Equine practical DVD trailer: A rescue horse selecting oils

The horse in this clip is being offered angelica root, yarrow (the blue one) and rose. Notice that she shows the greatest interst in yarrow and yawns almost everytime she licks or inhales it. The selection of yarrow is often associated with animals that have had negative past experiences (as this horse is a rescue who knows what happened in her past). Yawning is an emotional release in many species.

 

Elephant calves self-selecting

Read the abstract on Sinya, a young calf at teh Sheldrick Trust who was found trapped in a well. A paper on this case presented to the International Elephant Conservation & Research Symposium (2008) here.

The video below shows me working with Shimba, another calf at the Sheldrick Trust. Shimba was found at 3 months old trying to wake his mother, who had died of starvation after getting her trunk caught in a trap. 

An agressive ram self-selecting at a small breeds farm in Somerset

He had displayed extreme agressive behaviour for two years following the foot and mouth crisis. Before this he was very gentle and would often be led into showrings by children. The keepers feared that he would seriously injure someone and unless his aggression was resolved he would be but to sleep. Not shown in the clip is his selection of Devil's Claw, a plant generally selected by animals in pain. Also the yarrow response was not a 'no' as mentioned in the clip. Caroline had to say this as there was not enough time to explain an emotional release for Sunday afternoon TV.

This clip is derived from a documentary produced by Tigress Productions who were making a programme on T Touch with Sarah Fisher.