Hello from Dr Kathrine
If you are curious about me and why I invented Sel-Plus here is my “official bio” I graduated from Murdoch University School of Veterinary Science, Western Australia in and shortly thereafter emigrated to the United States. I worked for six years in private practice in the USA after gaining accreditation through the Educational Commission For Foreign Veterinary Graduates Programme. Currently I am licensed Veterinary Physician and Surgeon in good standing in Australia, New Zealand, and in the US States of Oregon, California and Idaho. As well as manufacturing Sel-Plus and running our company, I travel to China and Hong Kong where I am a Veterinary Consultant for equine related business projects – equestrian development, feeding and education, training and racing, dressage and showjumping nutritional program development.
In the USA I worked in a very progressive practice which offered both Western and Traditional Chinese Medicine modalities. I learnt there are many paths to wellness from western medicine, surgery, massage, acupuncture, homeopathy, Chinese Herbal Medicine to nutrition to treat animals under stress. “Stress” meaning any illness, pregnancy, crowded housing conditions or being asked to perform at maximum for an equine athlete. This practice encouraged me to develop my interest in nutrition for horses and enhancing performance using anti-oxidant combinations of vitamins and minerals.
We adopted a holistic approach to the animals in our care not only doing emergency work, but enhancing each animals quality of life and therefore performance.
Further equine work in California convinced me to concentrate on sports medicine for horses. I wanted to help horses maintain healthy immune, cardiovascular, gastro-intestinal and musculo-skeletal systems, the benefits being better health for the animal, fewer emergency calls from colic and other situations arising from poor husbandry and improved performance for the owner.
My husband and I immigrated to New Zealand (with 6 horses) and continued our research into Selenium-Vitamin E issues. Selenium, along with all the antioxidant minerals, is essential to performance horses. Equine athletic performance declines due to low selenium significantly before the breeding horses show classical deficiency symptoms such as weak or “dummy foals” seen in Nutritional Muscular Dystrophy. A recent survey showed that many foals born diagnosed as weak, or failure of passive transfer (FPT), were in fact foals born to mares with very low selenium levels.
I have been interested in this syndrome since many years ago we lost one precious foal, which was misdiagnosed as a Failure of Passive Transfer (FPT) foal, but was in fact a Nutritional Muscular Dystrophy (NMD) foal. Further research revealed that selenium does not act alone but in concert with Vitamin E and other antioxidants. Our company, Ultimate Equine Limited, grew from the conviction that it was possible to produce a safe, effective feed supplement that would prevent the problems caused by low selenium and low antioxidant levels, and furthermore, enhance performance. We have achieved our goal and developed Sel-Plus.
Company Biography
Ultimate Equine Ltd company began in March 1992 preceded by two years of research, testing and product development. The result, Sel-Plus, is an all organic trace mineral and vitamin antioxidant feed supplement for performance horses.
Registration, Patents and Licenses
Patent rights were granted in New Zealand in April 1992 and in Australia in December 1994 and Trademarks registered. Sel-Plus was licensed by the New Zealand MAF Animal Remedies Board in December 1991. The Australian National Registration Authority (now APVMA) also licensed Sel-Plus. These licenses were granted once Sel-Plus passed stringent standards proving its safety and efficacy in horses.
Product Positioning
Sel-Plus was positioned at the upper segment of the equestrian market with the initial market being Eventing, Dressage, Showjumping and pleasure riding equestrian sports.
Domestic Market
The product continues to be well supported by a loyal user base in the sport horse industry. To successfully grow in the New Zealand market it was decided to introduce Sel-Plus to the thoroughbred and harness racing industry. This was achieved by contacting 120 New Zealand trainers and asking for their participation in a field study over the Summer 96/97. Response was positive with many trainers observing improvement in their equine athletes including New Zealand’s top Harness Racing trainer Mark Purdon who won the Australian Interdominion with a “Sel-Plus horse” Blossom Lady.
International Market
It was evident that from the first year of eager acceptance that Sel-Plus occupies the premium position in the equine product market place.
Since August 1992 Dr. Kathrine Davis has been invited to join official Trade Mission’s, for example from the Canterbury Chamber of Commerce to Singapore, Malaysia, Japan and Hong Kong. Dr. Davis is now a regular visitor to several Asia countries where her expertise and local knowledge has assisted many professional trainers to become very successful in their equestrian sport and businesses.
In April 2008 Dr Davis was invited to join the business delegation for the signing of the New Zealand-China Free Trade Agreement. Ultimate Equine Ltd sees a great future partering with elite Chinese equestrian organizations to educate, train and assist in developing the depth of knowledge required to be an international force in equestrian pursuits.
Sel-Plus is currently available in:
- Australia
- Japan
- Malaysia
- Singapore
- Hong Kong
- Macau
- China
We welcome enquires worldwide.
Visit the Factory 20 years ago
Sel-Plus is manufactured in Auckland, New Zealand from the richest human grade ingredients. The manufacturing facility is certified to exceed Australian health department standards for the manufacture of vitamin and mineral supplements for human consumption.
Prior to mixing Sel-Plus all ingredients are triple checked to ensure quality. Pre-mixing of concentrated ingredients in drum roller mixers ensures thorough blending
After pre-mixing, the Sel-Plus is checked to ensure thorough blending has occurred
Transfer of the blended pre-mix and further ingredients is transferred via a stainless steel vacuum system. This ensures health department hygiene standards are maintained.
Sel-Plus Ingredients are vigorously mixed in the final blending process for several hours . Mix is then transferred by vacuum to hopper for canning.
Sel-Plus is packaged in airtight sealed tins. One 15gm scoop is placed in each tin prior to adding blended mix.
The Sel-Plus is fed down an automated hopper which delivers 500 grams per tin. Each tin is checked on an independent electronic scale to ensure it contains the minimum of 500 grams per tin.
Immediately after mixing and weighing the steel cans are automatically sealed. This packaging system was chosen to keep Sel-Plus fresh assuring your horse reaps the maximum benefit from supplementation.
Labels are printed with a batch number and expiration date for our customers convenience. Labels are individually created for each export country.
Each can of Sel-Plus is checked after labeling for dents and quality of label finish. The tins have a “Rip-Top” over which a plastic re-closable lid is secured.
Sel-Plus is packaged as six per heavy cardboard outer box weighs 4 kg band measures 0.01 cubic meters. Sel-Plus is shipped for export as 100 boxes per pallet equaling 1 cubic meter and 400 kg gross weight.
Visit Our New Modern Factory
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- Sel-Plus is manufactured in Auckland, New Zealand from the richest human grade ingredients. The manufacturing facility is certified to exceed Australian health department standards for the manufacture of vitamin and mineral supplements for human consumption.
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- Prior to mixing Sel-Plus all ingredients are triple checked to ensure quality. Pre-mixing of concentrated ingredients in drum roller mixers ensures thorough blending
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- After pre-mixing, the Sel-Plus is checked to ensure thorough blending has occurred