True Supplement Candidates
Horses that are overly sensitive to touch or sounds, are genuinely fearful, nervous or anxious in predictable situations, where physical and training issues have definitely been ruled out—and you’re sure it’s not just a matter of the horse being naturally high-spirited—may be helped by the correct supplement. Another scenario for supplement use is horses on forced stall rest. Once you have determined a calming supplement may be useful, the next step is actually picking one.

To Longe Or Not To Longe

Longeing before you ride is a common method for letting the horse “get his bucks out” and it works—if you don’t go too far. Longeing a horse that’s feeling good for a few minutes can let him kick and play before he has to work, but if the horse is routinely longed to the point he’s actually getting tired, all you’re doing is getting him fit. A better approach is more turnout. If extended turnout isn’t an option at your facility, at least try to get use of a small paddock or round pen before you ride, an area where he can’t really run at high speeds at will but has enough room to let off steam and roll. Turn him loose until antics subside. The Abused Horse Rescuing a horse from an abusive situation is a noble gesture, and we applaud anyone who has done this. However, many of these horses come with “emotional baggage” that shows up as behavior issues. A horse that has been physically abused will have learned a deep distrust of people and most likely an even deeper distrust of people who resemble the previous abusing owner. Horses that have been beaten for exhibiting behaviors they can’t truly control will become increasingly difficult to handle. This reaction can take many forms, including being easily startled, evasive of contact, extremely fearful or even quite aggressive.

These horses should always be considered dangerous in the sense that you can’t always accurately predict what might trigger a memory and cause the horse to act in self-defense in a way that could get you injured. You can’t really “blame” the horse for this, nor can you train them out it, or supplement them out of it. It simply takes time to regain their trust. If you have no experience with an abused horse, you definitely should get professional guidance. When handled properly by someone knowledgeable, these horses often form strong bonds, but there are many do’s and don’ts along the way. Horses that have been starved but not necessarily physically abused otherwise can also be a problem. Even long past the time when they have regained their weight and should “know” that they can count on being regularly fed, they will often be protective of food, to the point that feeding in a group situation might not be an option. You also need to be careful about getting too close to the horse when he is eating. Note: Be aware that, in some horses, aggressive behavior caused by abuse may reappear at any time, even with good, loving care. Precautions and proper handling may be needed long-term.

Products
In our “Ingredients And Typical Effects” chart on page 6, we’ve listed the ingredients you’re likely to find in calming products. Unfortunately, little solid equine-specific information is available, so we’re forced to give you common human conditions.

In our own field trials and experience with horses and calming supplements, we’ve found the best results with thiamine, magnesium or combinations of the two when dealing with horses that are excessively nervous, easily startled and over-reactive. Horses that became pushy or aggressive when worked up also responded but not completely.

Overall, we’ve found the best responses were to magnesium in the range of 3 to 10 grams/day. The level of magnesium naturally present in most horses’ diets is considerably below the 1.5:1 to 2:1 ratio of calcium:magnesium recommended by some equine nutritionists.

If the horse isn’t receiving grain or doesn’t accept powders well, we found Foxden’s Quiessence pellets effective and palatable.

Vitamin B can sometimes enhance the response to magnesium. Horses are calmer but alert and full coordinated, not at all “drugged.”

Thiamine has a long history of use as a calming supplement for horses, either orally or intravenously by a vet in combination with calcium. It doesn’t work 100% of the time, but when it does the results are very good with nervous and anxious horses. Dosage is 500 to 1000 mg/day.

Of the available herbal supplements, valerian produces the most obvious effects.  With valerian-only, it takes about a week to see a difference, while with valerian-combination products, some calming was noted in a few days, more noticeable after 10 days to three weeks.

Desensitizing

Many classical training/learning techniques are routinely used in dealing with horses. These include: Positive Reinforcement: Treats for properly performed tricks/tasks, a pat, a “good boy.” Negative Reinforcement: Removal of a negative stimulus as reward – e.g. release of bit pressure when the horse slows or stops. Punishment: Use of spurs or crop if the horse does not respond to weight, legs or voice. A 2006 study performed at the Danish Institute of Agricultural Sciences looked at the response to some traditional learning tools when the goal was to eliminate fearfulness. They used two-year-old stallions and a flapping white plastic bag as the scary stimulus. They used five three-minute training sessions per day. Methods tested were: Habituation: Exposure to the full stimulus. Desensitization: Horses were gradually introduced to the bag, then to gradual increases in its movement. The horse did not move onto the next step until it had shown no reaction to the previous one. Counter-conditioning. The horse was given positive reinforcement (food) immediately before being exposed to the full stimulus. The horses trained by the desensitization method showed fewer flight responses and required fewer training sessions in total to learn to accept the frightening bag. “Sacking out” is desensitization. Another example of putting this into practice would be horses frightened of clippers. To follow this method, you would allow the horse to see the clippers and cords at a distance then up close, moving on to touching the horse with them around his head and forequarters, then all over his body. The next step would be turning them on at a distance, and moving closer in increments. Final desensitization would involve touching the horse for brief periods with the vibrating clippers, all over his body, finally actually clipping. Keep the steps small, and don’t move on until the horse is showing no fearful reactions.

While the horses were calmer, or even “dopey” in their stalls, the effects didn’t necessarily hold when the horse was stimulated. Horses that were hard to handle in the paddock, or spooky on rides, seemed to often snap out of the effects of valerian entirely under those conditions, but it’s a good choice for a horse on stall confinement.

Bottom Line
Before reaching for a calming supplement, take a detailed look at your problem to see if management changes or training aren’t better solutions. Make sure there’s no physical cause for the horse’s behavior, that you’re not actually over-mounted, that the horse enjoys the type of work you want from him and that you’re not mistaking a naturally high energy level and zest for life for a behavior problem. You can’t change personality.

If it truly is a situation where a supplement might help, first try adding magnesium oxide or thiamine alone to the horse’s diet. If this doesn’t work, we’d consider a commercial product that combines these ingredients. The nutritional approaches gave more consistent and reliable results with our test horses.

Of the products we’ve used, Seroquine, At Ease and ExStress produced excellent, solid results in our field-trial horses. Seroquine gets the nod for potency and price.

If your nervous horse also gets aggressive, we suggest you try either L-tryptophan alone, as is found in B-Kalm paste (which may work at even a half dose), or in combination with magnesium and B vitamins, a combo we like in At Ease.

Effects with the herbal-based products were milder and less reliable in our test horses, but with valerian producing the most obvious effects when dosing was high enough. Equilite’s Equine Relax Blend, the valerian-based formula, worked the best. Its combination of valerian with milder but more-rapid-acting herbs produced results quickly with peak effect in about two weeks.