By Caroline Ingraham

I was contacted by an owner who was at the end of her tether with a horse that had been hit with a rake some years earlier. He had galloped for about a mile with the rake hanging from his side. As a result he had developed intense nervous behavior, spooking at everything. He responded to five oils: rose otto, orange blossom (neroli), violet leaf, frankincense and jasmine. The first three he took by licking with the underneath of his tongue, which offers a faster route into the blood than the top of the tongue. He then pushed his nose into the hand offering frankincense, effectively massaging it into his nostrils; and the jasmine he just smelt for a long time, whistling into the bottle, but did not want it applied and had no interest in licking it. An hour later he was then taken for a gentle hack. During this exercise some cows stampeded in a nearby field. Although the other horses present jumped violently at this, he just stood, looked at the commotion and walked on. Previous to the treatment the swish of another horses tail would have caused him to spook.

The next day he chose to lick the jasmine as well. He had no further interest in the frankincense, which indicated that the oil had already eased his deep-rooted fears. He was drawn to the remaining oils for a further two weeks, but after the first application it seemed that most of the work had been done and the horse was again the calm animal he had formerly been.

Case study 2

The horse was kicked in the field under the forearm. The injury was cleaned with antiseptic, but two days later the leg blew up and the knee was about the size of a football. There was no time to call the vet as the owner had to attend a funeral, so she decided to try some yarrow. The leg was bathed in warm water which had two drops of yarrow added to it, and a drop of undiluted yarrow was also applied to the wound. The horse was offered the aroma to inhale before each application.

When the aroma was first presented to the horse he puckered his lips and tried to eat the bottle. He took the oil orally and the next day the swelling was greatly reduced. The owner once again offered the yarrow aroma to him but this time there was only a moderate interest, he continued to give several licks of the oil but less enthusiastically; the following day the leg was almost back to normal but there was still a slight interest in the oil. He did not take it orally so the treatment was applied externally only. On the fourth day there was no further interest in the aroma and the leg was back to normal with no sign of swelling.