I've been very neglectful with my blog, and I apologize for that. I started, did two posts, and then never to be heard from again ... until now! I'm BAAAACCKKK!
A lot has happened since my last post in December 2014, which is to be expected. I'll get the sad news out of the way first.
Dear sweet mini mare Lucky had to be euthanized early Spring 2015 after a battle with laminitis and founder. She had been susceptible to diet related laminitis ever since she arrived here May 2014, but I had that pretty well figured out so she stopped getting these episodes. I didn't know the whole story about her health when I brought her home ... if you get my drift. I had to find out about it the hard way.
But what ended up being her down fall was not too many apples, too much grass, high NSC hay ... but an odd situation where she had ice ball build up in her hooves so severely it was like she was walking on rocks until I arrived home from work for the evening feeding. She could hardly stand!! I managed to chop it out, but she was so lame she lay down immediately. I gave her some Banamine and hoped she would be fine--I had never heard of lasting effects from something like this. I consulted the vet and she thought Lucky would rest up for a few days on a soft bed and be good as new. Well, she never got much better. She had a couple of good days here and there, but for the most part she was lame in varying degrees from that day on. My vet diagnosed it as a "road founder" type of condition and I tried everything--padding her feet and wrapping with tape (tape wouldn't stick in the freezing cold we were having in January in Upstate NY), put socks on her legs in case the cold was affecting her nerves and making things worse, daily Banamine (bute and Previcoxx didn't work as well), every laminitis-related supplement I could find, cold laser treatments, bloodwork for Cushings, re-tested my hay to make sure it wasn't too high in NSC for her because she had previously gotten laminitic on hay that tested 9.8, which is usually in the safe range for even insulin resistant horses--but not low enough for Lucky. The hay I was feeding her tested at a super low 4.5--well, problem wasn't diet. We tried to keep her comfortable, hoping the acute stage would end and she would go back to her baseline of relative soundness as long as she was kept on super low NSC hay and no grass. Her x-rays showed some coffin bone rotation, but not horrible. Nothing worked. Although she was never down and in severe pain as she was the night of the ice-ball assault, she was never comfortable or even close to sound. After about two months of treatment, I made the difficult decision to euthanize her.
It was a very sad day here at that farm. I wanted her last day to be a happy day and as pain free as possible. I loaded her up with Banamine--I gave her at least triple her daily dose and I could tell she really felt better. My neighbor has a backhoe. He came and dug a grave. The vet arrived, I led Lucky to the grave where she was quietly laid to rest. I cried, the vet cried, the vet students cried. My perfect little pony was gone.
I'll get the other bad thing out of the way. July 2015, Mac (the cute roan looking appaloosa on my earlier posts) had a chronic hoof toe crack that had been going on for at least a year. I was concerned about it, but my farrier wasn't--when I asked him about it, he would just brush it off as no big deal and that I was an over-protective horse parent type of response. Since he had good credentials and a good reputation, I trusted him. After all Mac had always had been prone to a degree of hoof cracking, he was probably OK and this one would grow out if I just gave it more time, right? Wrong! I let it go too long before asking for a second opinion from another farrier.
Second farrier, Mario, picked up the hoof, did a little "cleaning up", called me back with "Umm ... Dorothy, I want to show you something." He proceeded to tell me Mac had a severe fungal infection under the wall extending all the way up to the coronary band, even though the wall looked intact to a lay person except for the widening crack at the bottom 1/4 of the wall at the toe. Other than the crack, it looked like a pretty normal hoof--How could this be???? How did I miss this???? These kinds of things happened to neglected horses--Mac had never gone for more than 7 or 8 weeks between trims, usually 6 weeks. He had me feel a bulging on the outside of the hoof wall, which was an indication of the infection under the wall. Mario did what he could that day, but the bottom line was that Mac would need a wall resection to save the hoof. We planned a time, he came, and Mac was lame on that hoof. Farrier Mario didn't feel comfortable proceeding at the farm, where we had a lot of mud at the time, working on a horse that likely had also developed an abscess to complicate matters, and he felt the hoof should also be x-rayed first.
I'm fortunate enough to live only about 1/2 hour drive from the Cornell University Vet Equine Hospital, and after a conversation with a vet and the head farrier there, we decided to trailer Mac there. Trailering Mac was a big deal. He was nearly completely blind; he hadn't been off the property in several years since he became blind; my other horse "Babe" would have to go along as his babysitter, seeing-eye-horse. She is also pretty much retired and hadn't been off the property in a few years. Could we manage this without Mac losing it????
I was so worried how Mac would react to things, but he did fine as long as Babe was within a foot or two of him at all times. Mac went to x-ray; Babe went to x-ray; Mac went to the treatment room; Babe went to the treatment room. My friend, Mike (technically Mac's owner), and I had the good sense to enlist the help of a local teenager, Michaela, who has helped care for the horses when I've been unable to for medical reasons. I assigned her to Babe and she also ran all those "oh can you get this from the trailer--we forgot" stuff that came in so handy. My knee was killing me from a torn meniscus; Mike is not very experienced with horse handling when things get a little tricky, and he was also very overwhelmed about dealing with the whole "sick Mac" situation. Michaela was a Godsend, and it was so much easier with her there. She handled the difficult day better than most adults I know. What a blessing!
It was an unusual situation for the Cornell staff as well. The ones we were working with hadn't had to deal with a situation of a tightly bonded pair like Babe and Mac--with Mac blind AND not having been trailered or off the farm since he became blind. They were great, though. After the initial history, paperwork, general exam, Mac (and Babe) went to x-ray. We waited outside for what seemed like forever, which wasn't setting well with me--they must be discussing some difficult things. Finally, they emerged from the x-ray room. Showed us the films and explained what was going on. The infection had progressed to at least half of his coffin bone. He had both a fungal and a bacterial infection. The two vets and the head farrier explained the possible treatment. Surgical debridement of the hoof, including the coffin bone. After that, he would have a shoe with a metal plate covering the sole that would be removed daily for treatments at home. He would be on stall rest for probably at least 2 months ... IF it all worked perfectly. Keeping him stalled for two months would be very difficult. He didn't like being in a stall since going blind; he freaked out if Babe was taken out of her neighboring stall---it would be prison for both of them ... again, IF the treatment plan worked and he could recover from extensive debridement and didn't develop a complication, like a secondary infection. We talked it over and came to the agonizing decision to euthanize him there at Cornell so he wouldn't have to be trailered again back home.
Then, we had to figure out the logistics of euthanizing a blind horse who needed his seeing-eye-horse friend with him every step of the way. Mike and I also wanted to be present, and as close to Mac as the vets would let us be (for safety reasons they had some rules about that)--he was going to die surrounded by his loved ones. Surprisingly, the vet said most owners don't want to be present and they had NEVER had another horse involved in the process like Babe would need to be. They sedated Mac and Babe before walking out to their "euthanizing paddock"--they really do have a tarp-surrounded paddock for this purpose. Again, everything was fine with Babe leading the way. Mac was calm, went down quietly, and it was a peaceful good bye. Babe was brought in to see his body to help her understand that he was gone. She didn't seem to care and was more interested in eating some nearby grass. Oh, OK--I guess she wasn't affected by it in a bad way. Whew! That was a relief.
We led Babe back through the hospital hallways to go back to the holding stall. As we got farther away from Mac, she kept looking behind her with this confused look ... which progressed to panic. They gave her more sedation, but by the time she was back to the stall, she was SO distraught. Babe is a very stoic horse. I had owned her for 12 years at the time and had NEVER seen her react that way to anything.
We spent a lot of time soothing Babe. She calmed enough where we felt we could go to the office to settle up the bill and paperwork. Michaela was left to keep an eye on her. We came back 10 minutes later to hear Babe screaming and Michaela trying to calm her. Michaela said she had gotten upset again right after we left. I spent some more time with her, she settled down, and we were able to load her in the trailer for the ride home without incident.
Babe was a little depressed the next couple of days, but appeared to adjust. She was in a pasture by herself, but it bordered the minis' pasture and she could reach over the fence if she wanted to. She stuck kind of close to them for a couple of days, but then ventured off when grazing. I think she still misses him, months later, but she's doing fairly well, although there is just something "different" about her--I do think this experience had a lasting effect on her. I still choose to keep the mini's separated from her due to the size difference and my fear that Rosie, my youngster (much more to come about the mini-update and this little rowdy girl in my next post), will irritate Babe and may not get out of the way if Babe decides to teach that little runt a lesson.
I'm going to end here just because of the length of the post. I apologize for the depressing post, but this is part of life with horses. I PROMISE more fun and joyful posts to follow. LOTS to talk about with the mini's.
Rest in peace dear Mac and Lucky. Our lives are better for having you in it.
A lot has happened since my last post in December 2014, which is to be expected. I'll get the sad news out of the way first.
Dear sweet mini mare Lucky had to be euthanized early Spring 2015 after a battle with laminitis and founder. She had been susceptible to diet related laminitis ever since she arrived here May 2014, but I had that pretty well figured out so she stopped getting these episodes. I didn't know the whole story about her health when I brought her home ... if you get my drift. I had to find out about it the hard way.
But what ended up being her down fall was not too many apples, too much grass, high NSC hay ... but an odd situation where she had ice ball build up in her hooves so severely it was like she was walking on rocks until I arrived home from work for the evening feeding. She could hardly stand!! I managed to chop it out, but she was so lame she lay down immediately. I gave her some Banamine and hoped she would be fine--I had never heard of lasting effects from something like this. I consulted the vet and she thought Lucky would rest up for a few days on a soft bed and be good as new. Well, she never got much better. She had a couple of good days here and there, but for the most part she was lame in varying degrees from that day on. My vet diagnosed it as a "road founder" type of condition and I tried everything--padding her feet and wrapping with tape (tape wouldn't stick in the freezing cold we were having in January in Upstate NY), put socks on her legs in case the cold was affecting her nerves and making things worse, daily Banamine (bute and Previcoxx didn't work as well), every laminitis-related supplement I could find, cold laser treatments, bloodwork for Cushings, re-tested my hay to make sure it wasn't too high in NSC for her because she had previously gotten laminitic on hay that tested 9.8, which is usually in the safe range for even insulin resistant horses--but not low enough for Lucky. The hay I was feeding her tested at a super low 4.5--well, problem wasn't diet. We tried to keep her comfortable, hoping the acute stage would end and she would go back to her baseline of relative soundness as long as she was kept on super low NSC hay and no grass. Her x-rays showed some coffin bone rotation, but not horrible. Nothing worked. Although she was never down and in severe pain as she was the night of the ice-ball assault, she was never comfortable or even close to sound. After about two months of treatment, I made the difficult decision to euthanize her.
It was a very sad day here at that farm. I wanted her last day to be a happy day and as pain free as possible. I loaded her up with Banamine--I gave her at least triple her daily dose and I could tell she really felt better. My neighbor has a backhoe. He came and dug a grave. The vet arrived, I led Lucky to the grave where she was quietly laid to rest. I cried, the vet cried, the vet students cried. My perfect little pony was gone.
I'll get the other bad thing out of the way. July 2015, Mac (the cute roan looking appaloosa on my earlier posts) had a chronic hoof toe crack that had been going on for at least a year. I was concerned about it, but my farrier wasn't--when I asked him about it, he would just brush it off as no big deal and that I was an over-protective horse parent type of response. Since he had good credentials and a good reputation, I trusted him. After all Mac had always had been prone to a degree of hoof cracking, he was probably OK and this one would grow out if I just gave it more time, right? Wrong! I let it go too long before asking for a second opinion from another farrier.
Second farrier, Mario, picked up the hoof, did a little "cleaning up", called me back with "Umm ... Dorothy, I want to show you something." He proceeded to tell me Mac had a severe fungal infection under the wall extending all the way up to the coronary band, even though the wall looked intact to a lay person except for the widening crack at the bottom 1/4 of the wall at the toe. Other than the crack, it looked like a pretty normal hoof--How could this be???? How did I miss this???? These kinds of things happened to neglected horses--Mac had never gone for more than 7 or 8 weeks between trims, usually 6 weeks. He had me feel a bulging on the outside of the hoof wall, which was an indication of the infection under the wall. Mario did what he could that day, but the bottom line was that Mac would need a wall resection to save the hoof. We planned a time, he came, and Mac was lame on that hoof. Farrier Mario didn't feel comfortable proceeding at the farm, where we had a lot of mud at the time, working on a horse that likely had also developed an abscess to complicate matters, and he felt the hoof should also be x-rayed first.
I'm fortunate enough to live only about 1/2 hour drive from the Cornell University Vet Equine Hospital, and after a conversation with a vet and the head farrier there, we decided to trailer Mac there. Trailering Mac was a big deal. He was nearly completely blind; he hadn't been off the property in several years since he became blind; my other horse "Babe" would have to go along as his babysitter, seeing-eye-horse. She is also pretty much retired and hadn't been off the property in a few years. Could we manage this without Mac losing it????
I was so worried how Mac would react to things, but he did fine as long as Babe was within a foot or two of him at all times. Mac went to x-ray; Babe went to x-ray; Mac went to the treatment room; Babe went to the treatment room. My friend, Mike (technically Mac's owner), and I had the good sense to enlist the help of a local teenager, Michaela, who has helped care for the horses when I've been unable to for medical reasons. I assigned her to Babe and she also ran all those "oh can you get this from the trailer--we forgot" stuff that came in so handy. My knee was killing me from a torn meniscus; Mike is not very experienced with horse handling when things get a little tricky, and he was also very overwhelmed about dealing with the whole "sick Mac" situation. Michaela was a Godsend, and it was so much easier with her there. She handled the difficult day better than most adults I know. What a blessing!
It was an unusual situation for the Cornell staff as well. The ones we were working with hadn't had to deal with a situation of a tightly bonded pair like Babe and Mac--with Mac blind AND not having been trailered or off the farm since he became blind. They were great, though. After the initial history, paperwork, general exam, Mac (and Babe) went to x-ray. We waited outside for what seemed like forever, which wasn't setting well with me--they must be discussing some difficult things. Finally, they emerged from the x-ray room. Showed us the films and explained what was going on. The infection had progressed to at least half of his coffin bone. He had both a fungal and a bacterial infection. The two vets and the head farrier explained the possible treatment. Surgical debridement of the hoof, including the coffin bone. After that, he would have a shoe with a metal plate covering the sole that would be removed daily for treatments at home. He would be on stall rest for probably at least 2 months ... IF it all worked perfectly. Keeping him stalled for two months would be very difficult. He didn't like being in a stall since going blind; he freaked out if Babe was taken out of her neighboring stall---it would be prison for both of them ... again, IF the treatment plan worked and he could recover from extensive debridement and didn't develop a complication, like a secondary infection. We talked it over and came to the agonizing decision to euthanize him there at Cornell so he wouldn't have to be trailered again back home.
Then, we had to figure out the logistics of euthanizing a blind horse who needed his seeing-eye-horse friend with him every step of the way. Mike and I also wanted to be present, and as close to Mac as the vets would let us be (for safety reasons they had some rules about that)--he was going to die surrounded by his loved ones. Surprisingly, the vet said most owners don't want to be present and they had NEVER had another horse involved in the process like Babe would need to be. They sedated Mac and Babe before walking out to their "euthanizing paddock"--they really do have a tarp-surrounded paddock for this purpose. Again, everything was fine with Babe leading the way. Mac was calm, went down quietly, and it was a peaceful good bye. Babe was brought in to see his body to help her understand that he was gone. She didn't seem to care and was more interested in eating some nearby grass. Oh, OK--I guess she wasn't affected by it in a bad way. Whew! That was a relief.
We led Babe back through the hospital hallways to go back to the holding stall. As we got farther away from Mac, she kept looking behind her with this confused look ... which progressed to panic. They gave her more sedation, but by the time she was back to the stall, she was SO distraught. Babe is a very stoic horse. I had owned her for 12 years at the time and had NEVER seen her react that way to anything.
We spent a lot of time soothing Babe. She calmed enough where we felt we could go to the office to settle up the bill and paperwork. Michaela was left to keep an eye on her. We came back 10 minutes later to hear Babe screaming and Michaela trying to calm her. Michaela said she had gotten upset again right after we left. I spent some more time with her, she settled down, and we were able to load her in the trailer for the ride home without incident.
Babe was a little depressed the next couple of days, but appeared to adjust. She was in a pasture by herself, but it bordered the minis' pasture and she could reach over the fence if she wanted to. She stuck kind of close to them for a couple of days, but then ventured off when grazing. I think she still misses him, months later, but she's doing fairly well, although there is just something "different" about her--I do think this experience had a lasting effect on her. I still choose to keep the mini's separated from her due to the size difference and my fear that Rosie, my youngster (much more to come about the mini-update and this little rowdy girl in my next post), will irritate Babe and may not get out of the way if Babe decides to teach that little runt a lesson.
I'm going to end here just because of the length of the post. I apologize for the depressing post, but this is part of life with horses. I PROMISE more fun and joyful posts to follow. LOTS to talk about with the mini's.
Rest in peace dear Mac and Lucky. Our lives are better for having you in it.
