Horse
  Savvy
      Ranch

Cindy Schleuss, Owner
BRUNO
Photo by Julie Colt
This is a story of a horse that beat the odds.  A story of a woman's love of her horse no matter what he could or could not do. 

When Bruno first came into my life, I was not certain how I would be able to help him.  He was a gangly 18 hand five year old appendix quarter horse with no hind end muscling to speak of.  This was not because of lack of groceries or lack of trying, it was simply the way it was. 

So what happened anyway? 

I can only surmise what happened because I have no evidence.  Let's start with his physical issues.  First there is the arthritic stifle on the right hind.  Then there was the inability to build muscle in the hind end.  The lack of control of his urination as well as the lack of the "position to urinate".  Lastly there is the white hairs that are on the left side of his tail head.  The  best I could come up with was that he had a tail block that went wrong.  Instead of it eliminating the swishing tail, it instead went up the spine causing partial paralysis from the tail head to the middle of the loin.

So what did we do?

Well, first things first.  In order to build something one must have a solid foundation.  Bruno did not have a solid foundation.  The lines drawn on the front legs reflect this.  The yellow lines (the ones that are perpendicular to the ground) show how Bruno's body weight is distributed to the ground.  The red lines (the ones that are following the coronary band) show how uneven his lateral / medial support is.  Add the fact that Bruno has feet that all farriers dread, a foot with a thin sole and very shallow wall. What a mess.  This, compounded with his size, makes it even more challenging.  I knew I was going to need a farrier that would be willing to go out on a limb and have some creative ideas to help get Bruno's feet in balance.  Mike Chisham was the man for the job.  He not only had a way to balance the foot more correctly to the ground but he also had different size nails to accommodate the different wall thickness's.  Instead of putting 3 to 4 of the standard nails into Bruno's hoof he used 5 to 6 thin nails to provide the same security.




With Bruno's new feet we then put him to work.  My philosophy is that muscle supports bone and if this horse was to have any chance at all we had to find a way to build the muscle system of his hind end.  Bruno had already done all of the walk portion of his rehabilitation before he came to my barn which gave me more room to be bold in my approach to challenge his body.  So we started with 40 foot long lines and a circingle and got Bruno to drive from a lunging position around the arena.  If he bolted or spooked we just kept him straight and balanced as best we could until his brain and feet came back to earth.  We quickly added ground poles and then cavalletis, not only for the muscle building portion needed for his hind quarters, but also to give his mind something to focus on.  We varied his workout to two days of walking / trotting basic dressage tests and cavalleti work to one day of cantering on a circle the size of a 100 x 100 arena.

September 2, 2006
Two months into the training program Bruno still was not building muscle in his croup.  After discussing this with his owner, Amelia Mazer, we decided to put him on the herbs I have been using on other horses. The one in particular that I was hoping would assist us to fire his cells to rebuild his body was the comfrey root powder.  It is a "miracle drug " in my book as it had saved my horse Vinnie's life.  It worked like a charm.  Bruno started to build muscle.  Soon he was strong enough to carry weight on his back so we mixed it up and lunged him three times a week with the saddle on.  We continued to support his "push power" from the hind end by using the sliding side reins.  We use this tool to match resistance so as to build a balanced body not to confine or restrict the horse's head.  It works something like using a wall to do push ups on versus doing the push ups against nothing.  Soon Amelia, a petite young woman, was able to ride Bruno for his cool out. 
September 30, 2006
February 26, 2007
Lateral side
Medial side
So all was going well until it wasn't.  Bruno's body decided to expose more truths for us to ponder on and try to rectify.  First, he decides to bolt thru the arena fence while we were doing a photo shoot, then he blows 2 quarter cracks one on each medial wall of the front feet.  Now, remember his conformation and how his body weight wants to drive into the medial side of his hoofs? Well, it sent us back to the drawing board and to a different farrier.  We did not change farriers because we did not think Mike Chisham could not do the job, but because John Suttle just happen to be at my barn at the same time our veterinarian Dr. Cassandra Schuler was.  I believe there are no accidents.  With their help we were able to take the pressure off of the quarter cracks and keep Bruno in work.


So what caused Bruno to bolt thru the fence?

At the time he did it, we had no idea.  One minute he is running around the arena bucking and having fun, the next minute he is crashing thru the fence and running up the hill.  It wasn't until we were reviewing the pictures that the truth was revealed.  These funny looking bumps appeared from the tail head up to the loin in the last three photos that were shot.  I believe these to be nerve fire.  If my theory holds true then what happened was that the nerve fire was slowly building as Bruno was running around.  Once it hit a level that felt like he was  "shot out of a cannon" ,he no longer saw his environment and ran thru the fence.  Any of you who have a horse that will  "out of the blue" start bucking until you are in the dirt will understand this.
Quarter crack
Lucky for us Bruno did not hurt himself.  For safety reasons we did not free lunge him nor did we ride him.  I used MRT to change the nerve fire patten and we found that the topical lotion called Anti-Itch made by Derma-e worked well to keep the nerves calm and cool.  When we no longer saw the bumps and he consistently maintained a safe work ethic, Amelia climbed back on board and we have never looked back. 

Photo by Julie Colt
Photo by Julie Colt
Photo by Julie Colt
May 5, 2007
August 1, 2007
June 25, 2008
March 2, 2007
March 12, 2007
Lateral side
For a horse that was deemed a lost cause, Bruno has amazed us all.  I thank Amelia for throwing caution to the wind numerous times and trusting my ideas of how to best build her horse's body.  Although Bruno still has some urinary issues and arthritis in his right stifle he is holding strong and sound.  Amelia and Bruno just recently rode with clinician Claus Bergener (June 25, 2008 photo) where for the first time he rode a medium trot without a hitch.  It was completely even and rhythmic.  Even I had to eat my words because I was certain Bruno would not be able to perform an even strided medium trot because of the arthritis in the right stifle.

To this day it brings me joy to watch Amelia and Bruno.  Her constant praise of his efforts and her lovely smile keep reminding me of what I do all of this for.