If you’re reading this, chances are you have a special horse (or two) in your life and are curious about enrichment — how to make their world more stimulating, playful, and fulfilling. My goal is to bring those two worlds together: your love for your horses and the concept of enrichment. With the right ideas, you can make their daily lives more interesting, movement-rich, and deeply worth living.

How injury, overwork, and a culture of endurance are pushing Canada’s equine vets to the limit. With an ongoing equine veterinarian shortage in Canada, there’s a concern that equine vets, already stretched thin, are also being injured at work at alarming rates.

After many years as a dressage instructor and trainer, I received a phone call requesting help for an unlikely candidate — an Icelandic mare whose natural gait had disappeared, replaced by a shuffling amble-like movement. Little did I realize how many other gaited horses — from Foxtrotters to Tennessee Walkers — would soon follow.

During the switch to a 100 percent hay diet in the fall of the year is when many horse owners first notice that some of their horses are getting loose manure. The situation can quickly evolve into a management mess where one or more horses are so loose they can spray fecal material on the walls of the stall when they pass manure. Winter grooming becomes a major challenge for those who care for these horses as they struggle to keep tails, hocks, fetlocks, and equine clothing clean and free of encrusted manure.

Looking back, it is difficult to imagine how close two horses came to dying alone on a mountainside — and how a community’s determination turned that near tragedy into a story of hope that still resonates years later.