Karen is both a Masterson Method® Certified Practitioner, and a certified Equine Body Worker through Equinology®. She uses a science- and results-focused approach, augmented by intuition, when evaluating a horse and performing bodywork.
Karen was a horse-crazy girl, and grew up splitting her time between riding cow ponies at her father’s Angus cattle ranch in Montana, and riding her half-Arabian mare in the mountains of Colorado where her mother lived. She sold her horse to attend college, and then went on to graduate school in Alaska, where she earned a Ph.D. in biology, focused on nutritional ecology and physiology of caribou. After a post-doc in Antarctica, Karen worked as a lecturer at the University of California Davis, and also taught biology at local community colleges. She and her partner, Rodney, built their own house on a small ranch in northern California, where they were involved in conservation breeding of a rare hair sheep, the St. Croix, and also raise Dexter cattle and heritage poultry.
Karen returned to horse ownership in mid-life, and is currently a hunter-jumper and dressage rider. When her gelding developed lameness issues, Karen began teaching herself to perform bodywork, using the Beyond Horse Massage book and DVD. She was fascinated by the responses of the horse, and has gone on to complete over 800 hours of training and coursework related to equine bodywork, performance and health.