LEMON BALM (Melissa officinalis) *Organic herb for horses - calm uplifter, digestive harmony, everyday brightener
Benefits of Lemon Balm for Horses
If there were ever a herb that deserved the name ' balm ', it’s lemon balm. Old herbals say it brings " joy into the melancholy " (Culpepper), its soft lemon scent is sunshine in leaf form alongside the sense of ease it evoke.
In modern equine routines, Lemon Balm is often chosen as a gentle, food-based botanical for horses who benefit from support with:
- everyday emotional steadiness
- digestive comfort during feed or routine changes
- a calmer, more settled overall demeanour
A botanical companion for horses who respond well to gentle, grounding support.
Please note this is a nutritional, functional horse food supplement and not veterinary medicine. For more on this see Dr Kellon's Horse Sense - Nutrition is not 'Alternative' Therapy
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Find Lemon Balm in the EquiNatural range
You’ll also find Lemon Balm included in our blends designed to support everyday calm, digestive harmony, and emotional steadiness:
- CalmTonic - natural composure for high-stress situations
- HarmonyTonic - gentle support for emotional loss & grief
- KolicTonic - gentle colic digestive support
- MellowMare - organic hormone harmony for mares during seasonal or routine changes
- StressTonic - natural support for equine stress resilience
Composition & Feed Guide
💧Organic Lemon Balm Tincture
Our human-grade, certified organic tinctures give you a ready-to-absorb potent source of phytonutrients at the highest-strength available, for immediate absorption straight into the bloodstream and to the body’s cells.
- Melissa officinalis, Herb
- Cold Macerated 1:2 25%
- Fresh Cultivated
~ Feed Guide - 6ml/100kg bodyweight, daily in feed.
🌿Organic Lemon Balm Herb
Grown, harvested and dried without the use of agri-chemicals, non-irradiated and GMO free - see our Quality page for Quality Management & Certification Documents.
- Melissa officinalis, Herb
- Cultivated/Wild Harvested
- Origin Bulgaria
~ Feed Guide - 5g/100kg bodyweight per day, i.e. 25g for a 500kg horse.
Footnotes
- Laboratory tested for identification and compliance to the British and European Pharmacopoeia standards.
- Human grade.
- Please be aware that if you're purchasing our dried botanicals for human use, our dried range is cut to appropriate sizes for feeding to horses.
- ♻️ Eco Note: Our packaging is recyclable and refillable.
- 🧊 Storage Tip: Keep cool and dry.
Functional Nutritional Value
Constituents: Volatile oils: (0.06-0.375%): monoterpenes (>60%) including citronellal, citral (geranial and neral), β-ocimene; sesquiterpenes (>35%) including β-caryophyllene, germacrene D . Flavonoids (0.5%): glycosides of luteolin, quercetin, apigenin, kaempferol. Polyphenols: rosmarinic acid, chlorogenic acid, caffeic acids, protocatechuic acid, hydroxycinnamic acid derivatives, metrilic acid, tannins. Triterpenic acids. Ursene triterpene glycosides: melissiosides A-C. Vitamin C and carotenoids.
Clinical Considerations
Lemon Balm is a gentle, calming nervine herb that most horses tolerate beautifully.
Advisories
- Suitable for short- or long-term inclusion within calm, digestive, or general wellbeing feeding routines.
Contraindications
- Not recommended for pregnant or nursing mares, in line with standard caution for aromatic and calming botanicals.
- Avoid in horses with confirmed or suspected thyroid disorders unless under veterinary guidance.
Lemon Balm in History & Tradition
If ever a plant deserved a name that sounds like a deep breath and a smile, it’s lemon balm. Crush a leaf, and you’re instantly met with that soft, uplifting citrus scent - bright enough to lift your spirits, gentle enough to soothe the nerves. It’s no wonder this mint-family treasure has been adored by healers, cooks, poets, and even bees for over 2,000 years.
Shakespeare praised its “honeyed sweetness,” and Pliny the Elder noted that beekeepers rubbed their hives with it to keep swarms happily settled at home - a trick that worked so well it carried on well into the 20th century. Its botanical name, Melissa, literally means honeybee , and the plant lives up to it. Bees love lemon balm the way horses love a freshly opened feed bin - wholeheartedly and without hesitation.
But lemon balm isn’t just for bees. In folklore, it was considered a herb of joy and longevity. Paracelsus called it an “elixir of life,” and in the Middle Ages people steeped it in wine to lighten melancholy and warm the heart. Shakespeare even scattered it into his plays as a fragrant strewing herb, celebrated not just for its scent but for the happiness it brought into a space.
A herb for the heart and the nerves
Lemon balm has long been one of the herbal world’s favourite nervines - gentle, calming herbs that relax the mind without making you foggy or flat. Brew it into tea, infuse it in honey, toss it through a summer salad… however you take it, lemon balm is the botanical equivalent of someone placing a reassuring hand on your shoulder and saying, “You’re alright. Let’s slow down.”
Seventeenth-century writer John Evelyn claimed it “comforts the heart and driveth away melancholy,” and herbalists across history have echoed the same sentiment: lemon balm brings lightness where there is heaviness, and clarity where there is mental clutter.
And modern herbal monographs - always a little more restrained than the poets - still recognise it as a wonderful ally for:
- Restlessness and overthinking
- Trouble switching off
- Poor sleep linked to tension
- Digestive tightness, spasms, or stress-related upset
It relaxes the gut as much as it softens the mind, making it a herb that truly supports the whole system.
Versatile, fragrant, and surprisingly useful
Lemon balm has been used historically for everything from fevers to poisonous bites (herbalists of old were wonderfully optimistic), but the uses that have stood the test of time are the ones rooted in its nature: soothing, cooling, gentle, and comforting.
Even today, its topical uses are well-known - especially for cold sores - thanks to its calming, protective compounds.
But at its heart, lemon balm is simply a plant that softens life’s hard edges. It’s the herb you reach for when you need to exhale, settle, unwind, or remember the sweetness in things.
Joy in a leaf, indeed. And so loved by herbalists, poets, and buzzing bees alike.
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