Maca Root
A Peruvian root food with genuine research — conducted at gram-scale amounts, which is the whole problem here.
Maca Root in the Horsewood Formula
Lepidium meyenii — amount per capsule not published.
In one line: Real human evidence at 1.5-3 g a day, in a capsule that cannot physically hold that alongside twelve other ingredients.
A Peruvian root food with real energy and libido research — conducted at gram-scale amounts, which matters here.
What Maca Root Is, Before the Horsewood Framing
Maca (Lepidium meyenii) is a root vegetable from the high Andes of Peru, grown at altitudes above 4,000 metres. It has been cultivated as a food for thousands of years, which is an important framing: maca is eaten in quantity as a staple, not consumed as a concentrated extract.
It comes in yellow, red and black varieties, which some research suggests differ in their effects. It is typically supplied as a dried root powder rather than a standardised extract.
What the Maca Research Behind Horsewood Found
Maca has a modest but real body of human research, and it is more interesting than most traditional-food botanicals.
Energy and mood. Some randomised trials have reported improvements in subjective energy, mood and wellbeing scores.
Sexual function and libido. This is maca's best-known research area, with several small trials reporting improvements in libido measures independent of hormonal change — notably, maca does not appear to alter testosterone or oestrogen levels, which distinguishes it from how it is often marketed.
Evidence quality is limited: trials are generally small, and reviews have called for larger studies.
Amounts used: almost all human research uses 1.5 to 3 grams a day of maca root powder.
What Maca's Inclusion Means in Horsewood
This is the clearest arithmetic problem in the formula, and it is worth stating directly.
A standard capsule holds roughly 500–800 mg of material in total. The amount of maca used in research is 1,500–3,000 mg — more than a whole capsule, before any of the other twelve ingredients are added.
That is not an accusation about this product. It is a physical constraint that applies to every multi-ingredient capsule containing maca, and it means the maca content here cannot be at research levels. No amount is published, but this conclusion follows from capsule volume rather than from disclosure.
If maca specifically is what interests you, maca powder sold as a food, by the bag, at gram-scale servings, is how the research used it and costs very little.
Maca Safety in Horsewood
Maca has an excellent safety record, reflecting centuries of use as a food.
- Generally very well tolerated, including at the gram-scale amounts used in trials.
- Not hormonal. Despite the marketing, research has generally not found maca to change sex hormone levels — which is reassuring rather than disappointing.
- Thyroid. Maca is a brassica and contains glucosinolates; very large amounts of raw material have theoretical thyroid implications, particularly with existing iodine deficiency.
- Some people find it activating if taken late in the day.
Horsewood names thirteen ingredients and doses none of them
This is the single most important thing to understand about the product, and it is awkward because the seller makes the opposite claim its headline selling point.
Its own words: "No Proprietary-Blend Games". "Named Doses, Not a Blend Fog". Thirteen ingredients "you can look up individually — not a fog of complexes with undisclosed amounts". "Each named, none hidden."
Yet no milligram figure is published for any of the thirteen. Not on the homepage, not in the ingredients section, not in the FAQ. The ingredients are named. They are not dosed. Those are different things, and only one of them lets you evaluate a formula.
To be fair, avoiding a proprietary blend is genuinely better than hiding ingredients inside one, and naming all thirteen is more than many competitors do. But a named ingredient with no amount attached tells you what is in the bottle without telling you whether there is enough of it to matter.
Why this matters arithmetically. A standard capsule holds roughly 500–800 mg of material in total. The studied amounts above, added together, come to several grams a day. Thirteen ingredients cannot all appear at their researched amounts inside one capsule — there is not physically room. That is not an accusation about this product; it is true of every thirteen-ingredient single-capsule formula, and it is exactly why the amounts should be published.
The one question worth asking the seller before you buy is for the milligram amount of each ingredient per capsule. Given that dose transparency is their headline claim, it is a fair question, and the answer would be a single line.
How to read the research described on this Horsewood page
The studies referred to here examined individual ingredients on their own, at the amounts the researchers chose — typically hundreds of milligrams a day, and for maca and spirulina, grams.
That research explains why an ingredient is of interest. It does not show that Horsewood reproduces those results. No clinical trial of this finished formula has been published, and because the seller publishes no amount for any ingredient, the comparison cannot be completed from the outside. Nothing on this site estimates the missing figures.
Related Horsewood Reading
The main ingredients page lists all thirteen, how Horsewood works explains the four fronts of the formula, and the benefits page assesses each support claim against the evidence.
Horsewood Safety Notes
Horsewood safety and sensible precautions
The reference's own guidance is sound and is repeated here, with a few ingredient specifics added that it does not mention.
- Do not use if pregnant, nursing or under 18. The seller states this directly.
- Show the label to your doctor if you take prescription medication or manage a diagnosed condition — the seller's own advice, and it specifically says show the label rather than a summary of it.
- Ginkgo and bleeding risk. Ginkgo has documented interactions with anticoagulants and antiplatelet drugs, and is normally stopped before surgery. This is the most clinically significant interaction in the formula.
- Green tea extract and the liver. Concentrated green tea extracts have been associated with rare liver injury, which is why several regulators have looked at them. The amount here is not published.
- Thyroid medication. Ashwagandha may increase thyroid hormone levels, which matters if you take levothyroxine or manage a thyroid condition.
- Zinc. If you already take a multivitamin or a separate zinc supplement, you cannot check for overlap here, because the amount is not published. The adult upper limit is 40 mg a day from all sources.
- Autoimmune conditions. Echinacea is traditionally cautioned against in autoimmune disease because of its immune-stimulating framing; discuss it with your doctor.
- Caffeine. The seller states the only caffeine is the small natural amount in green tea extract, which is far below a cup of coffee.
Horsewood is a dietary supplement, not a medicine, and it is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease.
When to see a doctor rather than buy Horsewood
Low energy, poor focus and feeling worn down are exactly the symptoms most likely to send someone to a supplement page, and they are also the symptoms most likely to have a diagnosable cause.
Persistent fatigue can reflect iron deficiency or anaemia, an underactive thyroid, sleep apnoea, depression, diabetes or vitamin B12 deficiency. Every one of those is identifiable with a straightforward blood test or assessment, and every one is treatable. A blood panel costs less than a six-bottle order.
New or worsening difficulty concentrating, especially with mood change or sleep disruption, is worth discussing rather than supplementing around.
Chronic stress that is not resolving is a health issue in its own right. Adaptogens are not a substitute for addressing it.
To the reference's credit, it says something similar: it tells readers to check with a doctor and states that the product supports everyday wellness rather than treating any condition. That is the right advice and it is repeated here.
More Horsewood Ingredients
Considering Horsewood?
Read the ingredients page first. Thirteen sensible ingredients are named, and not one of them is dosed — understanding that distinction is the most useful thing you can do before spending anything.
From $49 per bottle · 60-day money-back guarantee · No subscription or rebills
