First Ride of 2014 - Ride 40 - Happy New Year!

Sorry for the old pictures.  I didn't take any today.  I was working out in the yard with my dad and husband today and they drove the truck to the back of the pasture, but I had to take Stormy inside so I got left behind.  After taking the dog in I got my bridle so I wouldn't have to walk, but they were already driving back so I just bridled Chrome and rode him in the yard instead.  I rode around bareback at the walk for about twenty minutes, just enjoying the gorgeous weather and my sweet horse.  At one point my dad got in his truck to move it and I moved Chrome in front of it so he couldn't go anywhere.  It was hilarious because he was creeping forward expecting Chrome to move out of the way on his own, but my brave boy stayed put and wouldn't budge.  We laughed and I moved him out of the way so he could park the truck.  :)

My leg is getting much better.  It doesn't hurt anymore and the abrasion is almost completely healed.  It's still a hard knot and bruised, but it's getting better every day.  I can't remember ever having a bruise/abrasion take three weeks to heal.  Sheesh!  The abrasion was fairly deep though so I shouldn't be surprised.  It looks like it's going to heal without a scar though, so that's cool.  :)

Faran is doing great.  He has padding across his ribs again, although he's not quite back to his old weight yet.  I did deworm him with Safeguard (it's all I had on hand) to make sure that wasn't contributing to his weight loss.  His rain rot is gone too, so all is good now.  :D  I hope everyone has a great new year!!  My only goal for 2014 is to live in the moment and enjoy every single day to the best of my abilities.  I'm going to be a bad blogger and not do a 2013 recap since most of the year was taken up with moving and building the house (boring).  I do want to try to do better with blogging this year since the house is.... if not done at least we're living in it hehe.  Happy new year!!  I'll get caught up on blogs as soon as possible.  :)

Faran Update

Oops, sorry I haven't updated!  My husband's family left.  His niece was coming down with something (probably a head cold) and I was a bit offended.... so many people just don't give a damn if they infect other people.  My brother just recovered from the flu and is still weak.... getting sick again could be so dangerous since he has a compromised immune system!!  So I'm avoiding my parents and brother as much as I can in case I've caught it and just haven't started showing symptoms.  I've bleach cleaned my entire house so hopefully I won't get sick.  Keep your fingers crossed.  :)

Anyway you don't care about my illness paranoia, so I'll tell you about Faran.  He seems to have recovered from choking completely, although he has lost weight.  During my research I read that they can lose quite a bit of weight quickly because their throats hurt so they don't eat as much hay.... top that off with cold weather and it's not really a good thing.  Don't worry, he's not emaciated or anything, just a little ribby (would be normal on a Thoroughbred, but odd on my air puff Percheron).  You can barely see them because of his thick winter coat, but you can feel them more than I've ever felt them before.  I've added oats to his pellets just for quick calories and I'm going to start feeding him the Enrich 32 again as soon as the feed store gets a bag in (I wish they carried it more consistently) because he needs the protein.  They are also due for deworming so I'll do that asap just in case.

He appears to LOVE his soupy, disgusting mash everyday.  He slurps it right up.  In fact we've put a rock in his bucket just to slow him down some.  So far there hasn't been any sign of choke, so hopefully he won't ever have a problem with it again if we make sure to always soak his pellets.  I will NEVER feed them dry ever again to any horse after going through that.  Besides the extra water is good for them in the winter.  :)

The other two are doing well.  I'll update again soon.  I really need to get my camera out and take some pictures!  There is more cold, cold weather on the way.  *pout*  Also hoping I don't get a head cold.  If you don't hear from me for a week that will be why lol.  I hope you all had a great weekend (and Christmas actually!  I never even posted Merry Christmas!).

P.S.  I am reading blogs whenever I can get a minute, but I haven't been commenting like I usually do.  I'm sorry.

Poor Faran choked.... :( He's fine though.

Sorry no pictures!  We found a vet who does coggins that's only ten minutes away so we loaded Faran up to go get his blood drawn.  He loaded on the trailer in fifteen minutes or so which is awesome! Such a good boy.  He did it on his own too, we didn't have to force him.  The bad thing is that we were feeding him handfuls of dry hay pellets as a reward.... bad move!!  I should have known better.  I feed him hay pellets with minerals everyday, but I soak them and feed from the ground...

So when we got to the vet, ten minutes away, he started trying to swallow and we immediately knew what was wrong.  We unloaded him just as he started draining saliva out of his mouth and nose.  If you've never seen a horse choke... it's gross!  I was worried because the vet we went to doesn't do anything with horses except draw blood for coggins, but luckily their new vet (co-owner) is an equine vet!!  Yay!  He even had all of the stuff in his truck because he said he still worked on horses for his in-laws or some family with a horse farm (I was too distracted to really listen so I don't remember for sure) even though the clinic only does small animals (they are too busy to try to take on equine patients).  So he sedated Faran, stuck the tube up his nose and cleared the obstruction.  He said it was a small obstruction and we cleared it quickly, so he should be totally fine now.  Regardless I'm going to keep a close eye on him.  I'm also going to do some research on after care, because I don't know when I should feed him again or if I should let him drink or what.  Right now he's in the round pen letting the sedation wear off where the other boys can't bother him.  I've only ever seen one horse choke (the horse belonged to someone else), so I don't really have much experience with it.  I recognized the symptoms immediately, but I don't know the aftercare.  So if you know anything about choke, comments are welcome. 

So yeah that turned out more stressful and expensive than I was expecting, but he did get his blood drawn for the coggins so at least that's done.  I'm just happy he's okay.  I was on the verge of a panic attack before I found out there was an equine vet there!  :)  We have family visiting for the holidays at the end of the week, so I may be scarce a while, but I'll make sure to update on Faran in a couple of days.

P.S. Oh I almost forgot, his rain rot appears to be gone already!  Yay!  I'll check really well later when I have some latex gloves.  The MTG is still stinky lol.

P.P.S.  Faran is grazing out in the round pen so he's awake and seems fine.  :D