Category: Horses

Spooky

Hap and Rags refused to go into the barn this morning to eat their breakfast. This is almost as astonishing as if I had observed the sun to rise over the mountains. I finally haltered Rags and led him into his stall, but he bolted out when he heard the chain rattle as I closed the gate. Then, after a five minute slow motion chase, I was able to halter Hap and lead him into his stall. This time I was smart enough to hold onto the horse while I closed the gate. After Rags observed Hap chowing down, he finally consented to enter his stall, and I quietly closed the gate to shut him in. Hap stayed pretty focussed on his breakfast. Rags kept leaving his food to stare out of his stall, and galloped out as soon as I opened the stalls to let them out.

Hap losing his tiny little mind rarely surprises me, but Rags is downright sensible for a horse. They must have seen or smelled something very unusual to spook them so badly. And it happened relatively early in the night since there was lots of uneaten hay left in the stalls. Despite being less than a mile from Pike National Forest, we rarely get mountain lions or bears in this valley, but I bet it was one or the other that upset Hap and Rags.

Minus Three

Feeding horses when it is -3F is not much fun, but has to be done anyway. Fortunately, I didn’t look a the digital thermometer closely before I went out this evening, and thought it was three degrees above zero instead of three below. We have about one of these cold snaps every year, and each time I am profoundly grateful for rural electrification and stock tank heaters.

Clydesdale SuperBowl Commercials

I just watch because of the Clydesdale ads, honest. To vote for your favorite, you can go to Best Super Bowl Commercials 2006. My favorite was the one with the Clydesdale youngster. I want one, but I keep reminding myself of when I met a young Clydesdale gelding at the Ft Collins stables. He was already as big as my 16, 2 hh Thorougbred Hap, and yet was obviously a baby. I do NOT need an 18 hh horse.

Hap Update

Hap seems to be doing fine. I make at least three trips out to the barn each meal: the first time to give him his sulfa in his equine senior, and the second time to pick up the tablets that have fallen to the side and give him yet more horse chow so he will eat those as well. Rinse and repeat until all the tablets are gone, so I can let the horses out of their stalls. I think Hap may be training me. I am just so grateful that I am getting the medication down him that I don’t really care. I consider trips to the barn my new exercise plan. Even with the repeat courses, Hap is getting just a fraction of what Smoke used to get every day, so I hope he won’t turn into a complete blimp.

A Very Expensive Tooth

Hap\'s Tooth
Yesterday morning, when I went out to feed the horses, I noticed that Hap had some sort of drainage coming out of his jaw. My friend brought her clippers over and we found an impressive abscess underneath all the hair. I thought he had somehow managed to catch strangles, a highly infectious disease which is usually self-limiting in healthy horses. His vet came out, examined him, didn’t think it was strangles, and really, really wanted to take x-rays, to rule out nasty causes of the abscess like an infection in the bone, or a chip off the jaw.

I hauled Hap to the clinic this morning. My friend came along to provide moral support if it turned out to be something particularly nasty, and practical assistance if Hap decided to be a butthead. Fortunately, Hap’s evil twin did not show up, and the x-rays indicated the jaw bone was healthy. However, his teeth badly needed floating, and there was a possible fracture of one tooth. This was that tooth, which popped out as the vet started to float that side. She is quite confident that this fractured tooth was causing the abscess, and is glad that she got it out before it caused even more problems. As it is, I have to figure out how to get SMZ down him for a month. SMZ is a sulfa drug much used as a horse antibiotic. Horses don’t like the taste, so one spends a lot of mental energy trying to come up with novel ways to disguise it.

I was so euphoric as I drove back that I drove onto an icy patch on a hill before I realized it and got stuck. Even four wheel drive didn’t seem to be help. While I was assessing the situation, and trying to figure out a solution that did not involve Jack, a man in a truck stopped to help me. He had two shovels, and it took about five minutes to shovel enough sand over the ice that the truck was able to pull out the trailer using the lowest gear of the 4WD. Hap stood quietly in the trailer the whole time.

I bet I can’t get anything close to what this tooth cost from the Tooth Fairy.

Hap Nap

Hap Nap
Although it is still very cold out, Hap seems to find it comfortable enough to take a nap in his stall which opens south. (This photo was taken with the zoom, and the autofocus seems to have found the fence instead of Hap.)

Smoke’s Image

Smoke\'s Image
Smoke’s Image 1977-2005
Two weeks ago, I realized that a decision that we knew we would have to make about Smoke sooner or later was going to be sooner. Saturday, I watched him lurch down the hill to the barn and saw that his right knee, which had been bad for a long time, had given up functioning all together. Bute gave him a little relief through the weekend, and today his vet came out and put him down. Jack and a friend came to be with me while it happened.

Continue reading Smoke’s Image

Why, oh why

I’ve been cleaning the stock tank every two or three days, since Hap, at least, has the messy habit of rinsing his hay before he eats it. I am used to finding wads and strands of hay in the water. However, this morning I could have sworn that I found mud in the bottom of the stock tank which I had cleaned, rinsed and refilled two days earlier. Are Hap, Rags and Smoke now using their stock tank to make mud pies?