Update on Polar – Clinic with Caroline Ingraham, Zoopharmacognosy

Today Polar and I attended a day clinic with Caroline Ingraham – check her website here to discover the incredible work she does, including with the RSPCA and other animal welfare organisations in the UK as well as one or two Spanish vets.

Her stay in our area of France included visiting farm animals and an equestrian livery yard. Today the subject was dogs. I’d been invited to take Polar along because of his disability. There were two other dogs present, French rescued dogs – one a little hunting dog like a beagle without a tail who had been very badly beaten, with no confidence atall, and the other a labrador x who had spent his early years on a short chain, forgotten about, who had jealousy problems.

So we had 3 dogs with very different problems.

I couldn’t possibly begin to describe the work Caroline did with the dogs, individually, with her oils and plant extracts. Suffice to say that her mantra is ‘let the animal guide you’ and they will tell you if they believe a plant extract will help them with whatever they feel their body needs.

So far as Polar was concerned, he chose to eat some barley grass, coconut cream and arnica out of all the other plant extracts he was offered, for hyper-activity and anti-inflamatories. We also worked on massaging his injured leg and joint with an oil which included peppermint , wintergreen and yarrow. Moving up to his hip, there was just one point where he showed a slight reaction away from the hand – a tender spot. After that, he went to sleep, as you can see from the pix below!

This work further supported my feeling that massage will help ease the development of his muscles and joints as he continues to grow – he’s still only 7 1/2 months old! Hard to believe when he stands next to Bracken (rising 5) and is already as tall as him.

I prefer to use ‘natural’ healing supplements for my animals wherever possible. I’ve never been able to ‘get my head’ round homeopathy, although I know there are many people for whom this has been successful. But I can relate to oils from plants which, if an animal is to survive in its natural environment, they would choose to eat if they were available.

We all have our own ideas about what to use to help our animals. I like to consider all alternatives, especially non pharmaceutical ones where possible. If you find Caroline’s website interesting and informative and wish to contact her, please mention that you found her through Beryl’s Galgo News. Here’s the weblink to her new updated reference book.

The two photos below show Polar relaxed after his massage, watching Caroline work with Sofie and Blackie and then tired out with all the fuss and attention – phew, it’s a hard life being a celebrity!