Stephanie Ruff

Stephanie Ruff has spent her entire career in various facets of the equine industry. She was a freelance writer for many years, was the owner/editor of Arabian Finish Line, managing editor of Arabian Horse Life and content manager of Practical Horseman and Dressage Today before moving to The Horse. She has ridden many different disciplines, but for the last 20 years has focused on dressage. Stephanie has both a B.S. and M.S. in Animal Science from the University of Kentucky and has always had a keen interest in equine health, science, and research. A native of Pennsylvania, Stephanie enjoys hanging out with her Arabian and Half-Arabian mares, two German Shorthair Pointers, traveling and embracing the Florida lifestyle where she currently lives.

Articles by: Stephanie Ruff

The Right Touch: Massage

Editor’s Note: This series on therapeutic options is meant to offer basic information on the history of the therapy, what the therapy is, and how it is being used in the equine industry. Information presented in this series is

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Small Talk: Miniature Horses

Miniature Horses are gaining in popularity, say devotees of the diminutive breed, but that growth has brought with it some problems in the realm of health and conformation. Mary Ann Eberth, operator of Little King Farm in Madison, Ind., says the

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Info Flow

When did we lose our way? How did it happen? What was the reasoning behind horse owners asking questions about health care, putting up money for research to find answers, then being ignored when breakthroughs occurred? I’ve been asking these

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Combined Immunodefiency in Arabians

A newborn Arabian foal is possibly one of the most beguiling creatures on Earth. Elegant of feature and blessed with beauty, he’s full of promise for the future–and often descended of royal blood and worth many thousands of dollars. Imagine how

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Restraint Techniques for Breeding

When a mare and a stallion meet, love might be in the air…but there’s the potential for danger, too. Particularly when humans get in the middle of it all. In our efforts to orchestrate the best possible combinations of

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Getting the Germs Out

You’ve heard it before, but here it is one more time: An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. With this in mind, it’s time to take a serious look at disinfecting barns and equipment where horses are housed. When it come

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Failure of Passive Transfer in Horses

Infectious disease is a major cause of death in neonatal foals. The foal is born immunocompetent, meaning it probably is able to initiate an immune response to organisms to which it is exposed. However, a newborn foal lacks

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CEM Screening Techniques Tested, shy breeding stallion

Teasing Mares

Teasing mares can be a time-consuming and boring procedure, but it is essential if one is to detect when a mare is in estrus. Unfortunately, all mares do not react to teasing in the same manner, so one approach doesn’t suit all.

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Freezing Semen

The technology that allows us to freeze a stallion’s semen for future use has opened up a world of opportunities. Not only does it allow the stallion’s DNA to be available to mare owners around the globe, but it enables a stallion to stand at stud wh

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Back To School-American Association of Equine Practitioners

For most of us, our formal education might have ended upon graduation from high school or college. With our trusty sheepskin, we entered bravely into the world of the gainfully employed, with only the occasional nightmare of imagining

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Protecting the Wild Herds

Wild horses have captured the imagination of the American public for many years. Books have been written, movies have been made, and young and old have harbored fantasies of catching and taming a wild stallion which will become

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Wild Wisdom

It is a stirring sight to watch a band of wild horses on the run across a prairie or valley floor, manes and tails flowing in the wind. If they are in rugged country, they won’t slow their pace when the trail winds its way up a

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It Starts With One Opinion

Have you ever noticed that most conversations start with one person’s opinion? Usually followed by another person’s opinion, or a variation on the first opinion. Which then leads to a conversation and possibly learning something about each other

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Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease

The official title for an all-too-common respiratory ailment in horses is chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). For the average horse owner, however, that rather cumbersome title has been reduced to a single word: heaves. Other people

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WEVA: On the Move

They met in Italy to exchange information about reproduction, sports medicine, infectious diseases, transportation, and surgery. The more than 300 delegates from 29 different countries, including Germany, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, Denmark

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