower gears burning more fuel, using more energy to work your way up the gears. Sadly, some of our horses are well and truly stuck in those lower gears.

The common mistakes that we make

It's too easy to blame these issues on aging … Newsflash again – aging is normal! Or masking them with quick-fix medications such as acid reducers - another common pitfall, and huge mistake! See our Ulcers page for that sorry saga. Then there are the latest phase of GLP-1 receptor agonists that we're all currently talking about – Ertugliflozin is eye-wateringly expensive, and we’ve all heard of Ozempic for human diabetes or weight loss. And yet - none of these solve the root cause! If I had £1 for every client telling me their horse has come off Gastrogard or Ertugliflozin, and Boom! – the ulcers are back or their insulin levels are off the charts again ... There we are, back on the hamster wheel, poorer for it and back to chasing temporary relief without any kind of progress.

I know this is all hard to accept because we’ve all been ingrained to believe what we’re told by the pros, then we find ourselves having to rethink our whole belief system when we see nothing’s changing with the band-aid system, running every test out there - hormones, adrenals, thyroid, genetic testing, food intolerances, constant repeat bloods ... And on and on and on it goes …

And then there's feed - we can't finish this section without mentioning how what we feed our horse can greatly affect their gut health

"If a body is undernourished – and by that I don’t mean starved; I mean lack of actual healthy nutrient ‘nourishment’ – it doesn't matter how many herbs and tinctures we throw at them. If the body isn’t being nourished with the basics of a healthy diet, appropriate to the species, then those herbs can only go so far in helping to resolve their conditions."
Emma Ruff & Dr Tieraona Low Dog, Herbalists

Every-thing starts with the gut, yet for the last half-century the rapid rise in cheap ultra-processed, refined, artifical carb-rich feeds, laced with sugary molasses and added beet pulp to sweeten the feeds, have significantly thrown off the balance. For the record, sugar is as addictive as cocaine - this is why weaning your horse off a junk feed is so difficult, 

In short, a horse is nothing more, and nothing less, than a hindgut grass-forage-fibre fermenting machine - that's it, full stop. A horse is evolved to eat only long, stemmy grass forage, full of cellulose and hemi-cellulose fibre in the stems that the hindgut biome microbes are evolved to ferment, in order to produce vital nutrient byproducts to support our horse's health.

Thing is, man thought he knew best, so changed everything to high-yield, cheap, mutant (GM) crops, and started telling us that it was okay to feed beet pulp and molasses, corn, nutritionally improved straw (NIS), oatfeed and wheatfeed, pea protein, rice bran, soya in a hundred different disguises, liquid oils, synthetic vitamin and mineral premix ... And worse, all these ingredients, unless stated otherwise, are highly chemically sprayed during the growth period, followed by a final treatment of post-harvest chemical mould-inhibitors before packaging, to stop the feed getting mouldy.

In other words, unless grown organically there’s a cocktail of toxins in every feedbag, as well as many of the ingredients grown GMO. Over the last half-century, along with feeding haylage, soaked hay, the heavy use of antibiotics and other pharmaceutical meds, and let’s not forget the dreaded green stuff - our neon-green, super-carb-rich grass pastures, have collectively contributed to an epidemic of nutrient deficiencies and chronic health issues.

As Dr Tom O'Brien of Big Bold Health says,
"Anything that's going on in the digestive tract is influenced by what you put in the digestive tract. You put the wrong petrol in a Ferrari and we know what's going to happen there."

We've got the whole subject of feed in the Advice Centre/Feeding our Horses Healthy section on the navigation bar. Read how to dump the junk, feed your horse how they're meant to be fed, and close the nutrient gap.

The path to rejuvenation: gut health and the mitochondria connection

So there we have it. We’ve uncovered the real root causes, and the mistakes we make, so now let’s get into it. What does it take to solve these persistent health mysteries, to rejuvenate our horse again and sustain their lasting health and vitality?

Let’s look at some of the advice out there; reduce stressors, up the exercise, feed a probiotic … for sure – reducing stressors and exercise are really important, although I’m on the fence about probiotics these days as there isn't a single one out there that mimics the horse biome colonies. But there are still a few other parts of the puzzle missing. 

Supporting the gut:mitochondria communication

We need to increase the cellular energy production - this is the ‘invisible energy’ that we don’t notice, the energy that’s needed to ‘run’ the body, the energy that digests the food, pumps the heart, make the lungs take a breath, triggers the immune system to react to an invader, or helps the gut bacteria make hormones - neurotransmitters such as serotonin, and enzymes. Basically, all the body’s systems need this invisible energy, and it’s made by the mitochondria inside the cells, producing around 90% of the body’s energy, including the physical energy as well. So, we need to go a little deeper into the gut:mitochondria connection.

The gut and mitochondria talk to each other all day long, back and forth, with an optimised gut function meaning cellular energy production will flourish. Hence, it’s crucial to get the gut:mitochondria communication and function supported immediately. Just like a Tesla needs its huge battery charging all the time, the mitochondria are the same,

Stabilse the gut

Let’s now move to the gut which we all know is vitally important for every-thing - if the gut's out of whack, so is the whole body -  what happens in the gut happens everywhere. But when the gut can’t produce the hormones or the vitamins or the neurotransmitters or the critical metabolites that it’s responsible for, the mitochondria won’t be able to make enough energy to get the body's cells through the day.
 

The major organs

Now let's head to the major organs - the brain, the heart, the lungs, kidneys, liver, thyroid - if the gut:mitochondria chat is no longer producing the normal amounts of energy, every single organ and cell in the body will be affected. Hormones, blood sugar, adrenals - nothing will become balanced if we don’t get rid of those root cause roadblocks.
 
See how all the dots are connecting? The big takeaway here is that we need to fix the gut:mitochondria connection to restore the energy, and help reverse – and prevent – chronic health issues such as autoimmunity. In short, we have to repair the gut to get the energy back.
 

Supporting the equine detox pathways

From here on we can then clear the detox pathways. We now need to open the internal drainage pathways - the lymphatics, skin, bladder and bowel - to help the main detoxification organs - liver, kidneys, and lymph nodes - process those toxins into an excretable state before they overwhelm the system, and away from the vital organs, i.e. the heart, brain, lungs.

All critical steps, meaning we can finally stop relying on those band-aid surface-level fixes. The core imbalances such as adrenals, hormones, and blood glucose issues will start to stabilise naturally, and energy will improve because we’ve kicked the root causes into touch, and not wasted time trying to fix the bit in the middle.

Summary

The gut:mitochondria puzzle has actually been there all along; it’s just that conventional medicine hasn’t caught up yet. And lest we forget, learning about the microbiome only started in 2001, and we’ve been all over it ever since! But the beauty is that when the gut:mitochondria connection and cellular pathways are all in sync, the body can finally reclaim its energy and vitality. This is the missing piece of the puzzle in addressing exhaustion, immunity issues, lack of focus and so on. Chronic conditions like inflammation, arthritis, allergies, and metabolic disorders can begin to shift when we restore this balance.

The gut is the core of equine vitality

Gut health plays an essential role in the overall well-being and vitality of horses. A balanced gut isn’t just about addressing digestive issues; it’s the foundation of the immune system, energy production, and nutrient absorption. Functional medicine focuses on understanding how imbalances in gut health influence everything from mood and immunity to joint health and energy levels. By optimizing gut health through detoxification and nutrient support, this has an immediate impact on the cells and mitochondria, the body’s energy-producing powerhouses, which in return supports the entire body in achieving equilibrium, leading to a healthier, more resilient horse.

Now imagine the possibilities when your horse’s health is no longer compromised by unseen infections, parasites, toxins, nutrient deficiencies, and stress. Instead of being held back by these hidden drains on the body, your horse can thrive, getting you both off the hamster wheel and finally able to get your horse world back. It’s a powerful shift from crisis care to empowered, ongoing wellness.

Not knowing what’s going on in the gut is like dealing with an iceberg – the biggest part is all happening underneath, out of sight, and there’s a disconnect. And unless we know what’s going on in the gut, we can’t fix the mitochondria. So, let’s move forward with the knowledge and tools to transform your horse’s health for good with the Functional Medicine approach for your horse: Alleviate, Detoxify, and Fortify.

The OptimaPLUS (Alleviate/Detox/Fortify) wellness programme

"Healing is a process that always starts with stabilisation. Until the body's stable it cannot heal. The body then needs to detoxify and remove the roadblocks. The body also needs to get the nutrients that it needs to repair itself. When you have this combination in place the body can truly begin to heal."

Dr Nuzum, Toxicologist, Doctor of Naturopathic Medicine

So, you've probably assumed that there's going to be a gut regeneration protocol involved here, and you'd be right! But again, many of our clients have tried gut protocols before, yet their horse has remain stucked with symptoms because the protocols are outdated. Effective recovery requires a science-backed, updated and functionalapproach that addresses both toxins and parasites simultaneously.

Alleviate

But first, we have to start with alleviating.  To requote Dr Nuzam - "Healing is a process that always starts with stabilisation. Until the body's stable it cannot heal." This is all about alleviating/stabilising pain/inflammation and stress here. Whila a horse is in pain and/or with visible inflammation, they'll be completely focused on this so this needs alleviating first and foremost.

If your horse is in a state of chronic stress, or worse if your horse has shut down (our Stress page explains exactly what chronic stress actually does to the body and what systems it shuts down), this urgently need stabilising. NB - an ongoing state of chronic stress will very likely cause glandular (pyloric) ulcers, so all the more reason to stabilise the stress response.

Detox

Once pain/stress are being managed - allow a few days - we can then start the detox. It’s pointless throwing expensive fix-kits at a horse while the toxic overload is still blocking the body's basic function to heal, so we start with a full gut regeneration programme to reconnect the gut:mitochondria connection and re-establish the beneficial biome colonies.

This process starts with boosting cellular energy, opening internal drainage pathways, and safely removing toxins and parasites without overwhelming the body. A proper protocol must also support the body’s detoxification organs - lymph nodes, liver and kidneys, and the circulatory systems - lymph and blood, so that the toxins can be flushed out. All explained in full in our Detoxification page.

Fortify

Alongside the detox, we readdress the diet - check the feed brand ingredients to ensure they're produced from grass forage without any of the aforementioned junk fillers, and ensure that adlib quality fibre-filled hay is always available.

If you continue to feed your horse haylage, forget it. If you soak your hay, forget it. If you let your horse run out of hay, especially if stabled overnight, forget it. If haylage was fed, the gut also needs to deacidify, so feed Spirulina for a couple of weeks which is an excellent toxin-binder and is mainly excreted via the liver-bile-intestine, thus relieving the kidneys.

The horse also needs its body's chemistry balanced by correct mineral ratios because our UK grass/forage is deficient in certain nutrients that a horse needs to thrive - it’s all about the chemical information from those micronutrients in their forage that radically influences their body's genes, hormones, immune system, central nervous system, brain chemistry, skeletal and soft tissue structure; you name it – everything from mood, energy and physical health of the whole organism (body), at cellular level, with every single bite - all connected.

Nutritionally unbalanced forage means a nutritionally unbalanced horse. The source and nutrient-density of our horse’s food plays a huge role - the absolute role - in their health.

This is all covered in the Feeding our Horses Healthy section off the main menu at the top of the page, and specifically the Why what we feed has to be right page, plus you'll see our feed recommendations there as well. A quick heads-up, 2020 research now shows that there are equine-appropriate minerals versus questionable minerals, all covered in our blog post, Minerals, and it's All Change.

Finally, could it be KPU? Understanding Cryptopyrroluria in horses

Also, as at 2021, new science/research is now connecting all the above syndromes into a relatively unknown, yet now widespread, multi-metabolic detoxification disorder known as Cryptopyrroluria, or KPU for short. Put simply, a prolonged disturbed hindgut intestinal biome can affect the liver’s natural detoxification function, meaning dangerous circulating toxins will escape into the body where previously the liver would have normally performed its regular biotransformation (metabolising) process.

This is now known to trigger a whole range of metabolic disorders, manifesting in a multitude of unspecific symptoms, often several at a time concurrently, with the horse never seeming to get better from one issue to the next, despite the owner throwing everything they can at the problems.

This is all explained in more depth in our KPU page, which is worth a read to see if it resonates with you and your horse.

Supporting your horse's wellness naturally

We've got you covered, with our five different equine reset programmes as follows:

• As per this page it's our OptimaPLUS programme.
• If your horse is a KPU candidate, see our KPU programme.
• For hindgut dysbsios/leaky gut/faecal water syndrome, it's our Hindgut Dysbiosis/SIBO programme.
• If your horse has mallenders/sallenders, see our Mallenders/Sallenders programme.

Supporting your horse’s wellness, naturally

Every horse’s story is different - but the pathway back to balance is always the same: alleviate, detox, fortify. With the right support, even the toughest cases can turn a corner.

🌿 Explore our Wellness Reset Programmes, or contact us with any questions.