An Animal Owner's Manual

This work is very important and helpful for your animal/pet but is in no way a substitute for seeing a veterinarian regularly. Vets will keep the animal up on vaccinations and other needs that we will not address. Even if you see amazing dramatic results from the work we do here please make sure you have your pet properly scheduled for vet appointments.

There are many components to health. I cannot stress enough the importance of a whole systems approach rather than a symptom treating approach. Whole systems approach means that you search for the root causes and treat symptoms only for the animal's comfort while fully expecting the body to treat those symptoms itself once proper function is restored.

Proper nutrition is another extremely important key to health, and one that we can easily control. We recommend that dogs be on an enzyme and (intermittent) glucosamine. There are a lot of brands out there and many aren't compounded well or made from quality ingredients so are not effective. We like Dr. Bussan's supplements for dogs and feel they are made well and therefore work for the animal. For horses our research has led us to Sierra Gold supplement. S.G. comes in formulas for grass and for alfalfa fed horses. Please see the links page for both dog (Dr. Bussan's supplements) and horse (Sierra Gold) recommendations.

Bioavailability is important in supplements meaning the form of the vitamin needs to be one the animal can use. The oxide form, for example, is not very bioavailable, so you'd want to look for say magnesium sulfate over magnesium oxide, zinc sulfate over zinc oxide, etc. Many vitamins may be listed on the label but may not be in a useable form as most animal supplement manufacturers buy the by-products from companies making human supplements, meaning that when there's nothing left over in the process but an unusable form of the vitamin then they sell that so that the animal food manufacturer can list the name of the unusable vitamin on the label. Many "senior formulas" do this at the expense of your older pet so that they can display a long list of vitamin ingredients. The people at Sierra Gold have spent a lot of time researching what horses need and how to get it in them in a way they can absorb and use.

Pesticide use in barns is an issue of concern for us. Pesticides have a deleterious effect on the nervous system and whether we like it or not are affecting our horses the people around them, and the environment and food chain as a whole. We suggest using fly predators and natural products when appropriate, and we never ever suggest using neurotoxins (that is the category into which pesticides fall). If your horse has been exposed to pesticide use long or short term we suggest gentle detoxification support (for the both of you).