Sick Horse Update...

It’s been crazy around here with the horses lately and their health.

Daisy has had arthritis set in pretty bad in her shoulder and after bringing her in from the pasture she turned her ankle on her backend, so she was gimpy on both the front and the back. Her back leg is doing much better, but the arthritis is only as good as the weather. She is going to be placed on a senior feed and bute when needed and retired from everything. God willing she will be with us for another year or so, as long as the arthritis doesn’t get worse. When she stops getting up for her grain, then we will know it’s her time.

Holly also turned her ankle, only on her front end. She was really gimpy for about a week or so. She is doing much better, she ran from April the other day. She did not want to be caught and have her fly spray put on. She will be fine, no permanent problems from the injury. Holly is being retired from the business to be our fun, no hassle show horse. We plan on entering her in the monthly cart classes at the local arena.

Sergeant coliced, again. I talked to the vet about it. It seems that every time the weather changes he does this. The vet said that he has sand colic and when the weather changes some horses tend not to drink enough water, because the temperature of the water changes and is not to their liking. Anyway without enough water their poop gets a little on the dry side and starts pushing out the sand that is sitting in their gut, sound like a good thing, but it’s not. The sand irritates the intestines and upsets their system. Kind of like IBS in humans, gas, blotting, cramping, diarrhea, etc, only horses don’t tolerate the pain and you get colic. He is doing 1000 times better. He will be on a regiment of rice bran and sweet feed on a regular basis. He is also getting a clean out dose of “Sand Clear.” This will happen every night for the next week, then he will get a maintenance does once a week. With all the bran and the pysllium once a week we should be able to stay one step ahead of the colic. Now all I have to do is get the kids who feed him his hay to start putting it in his feeder and not be lazy little shits and through it on the ground.

Knock on wood everyone else seems to be doing okay.