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Tuesday, August 23, 2011

Faran's Leg is Swollen

What the heck is up with my accident prone horses? When Faran came up for breakfast this morning I immediately noticed his leg was swollen from the hock down. It's almost the size of a tennis ball on the back of his hock (keeping in mind his legs are enormous anyways because he's a draft). He walks a bit weird going downhill, but walks mostly normal on flat. He doesn't seem to be in horrible pain and has no problem bearing weight on it. We gave him some bute and cold hosed the leg. My husband wants it give it a couple of days before going to the vet because with him being unemployed due to his back injury things are kind of tight . . . I'm worried about waiting. We're going to give him a tetanus shot if it's possible to get them OTC because we don't know if he's had one. Is there anything else I can do while we "give him a couple of days"? There are no obvious scratches or puncture wounds or anything that I can fine. It's soft, a little warm and he doesn't seem bothered when I mash around on it. The pictures turned out like crap so here's a video. Please let me know what you would do.


P.S. Keep in mind when my husband is leading him that the hesitation is not because of the leg, it's because he's still not 100% sure about humans.
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5 comments:

  1. JudiAugust 23, 2011 at 2:44 PM

    I don't think it will do any harm to wait a couple of days, since it really doesn't seem to be bothering him. Keep up with the cold hosing, though.

    For as swollen as he is, you would think he would be really hurting!

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  2. appydoesdressageAugust 23, 2011 at 3:54 PM

    Such horrible luck! I would recommend trying some Sore No More poultice, it is a clay that works really well and it doesn't need to be wrapped. Could also try some basic liniment, you want to try to draw some of the excess fluid off of there.
    Unfortunately I don't have any ideas on the cause but I would agree with bute 2x a day and "wait and see". I couldn't tell how swollen his leg was in the video, just the knot on his hock. Since he isn't lame on it, he most likely isn't going to hurt himself further OR he is going to make whatever is wrong visible.
    Good luck, let us know how it goes!

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  3. MaryAugust 23, 2011 at 6:16 PM

    How weird, it looks ike it should hurt. I wonder if he was kicked. I hope it gets resovled with out to much expense.

    What was Chrome up to? It seemed there was some distractions going on.

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  4. Nuzzling MuzzlesAugust 23, 2011 at 7:13 PM

    I like the suggestions you already got. I learned that the shipping boots I got work well for packing ice. I don't know how Faran would be with that, especially on the hind leg, though, and you probably don't have shipping boots. That's good that he's moving well.

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  5. ValAugust 23, 2011 at 8:58 PM

    For how swollen it is and he is not lame, I am going with insect bite. Hope he feels better soon.

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