Episode 36: 3 Reasons to Do Groundwork With Your Horse

SWS036.mp3: Audio automatically transcribed by Sonix

SWS036.mp3: this mp3 audio file was automatically transcribed by Sonix with the best speech-to-text algorithms. This transcript may contain errors.

Speaker1:
Podcasting from a little cabin on a hill. This is the Stacy Westfall podcast. Stacy's goal is simple to teach you to understand why horses do what they do, as well as the action steps for creating clear, confident communication with your horses.

Speaker2:
Hi, I'm Stacy Westfall and I'm here to teach you how to understand, enjoy and successfully train your own horses. In this episode, I'm going to give you three main reasons that I do groundwork. Going to talk about earning the right to be in your horse's space and your horse, earning the right to be in your space. And in our final segment on call with Doctor Marney. Doctor Marney and I are going to discuss the reasons we are both using Equine Thrive. Let's dive in and get started. You may have noticed that in the podcasts I like to use a lot of verbal illustrations so that you can easily follow along. And I'm about to do that. But first I want to share with you a voicemail that shows me that what I'm doing is really working. Okay, let's take a listen.

Speaker3:
Stacy. Hi, my name is Alex. I'm here in an airport, traveling due to work, and I'm listening to your podcast, and it was quite funny that I got the attention of several people who I was trying to follow your directions of writing a circle for the use of the aids. That I guess I got more attention than I was hoping to have, just because all the movements that I was doing with my hands and feet. While listening to your podcast here at the bench, waiting for my next flight. Thank you for everything that you do.

Speaker2:
Alec, I want to thank you for the laugh. And after this illustration, anybody who is going to act out this podcast, I really request that you videotape it because I want to see a video of you in an airport acting out the round pending. I'm about to talk about. That'd be really funny. Okay, let's kick off today with a conversation. A deeper dive into the horse's body. Again, I've mentioned that this is where it starts to get complicated because we, the horse handler or rider, we do start to have an effect on the horses when we're around them. And when I start thinking about teaching people about the horse's body, the very first thing that always comes into my mind is a horse in a round pen. And the reason that I always go to groundwork, or this illustration in my mind of a horse in the round pen, is because I think when we talk about the horse's body, my early reactions, my early thoughts, whenever I pictured a horse, I pictured automatically horse running on a beach, me on horse bareback and bridleless. Also known as the Black Stallion Movie. And so just because this illustration automatically pops into my mind of horse and rider together, I think it makes it easier for us to consider the horse's body at times when we think about groundwork, because the strength in understanding the horse comes in understanding your role individually, the horse's role individually, and then how the two of you interact together.

Speaker2:
So for this podcast, I want to talk about three reasons you should do groundwork. And then we're going to go ahead and talk even more about earning the right to be in each other's space. The three reasons I would really encourage you to do groundwork is because, number one, it is the best place for you to learn to read your horse's body. Number two, it is the best place for your horse to learn to read your body. And number three, You can teach emotional control now because you are separate from the horse during groundwork. And right now I want you to picture that you're standing in the middle of a 60 foot round pen. Alec, I'm flashing back to you in the airport, standing up now, picturing this. Okay, back on track. Picture that. You're standing in the center of the round pen, and the horse is out near the edge of the round pen. And this would very much have been the situation that I was in when I first met popcorn at the road to the horse in 2006. He was essentially wild and he was in a round pen. He had never been halter broke. He didn't understand humans beyond the fact that at one point, just prior he had been run into stocks, they were vaccinated, gelded, and then they were turned loose again.

Speaker2:
So popcorn, when I met him, had very, very minimal interaction with humans. So he was essentially a lot more like a wild type of a horse because he was completely unhandled. Now, when you picture standing in the center of a round pen with a horse like that, you automatically kind of picture that that horse is going to be further away from you, or you kind of hope that horse is going to be further away from you, because you'll kind of intuitively know that this wild horse is going to have some kind of a reaction to you and your presence. Now, what's really interesting is if you picture this, then you also could picture or you can go ahead and jump on YouTube. I'm sure there's some round penning videos on there. You can actually see some in my Stacy's video diary. But Jack was not that wild. But you can still see that he was really reading my body language. And when you've got this more wild or unhandled horse, that self-preservation that they have has their senses very turned up to your presence. And so it's actually fairly easy to influence their direction of travel, or at least to be able to increase their speed while slowing them down. Might be difficult. Increasing their speed usually isn't because you can add some pressure by where you stand in the round pen. And all of this is happening because as the handler, you're reading the body language and deciding where to move.

Speaker2:
But he's also reading your body language and giving you instant feedback. Now, what happens most often is that when people show up here at a clinic or I travel around and teach clinics, I'll be headed to California in a few weeks for an event out there. What I see much more often is I see people interacting with their horses, and the person and the horse are kind of on top of each other, so they might go to lead the horse in from their trailer into a stall in my barn. And the horse is super comfortable in the handler's space, to the point where they're bumping into the handler. They're looking around at my horses and they might, you know, bump the hat off the top of the handler. Or when the human tries to slow them down, the horse might circle around them. And during all of this, you have to keep in mind this is a conversation happening between the horse and rider or horse and handler, even though it might just look a little bit more like a horse and a rider walking towards a stall with indistinct communication happening, I think a lot of times people kind of write it off as this is just how he is when he's in a new space, but don't be mistaken, he is reading your body language and he is reading into it.

Speaker2:
What he's allowed to do and what he's not allowed to do. So let's jump our minds back into this round pen with this wilder, untouched horse. We know that we would be having an effect on the horse when we moved around the round pen, and we also know that the horse would be highly tuned to us. I mean, it's either going to be highly tuned to us, or it's going to be kind of freaked out by our presence and thinking about jumping out of the pen. What you don't typically see in that situation is the horse just not aware of you at all. Now, in the example, when somebody is leading the horse in from the trailer into one of my stalls, there are many more times when the horse is seemingly almost not aware that the handler is there. So what I'm presenting you with here is kind of two different extremes. And the point of this is that I want you to think about the power that comes in having that horse away from you. Let's just say 20ft or more away from you. So 15, 20ft away or more. And the reason I want you to push that horse out that far in your mind is because now you get this complete picture of the horse's body, And you probably aren't feeling nearly as threatened with your body, because if that wild horse in the round pen came close to you, you'd probably be tempted to be like, I'm not quite sure I want to be here, because you'd be really respectful of his space, because you don't know what the reactions are going to be.

Speaker2:
I want you to be able to have that much respect for horses, and it doesn't have to be as tinged with what you could call fear or self-preservation for yourself. If that horse were, you know, to wheel around in the round pen. You might feel the urge to jump away and out. But what I want you to do is I want you to approach and think about what is going on here when you really respect that horse's space, and when that horse respects your space, and how that conversation feels different than if you've got a horse that's willing to push or really be in your space in a way that maybe should make you uncomfortable. Now, here's an interesting thought. When I met popcorn and I was in the round pen with him at road to the horse. In a way, if you had been watching, you can almost see a little bit more of that magical dance of liberty when you have this more wild horse then when you have the horse. I've been describing walking off from the trailer into one of my stalls. And the reason for that is that this wild horse is still exhibiting all of its ability to read and dance with what's going on around it, to be able to read the body language of the human, and to to make a turn and a response and go back and forth, and the art of the horsemanship that comes into round penning a horse or, you know, being in the presence of this wild horse is that dance of awareness.

Speaker2:
And I think you see it really clearly in the beginning with this really wild type horse that you intuitively or the handler hopefully knows can't just be manhandled into submission. And at the same time, you see this at the opposite extreme. When you do see horses that are very trained to do liberty work on the ground. And I think that in the middle is where if we can turn up our awareness and realize that when the horses are in our space and they're ignoring us, this is a problem. And the reason groundwork is such a good place for you guys to focus on this is because when you push that horse out to that 20ft away from you, you can fully see that horse and appreciate it as a separate being. That horse can fully see you and appreciate you as a separate being. And when they're 20ft away, it makes or more it makes biting, striking, kicking and all of these other things that could be labeled blatant disobediences it it makes those safer and actually less likely to happen.

Speaker2:
And we don't want the horses to learn bad habits of displaying some of those behaviors close into us. And this is why I say that when we are doing groundwork and we keep the horse at a distance, I actually want to personally, I want to earn the right to be in that horse's space, which means that I'm being respectful of him. But I also want him to earn the right to be in my space, which is him being respectful of me. So any time that I'm with a horse that I don't know. So let's just say I'm at a clinic and somebody hands me the lead rope to their horse, the very first thing I want is distance between me and that horse. So I will prefer to be on a longer lunge line or in a round pen. Most of the time it's going to be on a longer lunge line. And so I'm going to want to be on something like 24ft long so I can get some distance between myself and the horse so that we can both begin to earn the right to be in closer. Because if I see that horse is in the habit of ignoring the handler, that's not safe for either of us. It's especially not safe for the handler because we are smaller and more squishy.

Speaker2:
And if the horse discovers that, that's not a good thing for the horse because we end up with the Buck brannaman movie situation again. So I want to make sure that I'm very comfortable with my tools that I would need to be able to maneuver a horse that's going to be at least 20ft away from me, and with a lunge line and stick and string or lunge whip or whatever the tools you are to be able to extend your your bubble that far out. It is important that you practice that, especially with a horse that would be respectful of you before you put yourself in a situation where you might be handling a horse, that is much more wild. Because what happens is when those horses are much more reactive or emotional. They tend to go fast. And if you're already a little uncoordinated with the tools, then it can feel very quick. And this is where a lot of times you end up with these more wild horses in a round pen, because then you've got the panel walls of the round pen that are helping you instead of the rope. So it's a little less confusing. But don't get me wrong, the art is there and maybe even more strong when you're doing the round penning versus having them on the line. I'll call it 50 over 50, but there's definitely a bit of a difference.

Speaker2:
Now, when you've got that horse 20ft out, you can really read the body language and start to see if it's this wild horse like popcorn was in the round pen. It gives me a chance to to look at what he's looking at and kind of see the world through his eyes. So I'm getting to see him looking around at all the people in the stands and looking at what's going on in the other realm pens that were happening at road to the horse, and I'm getting to see when I step to the left or step to the right, how much pressure it takes to move him, and pressure being just my presence and how much he reacts or responds to me moving away from him. And does that draw him towards me? And how can I start that dance of pressure and release, or of basically communication? Because just because I'm communicating with him by moving my body around? On one hand, you could call it pressure, but at the same time, I mean, if somebody makes a move in the grocery store and it draws your attention, do you really want to call that pressure or were they just being kind of interesting, like maybe Alex was being in the airport? So interesting doesn't necessarily mean pressure, but I think for general communication, a lot of times we simplify it by saying pressure and release where a lot more of the time.

Speaker2:
When I'm at a clinic, I'm like, you know, your horse looks a little bored. Maybe you need to be a little more interesting and interesting can be, you know, if your horse has got its head down sniffing dirt, because a lot of these horses that would come in from the trailer headed to a clinic here, if we turned them loose in the round pen, they would be more interested in dirt than the handler in the middle, because maybe they're thinking about rolling and the dirt's looking pretty interesting. So at that moment, what I'll tell people to do is make yourself more interesting, because if he's not even interested, he's not going to be reading your body language. So I don't care if that's just jumping up and down doing jumping jacks. You can sing your favorite song, you can skip, you can do some kind of a line dance move, or you can legitimately add pressure to his body by, you know, stepping towards and driving him with your stick and string if you want, but any which way. If he's not even paying attention to you, he's not going to be practicing reading your body language in the real art that I love loved to do with round penning is to teach the horse emotional control, which to me is the beauty of groundwork. Before I ever climb on a horse, I want to teach that horse emotional control.

Speaker2:
But I'm going to do it with a horse that feels a little bit more like it's out away from me, and it's kind of like this remote control. So it's got this distance between me and the horse, but there's that dance. And so if I move my body, the horse has some kind of a movement. And, and they and they understand this body language from a distance, because then I can start to teach this horse that when pressure goes up, he doesn't need to respond to it. And that was the big tall assignment when I met popcorn at road to the horse was, how do you take this horse that could possibly be almost overwhelmed with the amount of 5000 And 6000 people in this. It was back in Murfreesboro, in Tennessee, in this big Coliseum, you know, thousands of people in the stands. Three other horses in three other round pens with three other handlers and all the chaos. And this horse is reading all of this. And yet I need to be interesting and yet not intimidating, so that this horse will start to look to me and say, are you seeing all this? It's looking a little crazy around here. What do you think about it? So part of that conversation is me moving around, seeing what he's thinking about it. But it's also the dance of me watching him and then having feedback for him.

Speaker2:
Like, I look calm. He maybe looks upset and disoriented about what's going on, but I look purposeful and like I have a plan and that starts to become attractive to this quote unquote wild horse, because he intuitively knows from the herd that the one that has the plan is the leader. Maybe one of the most interesting things about horses is that we often hear that they can feel a fly land on their body, but the one thing I don't hear spoken about quite as much is that they can withstand a kick from another horse that would put us in the hospital. So they are such a beautiful balance of both extremes that they can feel a fly land on them, but they can withstand and walk away and go eat hay. A kick that would have put us in the hospital. And I think knowing that both of those extremes is possible is what makes the dance with the horse so interesting, because when I am working with that horse, whether it's a wild horse in the round pen or whether it is a horse that walks in here for a clinic, I want to understand that they need to respect me and my space, and I need to respect them and their space for both reasons, because both of us can understand and feel something very sensitive. And yet that horse can actually overpower me because of that ability to be able to put out a kick that would put me in the hospital while another horse can simply just walk away.

Speaker2:
What I often see is that that that instinctual first reaction that I have when I want to picture a horse and rider, that instinct that I have to be like, oh, instantly I'm back in the Black Stallion movie and books. I'm instantly bareback and bridleless on this beautiful stallion running down a beach. I think it's that desire for closeness that brings us into close to our horses bodies too often. And when we can't see the separation between ourselves and the horse because at the end of the day, at the end of all of this training, I'm going to try to achieve as closely as possible that look of that ride on that beach. And for me, that's what I did with Roxy. And I've done that with a lot of other horses, maybe not fully bareback and maybe not even taking off the bridle, but you can have that relationship on a loose rein and with a saddle on Roxy. And I proved that all the other days of the year that we rode with the saddle and the bridle. But I think it's that desire for our closeness to their physical presence that ends up accidentally setting us up for being in a dangerous spot and blurring the lines so much that it becomes indistinguishable to the horse and the rider that there is communication, that clarity of communication that is needed to achieve that high level liberty work, whether it's ridden liberty or whether it's groundwork liberty.

Speaker2:
It is that inability for the horse to any more distinguished your communication because they've kind of gone blank to your presence. And it's also your your inability to communicate with that horse because you're in on top of each other. And there's not a clarity of cue system. And I think that is where people most often get stuck because they feel like being in close. And I'm going to label that closer than four feet, which is the length of my stick and string I use. When your horse starts to be closer than four feet, you've got to be able to have a very clear working system inside of there to stay safe, because there is really a danger zone when you are anywhere from, you know, when you start to get the length of that horse's body or closer to you because of the ability to be run over, kick, strike, bite, all of these other things. And I'm not saying that your horses will be doing this aggressively, but how often have you been leading a horse or near a horse that spooked or reacted and running you over was an option. In any of those moments where your body being pushed out of the way by your horse happens, you have to know that that is a sign that you are of lower importance than the leader of the herd would be out in the pasture because they don't run over those guys, and that realistically, you might be putting yourself in a dangerous situation and your horse in a dangerous situation because horses that hospitalized people kind of get a bad reputation.

Speaker2:
So in this podcast, I want to encourage you to look at groundwork as a place where you can study and read your horse's body language. Your horse can study and read your body language, and it is an amazing place to begin to teach emotional control to the horse. And I'll be going into more detail on that in another upcoming podcast I want to leave you with this question. Are you doing enough groundwork that your horse can learn to read your body language? And can you adjust the working zone that you have around your horse? For example, if your default comfort zone is two feet away from each other, could you easily adjust it to four feet away, or ten feet away, or 20ft away and feel like you have almost the same amount of control within 10 or 20%? I'll say, do you have about the same amount of control at all of those distances, or are you only comfortable in that default zone? Something to think about.

Speaker1:
Supporting companies make this show sustainable. Thank you.

Speaker2:
When I was a little girl growing up and head over heels in love with horses. I frequently got the comment you should be a veterinarian, but as soon as the vets actually showed up to do any of the routine care for our horses, it became very clear that was not going to be a great lifestyle for me. I typically ended up sitting on a bale of hay with my head between my knees, trying not to hyperventilate or pass out because I'd seen the horse receive a shot. Or worse yet, the vet had drawn blood for Coggins. So it became very apparent to me at a young age that I wasn't going to cut it as a vet, but I have been blessed over the years to spend a lot of time with great veterinarians. I'd like to give you a little bit of the history, because I find it really interesting. Back when my husband and I got married, we started training horses and eventually had a 20 stall barn where we had the horses on a waiting list, and we maintain that for over ten years. And even though it sounds like 20 stalls would be 20 horses, many, many more than that came and went. Because as a trainer, it's very common to have a group of horses, let's just say 50% of the horses that are 30, 60, 90 day horses. So somebody just wants to send them for a short amount of time.

Speaker2:
And then maybe the other 50% of the horses stay for longer times. But I'll tell you, when you're first getting started, the ratio is a lot more skewed towards the shorter term horses, the 30, 60, 90 day horses. And you're really hopeful if you can get a handful of horses that are going to stay for a year or two or longer, which is what Roxy did, which is how she turned out to be what she was. Having said all that, before I even got married, I was at the University of Findlay for four years and we had full time vets there. So over the years I've spent a lot of time with veterinarians. Thankfully, most of that was not for emergencies, but a lot of it was for more than just routine care. Growing up, it seemed like our horses were only seen by vets if they were either in an emergency state, or if it was the routine shots in the spring. Nowadays, I'm kind of back to almost that situation again, because Jesse and I mostly just ride and train our own horses. So most of the time the vet comes out in the spring and I say, I hope I don't see you again until next year. No offense. And they say, no offense taken. I also hope I don't see you again until next year, because anything in between is probably more of an emergency. But over all those years of training horses professionally, what was really interesting to me is that you had routine care and then you had maintenance because these were athletes in training.

Speaker2:
I also did a lot of early diagnostic because very many of the horses that came in were young horses to get started, which meant that I was probably the first professional to put my hands on them or move them around and watch them move. And then we had a lot of horses that were advancing and and doing quite advanced things, like you see, with Roxy and the bareback and bridleless, and it made us more like sports coaches in a way. And when you get to see that many horses in training and using their body and you get to see kind of the range of what's normal, what's abnormal, because it got to the point where I could see a young horse move and I would say I'm a little suspicious. There's something going on here. It might be OCD, it might be something with the, you know, the bone growth. They're just not ready yet. Maybe it's a little too early. Maybe there's a little bit of something going on. I was very clear that I didn't do the diagnosing. I did the something's off. Let's go to the vet now. I always chose, if possible, to be the one to take them to the vet. So a lot of the times that meant that I was the one driving them because I would call the owner, talk to them, or if the owner stopped by because they lived close, I would talk to them and we would agree that a vet trip was needed.

Speaker2:
And if possible, I either was the one that drove the horse to the vet, or I rode along because I always knew how much valuable information was going to be passed around. And the more time that I spent seeing the horse and their symptoms at home, and then going to the vet, watching the vet do the diagnostics, watching whatever went, went on, whether that was x rays, whether that was flexion tests, whether that was blocking, whether that was injections. And then I was most likely going to also be the one that was doing the rehab. This was a very key part of my education. That didn't happen in the normal education system. I mean, it did because I was at Findlay and I got to see it there. But I for sure continued my education much of the time with somebody else paying the vet bills because these horses were in training. And so the owners were the ones that were wanting to explore and and use these different vets. And it was amazing. Anytime you can spend time at vet clinics watching what's going on, especially if it's not an emergency, because thankfully I wasn't involved in a lot of those. Those are just really stressful, but I'm talking a lot more of the situations where it's either a young horse and you're saying this is a little unusual, what's going on here? Or it's a horse that's been going along and you think there might be a little bit, you know, how can we get that top 10%? So we're not focused on a horse that's necessarily in a chronic state of pain.

Speaker2:
We're looking at how can we maximize this and get the maximum benefit out of this horse that's working. And I have always just loved doing that. So when I was talking to the folks at thrive and they said that they had lots of connections with the vets, it was super exciting for me to think that I could continue my education again in that same way. So this week, what I want to bring to you is on call with Doctor Monte. This is a conversation that I had with Doctor Monte, who has been an equine practitioner for over 30 years, and he focuses specifically on the equine athlete. He's the co-owner and president of the Tennessee Equine Hospital. They have actually three locations in Tennessee, and he graduated from Auburn University in 1989. He is currently on the American Association of Equine Practitioners Foundation Board, focusing on benevolence, education, and research for the welfare of the horse. Now on to my conversation with Doctor Monte Monty Mcinturff. I will also put links to his website on Stacy Westfall. Com.

Speaker4:
I have Doctor Monty here on the line with me, and we've just met each other, and I'm really interested in hearing if we were connected through Equifax. And I'm interested in hearing your story. Doctor Monty with thrive because I have a story with Equifax, and since they brought us together, I'd like to exchange stories, if you're good with that. Yeah, sure. Yeah, I'd be happy to share. Share what I think about it. It was quite interesting to me. I've been practicing about 30 years, and probably ten years ago I was approached by the owner of thrive to to try his product. He was telling me all about it and I simply said, hey, look, I don't I don't really afford any over-the-counter joint oral joint therapies. I'm more into injectable forms like Adequan and legend and, and joint injections and the things that I do. And I just don't really think there's enough research to show that all these oral supplements really work. So I was pushing back pretty hard. And, um, the owner's like, hey, look, if I gave you some, would you try it? And I'm like, well, sure, I'll try it if you give me some. And he he gave me some and I threw it in my truck.

Speaker4:
And I was at a big barn that I knew that had a large amount of schooling horses where they give lessons to kids, and the horses work hard, probably 5 or 6 days a week. They'd probably jump in 3 or 4 of those days. And and I know a lot of these horses are on bute and joint therapies. And I told the trainer, I said, look, if I give you this product, would you try it and just let me know what you think? And he's like, yeah, I'd love to give it a go. So it was a it was a small box that I could drive, and I gave it to him and told him how to give it based on the label. And I didn't think another thing about it. And about two months later, he came back to me and he said, hey, uh, I'd love some more of that stuff that you put in my, um, my schooling horses on. I'm like, what stuff is that? He said, well, We'll withdraw that withdraw stuff. He said, it really works. I'm like, does that stuff work? He said, yeah, it works great. I'm like, what else are you giving with it? He said, I'm giving nothing with it.

Speaker4:
I'm not giving you with it. I'm not giving anything that I was giving before. I'm not having you inject your horse like I was doing. I've just had them on this product twice a day. And these horses that are 19, 20 years of age are acting like they're 9 or 10. He said these horses have more endurance. They're jumping more, they're their trots bigger. They're just holding up so much better. And I'm like, wow, really? So from that point, I started using it on older horses just to see how they would react. And I was really, really surprised that how these horses had more endurance, they were more active. They got up and down easier. I was really impressed by it. So from there, I started studying resveratrol and understanding the product and how it worked. But it was I pushed back really hard. And now in my 30th year of practice is actually the only oral joint supplement that I do recommend. I don't I know there's a lot on the market and I say, look, if you believe in it, give it a go. But this is what I believe in. And it's, it's a it's a great product. Wow.

Speaker5:
That is quite the testimonial. And I love a lot of it. Echoes kind of what I was experiencing from obviously a different side of the of it. But as an owner I've tried some different, you know, supplements and I guess I've always felt like I was kind of ornery when I tried them, because I'd put them on them for a while. And then even if I saw a difference, I'd be like, okay, I'll take you back off, because if it's working and I take you off, I should notice it. And so it was interesting because I put my older horse popcorn on it, and I had him on it for probably a couple of months. And then we went to Australia. And so when we left, I was like, I'm going to make it super simple. I'm going to take them off the supplements so that it's really easy for people that are feeding. And we left and we came back. And it was really interesting because I could see a difference in him. But one side effect of using the exercise that I did not hear advertised anywhere, but it was that he has the oral plaques in his ear, right? And so he has training like crazy. And he will he will totally tolerate and he doesn't evade me. But you can also see him wince in pain when you handle the one ear that has has it in it. And when he went on the thrive, the first thing we noticed was that sensitivity was dramatically. I'm talking like 90% cut. And it was. And so it was like, is this just a side effect? Well, when we went to Australia and then came back, he was right back to super sensitive. And so it was interesting that before you even touched him, to get him out of the pasture to see the rest of what was going on, you can judge it by what's happening as almost like the rest of his body being affected because isn't it? Basically, it's like an anti-inflammatory. Is that correct?

Speaker4:
Yeah. So yeah, it's interesting you say that what what it does is it does not have an effect on the the circulating inflammatory enzymes. Okay. What are what's there is there it's like you blocks those from causing pain or banamine or these insects block that cascade. What it does is it turns the production of these inflammatory enzymes down. It kind of cuts the source it down. It's kind of it's kind of like gene therapy where it affects the the production of these inflammatory enzymes. So we know that with inflammation the body's actively making more inflammatory enzymes all the time. So if you can cut that down, what you've done is you decrease the inflammation not by blocking it but by suppressing it. And it's pretty it's pretty neat. It's pretty neat. So I'm not surprised to hear you say that.

Speaker5:
Yeah. And it's essentially like, if you haven't heard of it before, this is very related to like the red wine health claims for that. Yeah.

Speaker4:
Exactly. Yeah. That's what resveratrol in red wine does is it suppresses the inflammation in your body. And inflammation is what makes us age and hurt. Right. So age slower and we and we don't hurt as much.

Speaker5:
Well from a from a owner's standpoint, what I know is I've got a very perky 16 year old horse that I was kind of thinking was going to be, you know, just kind of taking it easy and working on the good days and not doing so much on, on the not so good days. And, and now he's tearing around the field and chasing the youngsters around. So yeah. He's back. Yeah.

Speaker4:
Well it's it's neat. It helps in recovery. It helps, uh, you know, inflammation is what basically slows us all down. And if you can slow that inflammation production down, you feel better. That's exactly what I did. Yeah. Well, thank you.

Speaker5:
For thank you for explaining it in more detail.

Speaker4:
Yeah, you're quite welcome. Thanks for having me. Thanks.

Speaker2:
If you'd like to learn more about thrive. Visit thrive.com. Popcorn uses the Equa thrive joint pellets. If you decide that thrive is a good fit for your horse, use the code Stacy Stacy at checkout to receive 10% off plus free shipping. Thanks to thrive for sponsoring the podcast. Thanks to Doctor Monte for joining me, and thank you for listening. I'll talk to you again in the next episode.

Speaker1:
If you enjoy listening to Stacy's podcast, please visit Stacy Westfall. Com for articles, videos and tips to help you and your horse succeed.

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