TOABH: Costly

This week's blog hop from Beka is:  Costly
What has been your horse's most expensive injury to date? Let's exclude maintenance things, like hock injections and the magical monthly package of MSM. What single episode blew your savings or left you boiling ramen? If you want to get technical about it, time is money, too. 

I have been very, very fortunate so far and I really hope this doesn't jinx it lol. Here is Chrome's highest vet bill and fortunately it didn't blow my savings or leave me eating ramen.

I blanked out names and payment methods.

His hock puncture wound was close to this expensive since he had to be on antibiotics for three weeks, but this one still beat it by a little.  This is when they got into the horse feed that I didn't realize was in the barn.  We tubed him to be on the safe side, but he was fine and showed no adverse reaction to the feed thank goodness!!  Purina said that the Enrich 32 was unlikely to hurt him because it has no carbs or starch in it.  It's just protein, vitamins and minerals that were flushed out of his system.  They said it would take feeding large doses over a long period of time before it would hurt him.  I still don't regret being cautious though.  Founder is not something I'm willing to play around with.

Amazingly having him gelded was cheaper than this too.  He has been to the vet for two respiratory infections (when he was under a year old), was kicked in the jaw by Galaxy (actually the second respiratory infection was at the same time as this and he had sores in his mouth from hay seeds), the tubing, the gelding and when he punctured his hock.  His maintenance things like dentals, hoof care, feed, his dang sweet itch (I thought it was rain rot when it first appeared), vaccines, deworming, etc. costs more than injuries thank goodness!!  I hope he keeps it that way!

Oh and he had an abscess but my farrier didn't charge me for that because she's a friend, so it didn't cost anything more than the diapers, vet wrap, medicine and time (and heartache seeing him in pain).  There have been other injuries like when he cut his throat and bouts of rain rot, but he didn't go to the vet for those.  You can read all about his health related posts under the health tag here.

Here are some pictures since I don't like posting without them.  You can follow the links above for more pictures and info.

 Getting his teeth floated.  He got his wolf teeth pulled too.

 Treating his sweet itch.

 Click to enlarge.  The difference neem oil makes in his sweet itch.

 His abscess.  :(

 His punctured hock that he never acted like hurt at all.

If I remember right the vet opened it a little to check it. 

 His swelling from his cut throat.

Getting knocked out for his gelding.  

There are a LOT of pictures in that post so check it out if you aren't squeamish hehe.

So that was an interesting topic that makes me appreciate what I have and makes me grateful that things weren't worse (or even as bad as I imagined at the time... I tend to panic lol).  Thanks for the blog hop Beka!

More Pictures

Just some random snapshots from the GoPro video I took this morning.  The video was boring and I don't feel like uploading it, so I'll spare you guys and just share these snapshots.  Sorry for the poor quality.  We've gotten more snow and ice... this is such unusual weather for the south at this time of year.  Anyway I hope you enjoy them.  In the above picture he had his head turned away because the wind was blowing in his face.

 Trotting to me for his breakfast.  

He actually can cross underneath himself with his rear legs hehe.

 Pouring his feed in on top of the ice because I forgot to flip his bucket.

Can you see the flea-bites coming in around his eye?

 Yummy!  This is the bucket I feed him out of that I've mentioned before.

 Jackal has an awesome recall.  Coming at a dead run to me.  :)

 Silly goat.  You can actually see the snow coming down in this picture.

The action around the hay bale.

  Look at how long his mane has gotten!

That hay is better quality than it looks in the pictures lol.

 Yay Jackal is definitely developing a waist!

 For those who haven't seen pictures, this was him before his diet... FAT!

This was him about halfway between the two pictures above.

I'll try to get better dog pictures and post them on the other blog since this is supposed to be about horses hehe.  Well, that's all I have.  Sorry for being boring lately.

More ice!

Just an update so you know I'm still alive.  I did end up with bronchitis and it's been icy outside so I haven't done any riding.  We switched cell phone plans to something cheaper and I got a free refurbished cheapie phone with the plan since my old one was dying (it never rang... even with the volume all the way up... annoying!).  This phone is cheaper quality than my old one, but it actually has a better camera.  The light was low today so a lot of them came out blurry, but still not bad (even with my lazy, poorly done editing).  I took it with me when we put out a new bale of hay earlier today and snapped these pictures.

My handsome, constant companion Jackal.

 Chrome greeting me enthusiastically at the gate.

 Zep being a camera hog.  :D

 White goat being confident and cute!

 Brown goat was friendly as well, but way too close for pictures

so I snapped this one when he moved away from me.

 A picture of all four of them LOL!

P.S. I didn't have treats, but they were drawn to me for some reason.

 So cute! First picture of the three all together that I've ever gotten.

As I took the above picture Chrome came up behind me...

 ...and hovered, so I snapped this one above my head.

When we were trying to get the hay the tractor got stuck... there's been a LOT of rain and ice and it sunk in a gopher hole... :(  We finally got it out with the truck, but we couldn't put the hay in the barn because we would have gotten stuck again.  So we put it out in the pasture with the hay ring around it.  I really don't like putting it out in the rain and ice, but Chrome has a blanket now so he won't freeze to death while eating.

 He was wound up with all the vehicles moving around the pasture.

 Not bad trot picture for a cell phone. 

 I love that this phone has no delay at all in picture taking!

Chrome enjoying his new hay bale.  

Jackal looks like he's eating it too hehe.

We put it on top of an old pile to hopefully protect it from the wet ground a little.  :)  Later toward dusk it started snowing.  It was so pretty, but I was eating supper.  By the time I went outside to get video, it had turned to sleet.  The sleet was coming down hard but it doesn't show up on the video at all.  Darn!

Anyway here's a short (I sound annoying) video of Chrome coming when called and me putting the blanket (that really needs washed!) on him.  He knows what his blanket means now and stands patiently with no halter on while I put it on him.  He even tries to help do up the straps for me normally (he didn't this time because the weather had him on edge).


Anyway I'll be scarce while I get over this bronchitis and while the weather is crappy.  I hope you all are doing well.

Nighttime playing in the snow!

I was getting ready for bed and remembered that I forgot to check to see if FedEx had come.  We have a long driveway with a gate, so they always leave our stuff up there.  The only problem is they sometimes leave stuff on wet ground and we are covered in ice...  So I went outside and to my amazement it was snowing!!!  Big, fat, beautiful flakes were coming down heavy.  It was the dry, crunchy snow that I love to walk in and that makes perfect snowballs mwahahaha!  It was so magical!  We rarely get snow, so to me it's fun and exciting whenever we get it.  I was beginning to think we weren't getting any this year besides the recent dusting of ice.

The crazy thing is that it lasted for about twenty minutes while I was out playing in it, then it stopped as I walked toward the house.  When I checked the weather website there was no mention of snow.  Nothing in the forecast, nothing on the radar.  Yet there is half an inch of crunchy, beautiful snow covering our layer of ice outside!  It felt so special and magical that I happened to go outside at that moment and got to see the snow.  :D

Beware the monsters in the dark!

Jackal went too hehe.  Then I went out to see Chrome...

He was happy to see me as always!

 Although maybe not so thrilled with the flash.  Sorry Chrome!

 So cute!! 

 Zep is invisidonkey!

 I actually got a shot that kind of shows how much weight Jackal has lost!

 I put some hay out on the snow because Chrome wasn't sharing.

Of course he chased Zep away... dork.  After he realized he wasn't going to starve he let Zep share.  Aren't they cute??????  The goats were in the barn where it's dry with a whole round bale of hay all to themselves lol.  They are smarter than they look!  ;)

Anyway I'm keeping my fingers crossed that the snow sticks around long enough for me to get pictures in the daylight in the morning!!  It's supposed to get above freezing so it won't stick around long.  I guess I have to get up early... night!