Is there another horse stalled nearby? Does the company he keeps make any difference? Just wondering if there might be another horse (or other companion animal) that might help him feel calm. I have my doubts that a calming supplement would do enough to change this behavior. My horse will pace in a stall if he’s alone…but is completely fine if another horse is next door. I understand you not wanting to leave him out at night, but if your fences are secure I would probably choose that over him being miserable all night long.
Agree with others that stall walking/pacing may not be helped by a calming supplement.
That said, I’ve had my mare on SmartCalm since mid-2008 and I do notice a difference when she’s off it. I started with Quiessence, but it made her nuts! For her, SmartCalm is more to help with focus than calmness… she is very distractible!
[QUOTE=quietann;6134553]
. . .That said, I’ve had my mare on SmartCalm since mid-2008 and I do notice a difference when she’s off it. I started with Quiessence, but it made her nuts! For her, SmartCalm is more to help with focus than calmness… she is very distractible![/QUOTE]
Amen to that. Money was tight and I took my mare off SmartCalm for a couple of months. Holy rocket spook, Batman! I put her back on as soon as I could and I’ll not skimp on that again.
Eileen
Another vote for SmartCalm Ultra. I was very skeptical, but it has worked wonders for my anxious OTTB.
Quiessence!
You might want to try a stainless steel mirror. We used it for a mare we had that did walk around quite a bit and it worked. A friend used it for a young horse he had that required stall rest for a couple of months. Worked for him as well. He was the one who sold me his when the youngster was off stall rest.
We just drilled holes in it an screwed it to the wall.
I have found Quietex powder to be really useful in helping horses get used to scary situations, I don’t know about using it long term and it you can’t use it at shows but might be helpful in teaching your guy to relax indoors and set up a new behavior pattern.
I used it for getting my mare used to trailering, when she was younger she would get really anxious and sweaty in the trailer, the Quietex took the edge off and helped her relax, now the trailer is no big deal, I feel it helped (in combination with short low stress trips) give her a good experience.
I use smart calm ultra on my easily distracted mare. She’s one of those that has to look carefully at every single new thing, three times.
It has really helped. I find that she is just much easier to focus.
She was never super spooky, but I find that adding the smart calm has helped me keep her attention.
The barn is designed so that the walls in between stalls have spaces in between to help air flow but also the horses can see each other through them. He has horses next to him on both sides as well as across from him. He can hang his head out of the stall door into the aisleway and his pastured with his buddies when he is out. I am not really sure why he seems nervous. He always seems fine when I am around. I never see him pace he always looks completely content and happy but everyone else (other boarders and the owner) has said when I am not around he paces and paces. There is a well defined circle path in his stall every morning. When i ride him he is calm and quiet, rarely spooks at shows he is quiet for the most part. I guess he is only nervous when I am not around. He paces if he is in a stall and he paces if he is out in the pasture. He is hard to keep weight on in the summer. So I make sure to fatten him up a bit in the winter to avoid him being super skinny. The amount of hay and grain my horse gets is completely ridiculous. I just want to make him feel at ease and at this point I am willing to try just about anything.
Have you treated him for ulcers or had him scoped? This is pretty classic symptoms, and I would explore this first if you haven’t done so already.
I have one that is like that and I tried various calming things with limited success for years. Then I put him on omeprazole (the “pop rocks” from the horse care forum discussions). The pacing was almost completely eliminated within a few days, and he finally started lying down to sleep more regularly.
He has been on a daily maintenance dose for about a year now. Because he is so high strung, I occasionally will give him B1 for a few days in a row (because stressing out depletes this vitamin). Sometimes I have to up the omeprazole for a few days in a row, then drop back to the maintenance dose.
I guess a life of leisure gets stressful sometimes – dang redheads.:rolleyes:
See if he’ll make friends with a goat & leave it in the stall with him if you’re able. Works on some.
I"ve used the smartcalm ultra with great success and it’s OK for shows, too.
I’ve used smartcalm ultra with great success and it’s OK for shows. too.
MagRestore from PerformanceEquineUSA!!
My clyde x tb came home frazzled and non-focused. I put him on the MagRestore and within 7 days - I could see a difference.
He took his first “field trip” last weekend off the farm for a clinic. I changed his Mag from 40g to 60g the night before and morning of. HUGE help. He kept his calm and was quite focused the whole time.
It is fabulous stuff! Carla is wonderful and VERY helpful!!
The Chinese herbal Shen Calmer worked wonders for a horse of mine, years ago. It’s available through vets: http://www.tcvmherbal.com/store/topFormula.asp?cid=5
Equilite’s Relax DOES NOT work. My horse was a chronic stall walker so he was pasture boarded since I bought him…until he had a suspensory injury and needed stall rest. He weaved and paced and circled and pivoted on that hind leg for five months. Relax didn’t do a thing except put him off his food (it’s stinky stuff).
The strange thing is that he now loves being in a stall. I don’t know what happened to him but since leaving the farm where he needed stall rest (he was pasture boarded there too), he’s been fine. He’s been in a shedrow with a dutch door, and now an inside stall with bars on the front and one wall, and he doesn’t mind. Maybe it’s something they grow out of at some point. He’s in his late 20s so you have a ways to go yet, but he actually paces the fenceline to come inside now.
I swear by Smartcalm Ultra! Even my trainer asked what I was using, it made a huge difference in my mare. I use the powder since it’s less expensive and she loves it.
I have heard ‘chill’ works to calm horses quite nicely.
May I ask, for those who did, did you start supplementing with magnesium? What symptoms did your horse have?
thx
Does he have hay the entire time he’s in the stall? I would certainly start with that.
Is it possible to leave him in a pasture 24/7? (I’m guessing not.)
I believe if this were my horse, I’d tie him in the stall, as others have suggested. In the good ol’ days, many horses lived like that. I know it’s not ideal, but assuming you can’t have him out 24/7, I’d probably try this.
For me, I didnt know anything about calming supplements or anything. I just thought that was how my mare was. When I was a working student at a dressage farm here in 2004, the trainer had her nutritionist come by and check out the horses. That was my first time learning that there were other things out there than just feed and hay. He suggested B1 and Mag 3000 from Smartpak to help with her tension and weaving. I tried it and saw little to no difference but I kept her on it for a year hoping that it would “build up” and work. Nope. I tried ex stress, quiessense (sp), mare magic, and quietex. All a no go. So I had come to terms with the fact that my mare was just that way. No supplement was going to fix that. And yes, I address ulcers, feed, turnout, etc. Her being at home and only in to eat did help but not remarkably.
My friend has a very sensitive and reactive swedish wb mare who has tried more things than I have. She heard about the magnesium from Performance Equine and decided what the heck. She had tried everything else. What was $15. She had amazing results and kept telling me about it. I seriously told her NO that I wasnt going to waste any more money on supplements for my mare as she is the way she is.
After 6 months of her telling me to try it, I finally said I would try it ONLY if she would agree to stop bugging me to try it. So I did. And as I mentioned in my posts above, amazing results. I am a firm believer. And I am one of those people where I need to see it to believe it. Well trust me, I believe it and that is why I am so vocal about sharing my experiences with it. Maybe there is someone out there like I was who doesnt know about the difference forms of magnesium and how some horses need a more therapudic dose in a sense to help them. But I had given up and just accepted that was how my mare was. And now, to see how content and relaxed she is with all things in her life, it makes me so happy to know that I finally found something that worked.
