There
is no food pyramid for horses.
No Dr.Atkins andno South Beach
Diet.Therearen’t anyretirement
villagesforsenior horses, either.
What’sa horse owner to do? How can
apotentialhorse owner or other equine
enthusiast get the knowledge they hunger
for?
Finally, there is a place to find all of the credible
information they could want and it is as close as the TV
remote.
Beginning Sept. 21, RFD-TV will bring its viewers the first-ever series
devoted to all levels and areas of equine care. From the same producer as The
Cattle
Show comes Horse Sense, a 13-week series covering issues including nutrition
and reconditioning,
metabolic disorders in the performance horse, basic management for first-time
owners, and many more.
Nutrena, who shares a partnership in the quest to produce this series, will sponsor
10 of the episodes.
Horse Sense isn’t just about information, though. The show is full of beautiful
video footage from a variety
of locations across the United States. Sites include KESMARC, a state-of-the-art
facility with equine
swimming pools and aqa-trends in Kentucky as well as beautiful ranches across
America. Even people who
don’t own horses will appreciate the breath-taking views and beautiful
animals.
LZ, the show’s executive producer, says Horse Sense was created to fill
a
void in equine educational programming.
“There are many great shows related to training and
handling our equine athletes,” she says. “It just made
good horse sense to create a series that focused on the
animal and how to care for it.”
LZ says the show has been in the works
for more than one year. As executive
producer, she has worked on the
concept and layout of the show and
defined all of the video scripts.
Amy Gill, Ph.D., a freelance consultant and writer, as well as owner of Amber
Lane Farm, is another
integral part of the series. As an equine nutrition consultant for Nutrena and
an expert in the field, she is
in charge of developing the scripts for the shows.
Gill, who holds a master’s degree in equine nutrition and a doctoral degree
in equine nutrition and exercise
physiology, says she will be augmenting the show by contributing specifics to
nutrient requirements of
horses and also specifically talking about how to nutritionally manage specific
diseases or disorders in
horses. She says she believes the series will be popular because of the desire
for knowledge out there.
“I think we are starting to recognize some of the metabolic syndromes
that we have created in horses
due to their management situations. We’ve completely taken them out of
all of their natural
environment including their genetics and so we have some issues that we have
to handle from a
feeding standpoint that we are now finally recognizing and learning about so
I think the general
public that owns horses are aware of this and there is great interest in getting
all of the pertinent
information so they can manage their animals correctly,” Gill says.
Altair Brondani, brand manager for Nutrena, says there is a tremendous
need for
education in the horse
industry, especially in the area of nutrition. He believes that sponsoring the
series is a good investment for
Nutrena because “it is a great opportunity to increase Nutrena’s
visibility while educating consumers.”
John Wallace, business development manager for Nutrena in the
Florida and Caribbean region, has worked for the
company for 28 years and focused the last 20
on horse nutrition. He says horse owners
seem to crave knowledge more than any
other group of people. Wallace was
one of the show’s earliest
supporters. “Seeing the kind
of things LZ does, I was
really high on it,” he
says. |
