I began my morning by finally working with Sweetheart on jumping. I turned over two crab baskets and put some poles over them, then made the proper poles on the ground leading up to the jump (to "prep" her). I have been working with her on the ground but have never ridden her over one before. So today we walked through everything at a walk and then moved to a trot (she tried to dodge the jump just about every time), and I then discovered that the crab baskets were definitely much shorter than the construction barrel set-up I had been using, and thus she could just lift her legs and super high trot through/over them. After about an hour of this I got her at a fast enough trot to get one jump out of her. It wasn't alot, but it was something!
I went out with doc at noon today as well. We started with a re-check on the foal with the crooked legs. He had been turned out and so I got to see him running around like an adorable little... well, foal. :) His right front leg had straightened completely through the treatments, but his left front leg was still just slightly crooked. Doc suggested that she wait a couple more weeks to see if it would straighten out on it's own, but he also gave her a couple of other options- including knee braces for foals (something new that I am sure is quite interesting- I can't imagine how much damage and dirt a foal puts on them), or surgery to lengthen the tendon (which would have to be done by an actual surgeon- this isn't something that Doc would do in field).
Our second call was... interesting. There were two women and 6 horses at the barn, all Morgans. One of the women is in her thirties and is a farrier, the other in her 60's or 70's. The call was originally just for a check on the animals, but before we left we got a call that they thought one of their horse's was colicking, so we had packed the ultrasound just in case. We started out looking at that horse, and neither Doc nor I could see a reason that the owners thought the horse was colicking... except that it was slobbering. Slobbering this time of year is very common because of clover, which irritates the salivary glands. But this horse had colicked a couple of weeks ago, and Doc had gone to the call and took care of the horse, so we wanted to make sure everything was okay. Temp was normal, mucous membranes were normal, and upon palpation (Doc sticking his arm up the horse's butt and feeling the internal structures), everything seemed fine- though the horse had slightly looser than normal stool. Doc gave the horse an injection of Buscopan, a smooth muscle relaxer, to help with any possible discomfort she was having. The owner then went on a rant about how the other woman (the younger one) had told her that the horse (who had been laminitic) had cushing's because his ring bands on his feet weren't the right color. Doc very kindly explained to her that due to the laminitis the horse very likely would not have normal feet, and that clinically the horse had no signs. However, by the end of our exam, we had taken blood to test for cushing's, lyme's, a fibrinogen and an endogenous ACTH test.
We started to examine a second horse, a large gelding, and the owner informed us that he hadn't had any shots in six years. He had snot crusted around his nostrils and had been coughing. Doc put a plastic glove over his nose to induce him to breathe deeply, and found that he had some fluid brewing in his lungs. As we walked back to the truck to get a shot of bute for the poor fellow, Doc informed me that the women did not vaccinate their horses on a regular basis... and he suspected that the gelding had a case of flu-rhino- something we regularly vaccinate horses for. Of course then the women wanted more blood tests on the gelding, and a flu-rhino shot for the most expensive horse on the property (a stud). This is what happens when you don't vaccinate!! We ended up doing even more blood tests on the other horses in the barn, because the owners suspected everything from EPM, tapeworms, and lymes to god only knows what for a slight lethargy in their horse. Good for business, but I very highly doubt that many of those tests will come back positive... though I could be wrong. It is very true that clients know their horses better than a vet that comes out once every couple of months, but these people very much struck me as horse hypochondriacs.
Finally we made it out to our last call, and I was overjoyed to find that I knew the two horses at the farm. They were new clients and they had called us about a hernia on the yearling. As we walked up to the barn, they told me that the horses had just been adopted from the SPCA- a place I volunteer at on a regular basis during the semester. These two horses, Nike and Carrie, I knew quite well- I was there the morning they and 19 other babies were brought in to the SPCA in November after a seizure. 3 of them were in such bad condition that they didn't make it. The others became a community-unifier, and many people from all over the county, including many of the pre-vet kids from Gettysburg, came out to help take care of and train them. They were finally put up for adoption about a month ago and I was so happy to see what a nice place they were at, and how absolutely wonderful they looked. Nike was always one of my favorites, and Carrie, the lead mare who bit me at one point and almost kicked the crap out of me, seemed to have settled down with a little consistency in her life. Both of them seemed in very good hands. The owners I believe are going to try to race the two of them once they get their papers in order, but weren't particularly worried about it- they just wanted to do it as a lark, and if it didn't work out or the horses didn't like it, they were just going to turn them into riding pleasure horses. It was great to see them, and it even brought tears to my eyes to see them gallop off in the rain storm (which of course came out of nowhere as we were taking blood and soaked all four of us before we could get inside). I am hoping to see them again soon when we do the hernia surgery!
I was glad to get back home and change into dry clothes, then headed out for dinner with Jared. It was definitely a good day!
~Rich With Life~
No comments:
Post a Comment