2018 | August

We have been looking for a charity that we can partner with, to support on an ongoing basis, and I am pleased to say that we will be supporting the LIFE foundation. We would love for you to get involved too, in helping to make the lives of working horses and donkeys better. It's difficult to choose one charity from all of the organisations that are doing great work; we chose LIFE as they are operating in an area where other charities have yet to reach. Read more about the foundation and how we can help on page 22.

Rachaël Draaisma returns in this issue with her latest calming signals feature, this time looking at the behaviour classified as 'splitting'.

We introduce Alison Zuend BSc (Hons) from the Horse Place, Devon - who is a 4-Star Parelli Professional, the highest ranking and longest standing in the UK. Alison teaches about our 'independent seat' and provides some exercises to help us improve this.

We are excited to launch the first of our new podcasts! These are available at www.horsemanship-journal.com/horsemanship-audio. The audio versions allow you to listen to selected articles anywhere you like. Our first articles are by Ross Cooper, a regular contributor to Horsemanship-Journal.

I hope you have been enjoying the lovely weather and getting to spend lots of quality time with your equines, despite the heat at times being unenjoyable.

The early start to summer brought with it the usual seasonal allergies and bugs, and even now coming to the end of summer they are still causing issues. If your horse is prone to allergies have a read of Nikki's - Ask the vet? column, where she covers this topic in detail. If Sweet Itch is a challenge, then you will also want to check out the sweet itch article on page 28.

It's been a busy season for those of you who enjoy showing. The UK had some strong competitors at the European Championship who achieved some excellent results, see page 36 for the show report. The Youth team travelled to Texas to compete at the 2018 Youth World Cup - read more about their achievements on page 34. A little closer to home, we have the show report for the Caledonian AQHA and All Breeds show.

We have two new authors in this issue; the first is Brandon McAuslan who discusses Cowboy Dressage, and the second is Stormy May who talks us through the three key elements to transform our equine relationships.