Ailsa — Our Founder

Veterinary Physiotherapist | Equine Rehabilitation Therapist | Hippotherapist | Equine Assisted Psychotherapist | Behaviourist | Endurance Rider | Podiatrist | Speech & Language Therapist | Specialist Physical Therapist | Veterinary Nurse | Lantra Equido Horsemanship

My first riding experience was not a pony.

It was my great uncle's sow — clambered aboard at around the age of two with the confidence that only very small children and the completely fearless possess. My next mount was an obliging old highland cow who learned, with remarkable patience, to wait beside a wall while I hauled myself onto her back. Nobody taught me to work with animals. I simply always had.

The human path came later — a long period in a wheelchair due to a hip deformity sent me toward speech and language therapy and specialist physical therapy, and for years my work was with profoundly disabled and special needs children and young people. I loved it. But something was always waiting.

It arrived in the form of a Canadian job swap, a rancher with a way with horses that matched something I had always felt instinctively — that animals are partners, not subjects — and eventually, a horse called Luke.

Luke was the second horse I ever rode at a quiet local riding stable. Light, willing, responsive — he went where I looked and stopped when I simply sat down a little. I fell completely and utterly in love with him. When the stables mentioned he was for sale I became a horse owner without warning, preparation or any idea whatsoever of what I was doing.

Luke had a few surprises for me. He taught me, immediately and without apology, that I needed to learn. So I did. Monty Roberts and Kelly Marks. Buck Brannaman and Mark Rashid. The Lantra Equido horsemanship qualification. Equine massage and physiotherapy. Podiatry — after a chance conversation with a physiotherapy tutor opened an unexpected door. Endurance riding because Luke loved long rides. Hippotherapy and equine assisted coaching and psychotherapy because a headmaster pointed me toward what I was already doing with my most complex young people.

One thing always led to another. Always because of the horses. Always because I owed them my attention.

I began a small centre — rescue horses, linked to a veterinary centre, working with children with special needs and behavioural difficulties. I did my veterinary nurse exams. I was asked to do foal watch for a local stud — which is where I was standing, in the early hours of a quiet morning, when a foal called Ayesha came into the world.

Ayesha is with me still.

When my cancer treatment ended and Ayesha recovered from a catastrophic road accident, we made a decision that had been forming for years. We left for Sweden — for the north, for the forests, for a life that made sense.

We set ourselves a challenge to mark the new beginning. I would ride and walk beside Ayesha for 600 kilometres to the Arctic Circle.

We did it.

Today I live at Wind River — named for the turbines and the river visible from our kitchen window — with eight horses, six dogs, three cats, eight hens and a small flock of traditional Swedish forest sheep. I treat horses, I teach therapists and I spend a great deal of time being quietly grateful to every animal who ever taught me something.

Which is all of them.

Mel — Co-Founder & Lead Tutor

BSc Biology & Animal Behaviour (University of Edinburgh) | RAF Officer | Psychotherapist | Primary School Teacher | Mother Tongue English Teacher | Emergency Planning Trainer | Lantra Qualified Horse Handler

The wind dropped.

That is how it started.Ailsa was trying out sailing — Mel was instructing — and when the wind dropped they talked and laughed long enough for her to discover that the man in the boat with her had one of the most extraordinary and eclectic minds she had ever encountered.

She made him what she considered an irresistible offer: considerably less pay, a beautiful Welsh landscape, some very sweet horses and dogs, and the chance to use every skill he had ever developed.

He said yes. They also fell in love, which helped.

Mel grew up in the coal mining communities of Fife, Scotland — a landscape that taught him early about hard work, community and the value of doing things properly.

He studied biology and animal behaviour at the University of Edinburgh, was commissioned as an RAF officer, and then — in the way that the most interesting people tend to — reinvented himself entirely.

He retrained as a primary school teacher, then as a psychotherapist, and spent years working alongside some of the most complex and challenging young people in the system. He trained others in emergency planning. He has, by any measure, lived several careers simultaneously and done all of them properly.

Mel came to horses through his wife and has never pretended otherwise. He rides — though he will tell you this is primarily a diplomatic exercise in exchange for sailing time. But what nobody expected, least of all Mel, was that a biologist and animal behaviourist was always going to have an extraordinary eye for equine gait and movement analysis.

He is frequently faster than Ailsa to identify a subtle asymmetry — which he finds quietly satisfying and she finds entirely typical of him.

His horse handling is gentle, boundaried and kind. As he sees it, horses are simply very large four legged young people — and he has spent a career creating safe spaces for exactly that kind of individual to find their feet.

At The Whole Horse Institute, Mel teaches:

•       How to Study — meeting students exactly where they are and helping them develop the learning strategies that will carry them through the programme and beyond

•       Cellular Biology and Anatomy — making the science of cells, fascia, inflammation and tissue repair genuinely accessible and genuinely fascinating

•       Animal Behaviour — bringing scientific rigour to the horse psychology and behaviour modules

•       Whole Horse Connections Programme — the active listening, therapeutic communication and psychological frameworks that run through our equine assisted practice programme

He is also, if you ever get the chance to sail with him, an excellent instructor.

Wind River — Where We Live and Work

Wind River sits in the forests of Ångermanland in northern Sweden — named for the turbines on the ridge and the river that catches the light from our kitchen window on a good morning.

It is home to eight horses, six dogs, three cats, eight hens and a small flock of Allmogefår — traditional Swedish forest sheep who serve as both ecological gardeners and, in due course, as exceptional lamb.

It is not a tidy place. It is a real one.

The practical weekends of The Whole Horse Institute happen across our region — at working stables, private yards and here at Wind River itself, where students work with our own herd, each horse with their own history and their own lessons to teach.

Each year students also visit a local herd of Nakota horses — a rare American heritage breed kept in near-wild conditions nearby.

Wind River is not a backdrop. It is the philosophy made physical.

Why We Do This

We are not a large institution. We are not a faceless online platform. We are two people — and a wonderful network of colleagues, specialists and friends who we have shamelessly wheedled into sharing their expertise with our students over the years — with a herd of horses, a forest, a river, a flock of sheep and an absolute conviction that this work matters.

The Whole Horse Institute exists because of that debt. Because the world needs more people who truly understand horses — and who understand what horses can do for human beings when given the chance.

We would love to share it with you.