The natural treatment of colic in horses is always most effective if it deals with the cause. So you need to work out the cause of your horse’s colic.
Colic can occur from ingesting too much grain or any food that they normally don’t eat much.Horses need to get used to any new food slowly, as they need to breed up the right amount of gut bacteria to digest the new food. Each different food needs the optimum amount of the correct bacteria. It can come from not eating enough bulk.
Antibiotics can also create colic.
Since most colic in horses occur at the weekends, I consider this the key to one type of colic. The weekends are when most people ride or work their horses. We put these highly strung and sensitive creatures under enormous strain, without any conscious awareness of what we are doing.
Horses, being obliging, do their best to perform for us. Even their best efforts can be poorly received by some.
As horses are prey animals, their basic instincts are to be alert for every possible danger. By asking them to perform in unnatural surrounding, we are creating a lot of tension. You’ll often find that the top performing horses are irritable, even angry horses.
Little wonder.
This tension can create all sorts of problems, from anger down to muscular tension. This can lead to spasms, a tense back or colic.
I have often heard that ‘the jury is still out’ on how to treat colic in horses. It will always ‘be out’ because there can never be just one or two treatments for any condition. First the cause needs to be known – over or under feeding or stress, for example. Then the very personal symptoms of the horse needs to be monitored. A horse wanting to roll is showing a very different symptom from one who arches his back, or one who refuses to move an inch.
It is these personal differences which will lead a professional homeopath to a curative medicine, one which is also likely to prevent further episodes of colic.