On 1/24/00, Barbara Banwell<[log in to unmask]> wrote:
<< I visited a very elegant horse stable in New Zealand several years ago--in
each beautiful stall and out in the aisle were some pads--the vet explained
that these were magnetic pads on which the horses and other animals rested
themselves when they were uncomfortable or in pain--assuring us that many of
the horses valued at over a million $ (American $) and there would never be
anything considered harmful in those stalls. He said the animals
self-selected the position and pads. We have many varieties of magnetic pads
or blocks in the US--some people report good results--some not so good. >>
***This sounds like some wonderfully paranormal team of horses. Since the
horses could not be told about these magnetic devices, they somehow had to
"sense" from a considerable distance of several metres that these pads placed
there by humans were different from everything else in their stables and that
they were emanating a field that would help them recover!
Remembering that the magnetic field at more than a few millimetres from these
"therapeutic" magnets is far less than the natural magnetic field of the
earth, one wonders how the horses were able to sense their presence, let
alone their special healing qualities at a distance where ambient
electromagnetic noise is far greater than the field strength of these 'magna
blocs'. Talk about real 'horse sense'!
Maybe there is another simpler explanation. If you have ever owned any pet
and accidentally left some blanket or item of soft clothing lying on the
floor or anywhere else for that matter, have you ever noticed how it
invariably gravitates towards it and sleeps upon it?
Nothing supernatural or surprising about that - obviously, any 'dumb mutt' is
not so dumb that it fails to recognise that sleeping on top of some
convenient soft pad is a lot more comfortable than sleeping on top of a
harder surface like the floor, the ground or some prickly hay! Now, if those
magnets were buried at random a short distance under the stable floor and the
horses invariably ended up sleeping over those locations, then we might start
to wonder about something extraordinary.
The real horse sense here is that horses have perfectly good eyesight (which
is known to be among the best in the animal kingdom) to tell them that a
comfortable-looking pad is a better place upon which to repose than a bare
stable floor. Even an animal can see the difference between economy
accommodation and five-star luxury! Our old Dalmatians and stray cats would
have done exactly the same!
Just in case I sound overly critical, could someone tell us if a whole
selection of identical pads with and without magnets were placed in the
stable and all of the horses gravitated towards the magnetic pads instead of
the bogus pads? Or maybe could we be told that the horses were uncannily
able to sense the location of therapeutic magnets hidden at random beneath
the hay.
Dr Mel C Siff
Denver, USA
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