Equine Massage Scooping Sore Areas

Video Transcript

"When you're using a technique that we refer to as scooping on your horse, if you find a sore area, first you begin by scooping the area with your fingertips, back and forth, light, moderate, and heavy pressure. If you find a sore area, you stop, and just apply direct pressure with your fingertips, again, not with your fingernails, but more with the pad of your fingers. Apply direct pressure, and release. As you're putting the pressure on, you want to be pushing in gently, but firmly, and backing off in the same way. You don't want to dig in real abruptly, and then you can go back to the scooping. If you're scooping on the abdomen, you want to be very careful there, I don't recommend applying just straight, direct pressure on any area of the abdomen, just do the scooping technique with light, moderate, and heavy pressure. Most horses really like that, and if you're working on the hamstring area, if you find a sore spot, just stop and again, apply steady, direct pressure, and back off from it, and continue scooping."