As an equine rehabilitation therapist for the past two decades, Christa Veinotte has treated the health needs of thousands of horses – from elite, top jumpers to “sore, older backyard ponies.” But no matter what level of activity or athleticism her clients have, Veinotte has watched all of them thrive on Sentinel horse feeds.
“I have a huge range of clients, and I aim to switch them all to Sentinel if possible as I have for the past 20 years,” says Veinotte, who lives in Nova Scotia, Canada. She remembers driving four hours to her nearest Blue Seal dealer just to make sure her equine patients (as well as her own horses) had no disruption in their feed regime. She did that for eight years. Today she still drives 1.5 hours each way to get her bags of feed.
“I have to,” Veinotte says of her weekly drives. “Because in all these years, I can’t remember a single client who didn’t do well on Sentinel.”
Veinotte, who now completes an average of 1,500 equine therapeutic treatments a year, says proper nutrition plays a major role in her work to “fix broken horses.” Her go-to products are Sentinel Performance LS and Sentinel Senior – because she trusts the protein content to be correct and appreciates that the feed is “a slow-release carbohydrate that doesn’t give them a sugar high and then a crash.”
Years ago, one of her own horses – a mare named Adria – started on Blue Seal and transformed from being “hot and crazy to thriving in life,” Veinotte recalls. She now has a gelding from Adria, and he behaved the same way until he too started on Blue Seal. Veinotte also has a full-time, 35-year-old border named Megan who is still “bright, alert, active and super sound.” No one believes Veinotte when she tells them Megan’s age.
“It’s just such an amazing product,” she says. “Once I get my clients’ stomachs healed through proper nutrition, I can see the results quite quickly. The horses get better much faster. And it’s not just because of what I do, it’s because of the feed too.”
Christa Veinotte lives in Nova Scotia and has three horses that live on the property: Princess Megan; a Hanoverian gelding named Draco; and a paint pony named David. Her dog, Teddy, is a fan of Blue Seal’s peanut butter dog biscuits. She can be found on Facebook or on Instagram @christaveinotte_rmt.
Christa is also the developer of Hestaband, Canada’s first kinesiology tapes for horses.