Equine gastric ulcer syndrome (EGUS) is a major equine health problem worldwide. Multiple studies have reported a 90% incidence rate of ulcers in performance horses.
Ulcers negatively and sometimes severely affect a horse’s ability to perform. They cause pain and discomfort. They may reduce your horse’s appetite which in turn limits their capacity to maintain bodyweight and ulcers can lead to the development of vices like windsucking and crib biting.
Podcast #52. We talk a lot about protein in horse nutrition, especially for topline, growth, milk production and gut health, but the number on the feed bag is only the starting point.
Podcast #51. If you are spending money on joint supplements for your horse, or wondering whether that corticosteroid injection is really helping, this episode is essential listening. Dr. Nerida is joined by Renee Harbowy and Dr. Brian Nielsen from Michigan State University, two of the leading researchers in equine joint and bone health, for an honest, science-based conversation about what actually keeps horses sound for life.
Check out our latest tips to keep your horse happy and healthy. Because there’s always more to learn about keeping horses at their best!
Podcast #52. We talk a lot about protein in horse nutrition, especially for topline, growth, milk production and gut health, but the number on the feed bag is only the starting point.
Podcast #51. If you are spending money on joint supplements for your horse, or wondering whether that corticosteroid injection is really helping, this episode is essential listening. Dr. Nerida is joined by Renee Harbowy and Dr. Brian Nielsen from Michigan State University, two of the leading researchers in equine joint and bone health, for an honest, science-based conversation about what actually keeps horses sound for life.
Podcast #50. There is no time in horse nutrition where you need both art AND science more than when you are feeding a weanling. These funny, curious, chaotic little creatures are walking a tightrope every single day... growing fast enough to reach their genetic potential, but not so fast that they end up with bone or joint disease.
Podcast #49. In this replay episode, we are bringing back Dr Nerida’s chat with Professor Brian Nielsen on bone health in horses, because the ideas in this conversation have huge implications for soundness, durability, performance and long-term welfare.
Podcast #48. In this episode of the Happy Horse Nutrition Podcast, Dr Nerida is joined by Orla for a fascinating and surprisingly fun deep dive into the real story behind canola oil. They unpack where the wild claims came from, including the viral email that helped fuel decades of fear, and separate old rapeseed oil facts from modern canola oil fiction.
Do a google or AI search about anything to do with hoof health and nutrition and you will be smacked in the face with a plethora of supplements and advice on how to fix your horse’s hooves!
Podcast #47. In this episode of the Happy Horse Nutrition Podcast, Orla has curated a stack of listener questions (and kept Dr Nerida completely in the dark), so it’s a fast-paced, practical chat that bounces from industry ethics to real-life feeding decisions you’ll recognise instantly.
We start with a big one: what actually makes someone a “nutritionist” in the horse world, and why that label can be meaningful… or totally meaningless. Nerida unpacks the difference between qualifications, experience, and the uncomfortable reality of “armchair experts” giving confident advice that can cost horses their health.
Podcast #46. In this episode of the Happy Horse Nutrition Podcast, Dr Nerida is joined by Joanna Lepiarczyk from Horses Explained for a fascinating and deeply important conversation about horse mental health, equine behaviour, and the role that nutrition and feeding systems play in shaping a horse’s emotional wellbeing.
We explore why behaviour is so often a form of communication, why a quiet compliant horse is not always a happy horse, and how chronic stress can affect a horse far more profoundly than many owners realise.
I am quite sure it would be impossible to find an astute horse owner who doesn’t get a sense of satisfaction from seeing their horse’s coat glow! When you see them move and that sparkly coat just shimmers above their gorgeous muscles… that’s horse owner bliss right there!! 🤩
And as an astute horse owner, you’ve probably near pulled your own hair out trying to figure out why your horse’s coat looks plain yuk at times! I have, many times over the years! So here are all the things I know that might be making your horse’s coat dull or bleached or dry and brittle or just plain yuk!
Podcast #45. Grains are one of those ingredients that get demonised in the horse world… or fed completely on autopilot. And neither is an ideal situation.
In this episode of the Happy Horse Nutrition Podcast, Dr Nerida digs deep into her PhD research and explains why grain itself isn’t bad — it’s more like a power tool. Used well, in the right horse, grains are incredibly useful. Used carelessly (wrong type, wrong form, wrong amount), and grains can rapidly destroy hindgut health… and in severe cases, even cause death.
Podcast #44. Track systems (perimeter grazing systems) can look deceptively simple… but when they’re designed well, they deliver something horses are wired for: friends, freedom, and forage… with movement built in.
In this episode, Dr Nerida is joined by the wonderful Dr Katherine Goldberg (DVM, LCSW), a veterinarian and clinical social worker, to unpack what “species-appropriate husbandry” actually means in the real world, and why track systems aren’t just a “weight loss tool” for good doers, but a way we can help horses to live in a way that truly honours their needs.
Podcast #43. Free faecal water (aka free fecal water / free fecal liquid) is one of those horse problems that looks “not that bad” on paper… until you’re on wash-duty for the 14th time and your horse’s skin is angry, sore, and stained. 🐴💦
In this episode of the Happy Horse Nutrition Podcast, Dr Nerida McGilchrist unpacks why FFW is suddenly being talked about everywhere — from first hearing it at a conference in Dijon (2016) to seeing it dominate conversations at AAEP Denver (2025).
Podcast #42. What happens when your horses live on mostly straw for 10 days… and one of them decides to protest with full-blown diarrhoea? 😅 In this Q&A-style catch-up, Dr Nerida and Orla unpack a very relatable “whoops” moment and use it to teach one of the most overlooked fundamentals in horse gut health: fibre diversity.
I was CoaCoa’s everything - her caretaker, her protector, her teammate. My brothers pranked me constantly, but they NEVER messed with anything related to my horse. They knew better. I was fiercely protective of her, and honestly? She was my best friend.
We competed in camp drafting and barrel racing, and god, we were GOOD. When CoaCoa was on, we won. She was fast, she was brave, and she tried her heart out for me every single time.
But something wasn’t right.
Podcast #41. Feeding an Off The Track (OTT) in the first 12 months can be a worry inducing juggle… appetite, behaviour, ulcers and those classic “why won’t you hold weight?” situations. In this episode of the Happy Horse Nutrition Podcast, Dr Nerida shares her practical approach to feeding OTTs in their first year off the track so they can settle, digest fibre properly, and become easier to keep long-term.
Podcast #40. NSC is one of those three-letter acronyms that pops up on feed bags and hay reports… and consistently manages to confuse even the most dedicated horse owners. In this episode of the Happy Horse Nutrition Podcast, Dr Nerida McGilchrist unpacks Non-Structural Carbohydrates (NSC) in a practical, horse-owner-friendly way, looking at what NSC actually is (starch + water soluble carbohydrates), how it relates to WSC, whether we should be using WSC or ESC to calculate NSC (see, it gets confusing!), and why that “fructan piece” matters for both laminitis risk and the hindgut microbiome.
Podcast #39. A horse that won’t eat isn’t being “fussy”… it’s a red flag. In this episode of the Happy Horse Nutrition Podcast, Dr Nerida, PhD equine nutritionist and founder of the MyHappy.Horse app, breaks down the most common nutrition-related reasons horses go off their feed, what they look like in real life, and what actually helps.
We cover hindgut disturbance (including hindgut acidosis) and the appetite knock-on effects, including the destruction of vitamin B1, why some horses go off grain but still eat hay, and how faecal/manure pH can be a handy monitoring tool (with the key low-pH threshold to watch).
Podcast #38. In this episode of the Happy Horse Nutrition Podcast, Dr Nerida tackles a pasture risk that catches many good horse owners out: high-oxalate warm-season grasses that can block calcium absorption, slowly weaken bone, and set horses up for nutritional secondary hyperparathyroidism (Bighead disease).
You’ll learn the simple physiology behind it (the “bone calcium bank” concept), why blood calcium can look normal even when bones are being depleted, and the real-world signs that are easy to misread; shifting lameness, sore or grumpy behaviour, odd gait, skull changes, loud breathing noise under work, dental issues and poor hoof quality.
Podcast #37. Feeding horses during emergencies (bushfires, floods, storms, evacuations) can quickly become a “take what you can get” situation, but the choices you make in your makeshift feed room can determine whether your horse copes… or tips into dehydration, gastric ulcers, hindgut dysbiosis, colic, or even laminitis. In this practical episode of the Happy Horse Nutrition Podcast, PhD equine nutritionist Dr Nerida shares her approach to natural disaster horse feeding with one core rule: keep the diet as close to normal as possible.
Summer is coming! And with it, for some of us, so are HOT days and high humidity! And the combination of these climactic factors puts significant pressure on our horses to stay cool.
Your horse’s primary method of cooling is evaporative cooling, which requires them to sweat. And in order to sweat, they need they need electrolytes.
Without enough electrolytes, they stop sweating and overheat. If they overheat, the results can be deadly. So it is critical that you make sure your horse has enough of the electrolyte minerals to get them safely through summer!
