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The Story of Leo
by Maggie Owens
I
thought you might like to read about Leo, a horse who made a miraculous
recovery and led to the creation of Gen-A-Horse -- the first biotin
supplement for horses.
For
many years, my father and I took lessons at a hack barn in Staten
Island. In the mid-80's I got my own horse, an unpapered Morgan gelding
I named Sir Galahad, and we moved him to a quieter private stable on
another part of the island. We still had many friends at the old stable
and we often saw them at shows and foxhunts. (Being animal lovers, we
never participate in real foxhunting, but we enjoy mock hunts and
hunter paces tremendously.)
In
late 1983, several friends from the old stable mentioned that a horse
we had ridden often, Leo, had foundered a number of times and looked
like he was at death's door. They wondered if he would last until
spring. His condition was complicated by routine mistreatment -- he was
often sent out on a dozen rides a day, and allowed to eat and drink
without even a short walk to cool off.
Both
of us had a special fondness for Leo -- he was so beautiful and had
such a wonderful personality. We felt that we should go see for
ourselves how our old friend was doing. Our friends hadn't exaggerated.
Poor Leo could barely walk. Most of his coat that was covered with
mange and he was uniformly lackluster and dirty, all his ribs were
showing and his hips jutted out so far, he was just a bunch of crazy
angles. All that beautiful spirit was gone from his eyes. Leo was a
papered quarter horse, just twelve years old, but he looked like a 30
year-old nag, and an ugly one at that.
We
decided that we owed it to Leo to take him away from that place, and
try to nurse him back to health. We thought that if he recovered, we'd
put him in a nice pasture and let him live out any remaining days in
peace.
We
purchased him for $700 (far more than he was worth by any standard
other than love) and trailered him down to the stables where Galahad
lived.
Both
the vet and the farrier paid Leo a visit. The vet wormed him, floated
his teeth for the first time in years, and gave me medicine to put on
the mange that covered his body. The vet agreed that we'd never be able
to ride him again, but thought that he had a chance of recovering
enough to live happily in a pasture. He thought that Leo had perhaps
two years to live.
The
farrier agreed that we'd never ride Leo again. He was shocked at the
condition of his feet -- he'd never seen such a bad case of founder
before. Leo's soles had dropped below the two shoes that hadn't yet
fallen off. It was obvious that each step was painful for him. His hoof
walls were so weak, cracked and crumbly that the farrier said it would
be best to let him go without shoes for at least a couple of months. He
recommended a number of different hoof dressings we could use to help
the dryness a bit, but said there was nothing we could do for his
dropped and tender soles. He thought we should wait and pray that his
hooves would grow enough to hold shoes.
We
gave Leo a great big loose box and bedded it with plenty of fresh clean
straw. He was turned out in a paddock every day for an hour or so, but
he would just stand by the gate looking downcast and depressed. Each
day after I finished riding and grooming Galahad, I'd feed Leo some
carrots, groom him and apply his mange medicine. In a few days, he
started to look happier (but no healthier) and it was obvious that he
enjoyed the attention.
After
a couple of weeks, I remembered reading an article in Equus magazine
about a study that had been done in England about the effects of biotin
on foundered horses. The study had proved that in many cases, dished
hooves, dropped soles, and weak, cracked and crumbling hoof walls could
be cured or improved by feeding 15mg of biotin a day. In vain, we
searched for a biotin supplement, but found none. Finally, we went to
the health food store and bought the largest jar of biotin tablets we
could find. I knew there was no way I could make Leo swallow a few
dozen pills a day, so each day I crushed them with a mortar and pestle,
mixed it with oats (to cover the bitter taste of the carrier) and
sprinkled it over the top of Leo's feed.
At
first, everyone at the barn thought I was crazy, but then again, they
already thought I was crazy for believing that Leo could be saved. But
they quickly changed their minds. In three weeks, his hooves showed so
much improvement, he was able to walk more comfortably. Since biotin is
a water-soluble vitamin and the risk of overdose was virtually
non-existent, I upped his dosage to 30mg a day.
Not
only was crushing dozens of pills a day time-consuming, it was also
very expensive. The health food storeowner joked that I was his best
customer. My father and I contacted a number of large vitamin
manufacturers and finally purchased 5kg of pure powdered human-grade
biotin (enough to feed 15mg a day to all the horses in the barn for 6
months!). It was so pure, it was impossible to measure a 30mg dose or
to mix it with his feed and still be sure that Leo got to eat it. We
tried mixing it in various percentages with a number of different
carriers, and finally found that ground rice hulls worked best -- the
texture mixed well with the powdered biotin, it keeps well, it's
natural, contains nothing harmful, and actually contains a little
biotin. The final tester of our mixture was Leo. (Despite his
condition, he was a finicky eater.) He thought it was so tasty, he
would eat it right from my hand! Certainly an improvement over the
bitter crushed pills!
Six
short weeks after he first staggered into the barn, Leo was wearing
shoes again (the farrier was dumbstruck) and could occasionally be seen
frisking around in the paddock. His mange was gone and his coat started
to shine. Dapples that we didn't know existed started to appear. Leo
wasn't exactly the picture of health, but he looked a lot better. Two
months after that, Leo bore no resemblance to the pitiful animal that
had first stumbled off the trailer. He had a bright gleam in his eyes.
He nickered when I walked into the barn with his carrots, and was
running and bucking in the paddock like a colt! His ribs weren't
showing any more, and hips weren't sticking out so far. He got his
second set of shoes. The farrier and vet both remarked that they had
never seen anything like it; the barn owner and the other horse owners
were astounded! Many people started asking us to mix this biotin
supplement for them, and so Gen-A-Horse was created and Nickers
International was formed.
Right
after Leo got his second set of shoes, it occurred to me that maybe it
would be okay to ride Leo every so often. The farrier and the vet
couldn't see any reason why not. What a handful he had become! No
longer was Leo the docile old gentleman we knew at the hack barn -- he
was full of spirit. My father started riding him, and found that it was
best to let him spend a half hour "getting the bucks out" before
getting on.
We
were both so pleased -- now we were finally able to go riding together.
We called the people with the pasture and told them that we wouldn't be
bringing Leo there anytime soon.
Late
that summer, my father entered Leo in a hunter class at a small local
show. It was pretty informal, and strictly just- for-fun, so we didn't
bother with braids or show sheen, just a quick bath and thorough
brushing. Old friends didn't recognize Leo and asked when we got the
beautiful quarter horse! They wanted to know what we put on his coat to
make it so shiny and we speculated that it had something to do with the
Gen-A-Horse.
By
that time, I had started feeding Gen-A-Horse to Galahad. He already had
great hooves, but I figured it every little bit helps -- especially for
a horse in such heavy training. It was soon obvious that his coat
looked a lot better, too. Later that year, we sponsored more research,
and Gen-A-Coat was born.
My
father and Leo formed a very strong bond. It was obvious that my father
got along much better with Leo than I did, and I was happy to let him
assume full care of Leo -- balancing the care and exercise of two
horses with my teaching schedule (my instructor had recently turned a
number of his beginner students over to me) and school had become a
little tiring! My father had more time to devote to Leo. He rode him
several times a week and really pampered him. He began taking all his
lessons on Leo, and eventually got the okay from the vet and the
farrier to let him do a little jumping! These two distinguished
gentlemen were the picture of elegance both on the local trails and at
the small shows.
Two
years later, one of my students was preparing to ride in her first
horse trial. But a week before the event, her horse injured herself
while turned out, and the vet said she would have to spend a month
recovering before being ridden. I considered letting my student ride
Galahad, but she was new to eventing, and Galahad was notoriously
uncooperative in the dressage ring, and a bit too much of a handful on
the cross-country. Suddenly it occurred to me that despite his lack of
dressage training, Leo would be a perfect substitute. After all, my
student was entered in pre-training level -- the dressage was not too
demanding and well within Leo's capabilities.
I
cautioned my student not to get her hopes up about winning a ribbon.
After all, it was her first event and Leo's first event, and she'd only
ridden Leo twice before. I'm not sure who deserved more credit for the
second place ribbon they took, but they certainly deserved it! We knew
that Leo didn't have much of a future as an event horse -- we'd decided
to limit his jumping in quantity and height, and my father preferred to
be mainly a pleasure rider. But they certainly presented a beautiful
picture at Devon when he was invited to be an outrider. Leo certainly
didn't know his limitations -- he thought he should follow the advanced
horses over the big oxer he was posted by. In 1990, when he was 18, we
lost Leo to a heart attack. The vet speculated that he had suffered
irrecoverable damage from not being wormed regularly for so many years
at the hack barn. We were sad to lose him, but comforted in the
knowledge that he was happy, healthy and well cared-for in his last six
years. We imagine that in horse heaven, he's instructing the other
horses on the finer points of running, playing, and carrot-eating. This
isn't an ad -- everything in the story is true. Would Leo have lived
six years without Gen-A-Horse? Maybe. Would he have been as happy? I
don't think so. Would we have been able to ride him? I'm sure we
wouldn't have. Perhaps Leo's big heart, and all the love we gave him
helped. I know that there is no miracle cure. But if you love your
horse, he deserves the best. Give him Gen-A-Horse and tell him Leo's
story.
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