WordPlay

by Doranna

Ahh, yes.  April weather. 

Actually, this whole winter has been like this.  Achingly little precipitation of any kind, and going into what they’re calling a neutral year.  No La Niña, no El Niño.

When we do get wet stuff, it’s invariably somehow on those days of “zero percent chance of precipitation.”  And then it’s just a tease–a taste of what it might be like if it actually snowed.  Meanwhile the temps are all over the place, from hot to cold and back again.

Last night, the wood stove was going full blast.  The night before, I had the bedroom windows open…  Today, I freely admit to be hiding from the cold day and the cold wind, when my body was getting used to spring.   I haven’t, in any recent days (and also thanks to copyedits), managed to saddle Duncan up and ride.

This does not please him.

And snow in mid-April?

No.  DuncanHorse is not pleased.  No one, he says, consulted him.

by Doranna

ConneryBeagle has a Twitter feed (Because of course he does.  That boy has been online since the day he came home with me).   He doesn’t tweet religiously, since I rarely give up the keyboard, but he likes to talk about his adventures.

Over the weekend he did that, after an adventure with the horse.  And because there were questions…here’s the rest of the story!

DuncanHorse has a paddock inside our fenced pasture area.

Looking up at the paddock gate from inside the pasture

Unfortunately, of the three summers we’ve been here, he’s only been allowed out on the pasture for the first summer–that’s the drought in action.  I’ve got to protect what is, in fact, a terribly fragile soil/flora/fauna area.  (Things die; they don’t come back.  The land erodes in a heartbeat, which is how those deep arroyos ended up in the back yard to begin with!)

When I care for Duncan, I often go from the office to the back yard to the pasture to the paddock.  (Wee gate between yard and pasture, visible above; horse gate between pasture and paddock.)  If you watched Monday’s video, I’m standing at the yard gate when it starts, and at the horse gate when it ends.  It’s a lot more straightforward than it sounds.

Well, the horse gate is a pain in the ass.

No, really!  It is!

It has this horrible sticky bolt latch that has to fit into a rather small hole, and it does this with a big clang and clatter–and aside from the annoyance this is never, ever good for someone who fights migraines on a daily basis.

Horrible sticky gate latch in proper position. Cannot believe I paid money for this one!

So generally I don’t latch it.  The gate is on a slope, and it’s heavy–really heavy, I can assure you, as it took 3-4 people to move that panel–and it stays closed by itself.

A view from inside the paddock (well, through the corral panels, which is a bit tricky. And the lighting sucks. But darnit, you can see the latch!)

Except…

There’s those 3-4 times a year when the wind catches me by surprise and blows that gate open.  Uphill.  Have I mentioned that the wind gets pretty fierce around here?

Then, if I’m not quick enough, Duncan has some pasture time.  It’s not a huge issue except that unless I grab him close to the escape point, I have to clamber around Arroyo Minor to get him, and this is never good in the middle of the night, which is usually when this happens.  Also, it makes me wince for the land.

One of the reasons it rarely happens is that the wind usually bangs the gate a couple of times as the gusts build, and I hear this and trot out and latch it for real.  Also, the gate really doesn’t move that easily.  I go through it several times a day and I open it from horseback, and I can attest to this in spades.

Well, guess what.  The gate was also intensely squealy.

SO I LUBRICATED IT.

Suddenly the opportunity for escape seems to have increased considerably.

So on Sunday I laid tracks for the dogs, and Connery’s track wound through Arroyo Minor, starting near the big pasture-road gate on the north flat.  When I do this, I leave that gate open from the time I lay the track to the time Connery runs it.

So you see this coming, right?

Halfway through the track-aging process, I heard a  gentle “snortsnortsnort!”

DuncanHorse: I am out in the pasture and I like it!

My choices?

1) Run out to chase him down and wreck the half-aged training track.
2) Leave him out there to interfere with the track in his horsie way, and whip out the other side of the house at warp speed to close the open gate.

I chose option #2.

So Duncan moseyed around the pasture, tromping hither and yon, and then hung around the start of the track.  We pretended he wasn’t there and ran the track through Arroyo Minor, after which I removed Connery’s harness so he could do his own moseying while I convinced Duncan to return to Home Base.

Duncan knew where he was going and didn’t really want to go there.  Connery knew where Duncan was going, too.  So he put on his herding dog clothes and escorted Duncan there.  Not applying pressure as a herding dog would, but being present.   All business-like, trot trot trot, gently holding the outside of the curve.  And oh, his upright Beagle tail waved happily and his panting had a big grin in it.

ConneryBeagle: I was IMPORTANT.

Yes, Connery.  Yes you were.

And that was ConneryBeagle’s big Sunday adventure–tracking around the horse, and then being very important as he helped return the horse to his paddock.  Not much in the grand scheme of things, but it does so make me smile to see him that happy.

By the way, this is what the gate looks like now…

With Bells On!

(Have you closed all your gates?  Latched all your doors?  Turned off your iron…?  Mwah ha ha!!)

by Doranna

Things are starting to pick up in DuncanHorse World.  But first, a random bit of goodness:

Tiger Bound from England!

It’s an overseas version of Tiger Bound!  How cool is that?  I’m supposed to get copies of all international versions and I usually do (I have a small batch of foreign language books here that I admire every now and then), but this set came pretty promptly on the heels of the US version.  Neat!

Ahem.  So back to the big white pony, who is still dealing with flares from his severe reaction to the spring shots (which he’ll likely never get again, aside from tetanus).  A week or so ago I ordered him some $$$TransferFactor$$$, since my consulting vet has seen it work wonders for situations like his.  I wouldn’t know yet…they don’t seem to be in any great hurry to send it.

HURRY UP, PEOPLE!  Duncan and I are waiting.

Consulting Vet is ConneryBeagle’s chiropractic vet, and we’ve had some helpful casual conversations about Duncan’s situation over the summer.  I decided to make it official so I could really grill her (without friend-guilt!), so here we are.

Last week Consulting Vet also came by to poke around his furry white sides, chat about his diet, and ponder how to best manage the ongoing symptoms.  Duncan was sleepy in the sun in his early winter coat, and so willingly gave blood, schmoozed, and let himself be admired.

The blood work is just to eliminate certain concerns, after which we’re likely to do what I’ve been doing all summer–daily reality checks for the three subtle signs that he’s at the front edge of a flare, and tossing dexamethasone at him if I find anything.  It only seems to occur every couple of weeks–the heat seems to be a problem, so maybe winter will help, too–and at those doses, the steroids aren’t a big issue (barring ugly results on the blood work–I hope to know something this week).

Meanwhile, we’ve had some brisk mornings, and he does seem to be feeling a little better, yes he does.  But if a picture is worth a thousand words, a video…even better! Although I’m just now realizing that all the captions I put in the dark area in the video editor do not show up in the YouTube conversion. Oh, for pete’s sake..

(Don’t you wish you had that kind of energy?)

by Doranna

This is totally not the same as the camel toe effect.  Don’t even go there.

This is what happens on a Friday when one wakes up hoping to ride, and encounters this particular weather (and a Lyme Head attack) on the same day.  A little peek into DuncanHorse’s day, that’s what.

Also a little peek into what we’ve been dealing with since his spring shots went so terribly awry.  As it happens, on Friday he hit the front edge of a flare, and in some of the video shots you can see the hives high on his shoulders.

He got a dose of a mild steroid and was settled down the next day…and as it happens, he’s scheduled for a consulting vet visit next Thursday.  I’ve already ordered the incredibly expensive supplement called Transfer Factor because this vet has had such good luck with it when it comes to horses in Duncan’s situation.

Otherwise, it’s a DuncanHorse day!  Can you hear the wind in the background of some of the shots?  They were 50mph gusts, but I don’t think they’re coming through very well.  I can hear them, but…I know that they’re there!

by Doranna

My farrier (ie, horseshoeing professional) hates it when I say Horsie Manicure.

I guess I don’t blame him.  The description doesn’t really reflect the physical and exacting nature of the job.  I was a farrier assistant once upon a time, in gaited horse country.  So much more fascinating and complex than you might imagine.

Duncan, however, is a pretty straightforward boy to work with.  One of the benefits of the Lipizzan breed: good footies.  Duncan goes barefoot, which is better for any horse who can maintain that way.  We do have to take care when it comes to riding the road and the gravel, but generally we’re good to go.

What makes a good foot?  Good shape.  Good balance/angles.  Strong hoof walls and good thick soles.  Any horse needs some help with these things–and thus the farrier, with his nippers and hoof knife–but the less…the better.

This is Duncan’s foot before his recent trim.  He’s nearly 8 weeks since the past trim, which is much longer than I normally go, but he was keeping a ton of sole and looked good, so…I was going with it.

Left front footie at eight weeks out--still nice and round and solid

The front hooves carry two-thirds of a horse’s weight; they’re round and symmetrical.  Or they should be.  Duncan’s feet are in fact unusually round, and this makes him really hard to fit for a horse boot–most horses have front hooves that are, in the end, a bit more oval than round.

The front left foot before trim, from the bottom. This foot is still holding all of its sole from the past 8 weeks, nice thick protection.

And here’s his back foot.  Nope, it’s not the same shape as his front.  The back hoof is more oval, and you can see the spread near the heels.  You can also see that Duncan doesn’t wear his back feet as evenly as his front; he tends to walk toward centerline due to his bionic stifle.  You can also see the remnants of the slight roll we added to his back foot in this past year–a nod to his age, so the hoof “breaks over” a little more readily in the stride.  Half of what you see is the roll, and the other half is the way he wears his back feet.

The back left footie. The sole shed out the day before this picture, while I was cleaning his feet out. You can see how much growth he has in the hoof wall--basically the same as our fingernails.

Look!  Clean shiny new front foot!  The about-to-shed sole is gone, the outer edges are slightly rounded, and the whole foot is evenly balanced.  You can see here how thick his hoof walls are, and that they’re decently even. I won’t point out the slight flare–maybe you can see it.

The front left foot, all spankin' trim and clean. Often we leave the sole in place, but it was just about ready to shed, so much better to trim everything up.

Clean shiny new back foot, with toe roll!

The back footie. So handsome.

And guess what!  Now we’re going for a ride, to put those bright clean footies to use. Because I’ll bet that was more than you ever wanted to know about horse feet…

by Doranna

Duncan and I have had the Summer of Sick in common this year–me with the Lyme, him with his autoimmune reaction from his shots.  That should be over by now but it’s lingering in a worrisome way, flaring up on a regular basis.  And with neither of us well, he’s not been ridden.  So he’s not fit, and he’s missing a lot of his usual war horse attitude.

But not all of it.

Just a glimpse of the old boy in action. I hope it gave you a grin!

Enough is MORE than enough.

I have a dog whose life changed after his final puppy shots (ConneryBeagle).  It started immediately, but it took us a while to understand the full ramifications…the autoimmune issues leading up to his third year, when the vet who had kept him alive also grimly suggested that I prepare to lose him early.

Very, very early.

That Connery is still alive at 8 1/2 is beyond everyone’s expectations and due to extensive and intricate care–there’s a reason I have a fundraiser book for his medical expenses, and a reason I’m running my car into the ground rather than replacing it at its age.  And there’s a reason he’ll never get another vaccine.

Things came on more slowly with Duncan.  Last year, he struggled after his yearly floating and shots.  Both his  vet and I thought it was his effort to adjust to his “new” teeth, since the previous vet hadn’t compensated for his missing molar, and that meant a significant amount of mouth work this time around.

Hindsight is everything.

This year, Duncan had a normal floating with his shots…but he clearly didn’t feel well in the days following the vet visit–and besides that, he was being plagued by bugs, with welts the size of which I’d never seen on him before.  I put him on colic watch, I cajoled him to eat with nummies and special feeding routines, I rubbed on new fly spray and I thought he was coming out of it.  Even when he woke up one morning with thick pasterns, I wasn’t too worried–he’s stocked up before with changed feeding routines (alfalfa, that devil hay!).

But he got more swollen, and more…and suddenly his skin was oozing in various places where it runs thin.  His belly was bloated, his head was hanging, and he didn’t want to move at all.  It happened very quickly once it started, in the course of a a late afternoon/evening.  (FRIDAY, of course.)  It was then that I realized the bizarrely reactive bug bites were part of the whole picture, and then that I realized he was in a full-blown immunological reaction from the shots–and that the stocking up was in fact vasculitis.

My poor noble boy!

I was lucky.  Patty (of Friday’s Write Horse blog feature!) responded to my “What the heck?” from earlier in the day, and as things developed into Friday night, offered some meds until I could reach the vet.  Within five hours, he was a different horse.  In short order I got a stamp of approval on treatment.  Another forty-eight hours and it became evident how many little things from the past week–things I’d been trying to resolve piecemeal–were part of the vaccine reaction.

That was more than a month ago.  It’s taken several courses of treatment, a completely new feeding regimen and supplements, additional consultations, and lots of horse hugs–but he’s finally starting to put muscle and weight back on.  And he didn’t get laminitis, although I’m still watching for signs of trouble.

The week before his shots, Duncan looked like a 15yo horse instead of his 21 years.  Now he looks a decade older.  I’m told he’ll recover; it’s going to take a while at this age and he may never be what he was before it happened, simply because of his age.  It’s hard for an old boy to come back from something like this, although a Lipizzan at 21 is still generally an active, athletic creature.

Me: No shots.  Ever again.

Vet: Sadly, there are no studies saying that the shots are good for more than a year.  There are only studies saying they’re good FOR a year.

Yes.  Because who funds those studies?  Who decides the parameters of the studies?  The vaccine people, that’s who.

I’m not a “vaccines are evil!” person.  I think vaccines are awesome.  I think they save lives.  I think there’s a responsibility to vaccinate.

SENSIBLY.

And I think part of being sensible is not letting the vaccine manufacturers define what IS sensible.  Do puppies need their shots that close together?  Do they need that many?  Do horses and dogs needs shots every single year? Do they really?

I don’t think so.  I think in this single household, I have two animals who have suffered for trusting what the vaccine people say is necessary…and assume is safe.

No more.

Now I make the best choices I can, consulting vets, doing research, and knowing that for Duncan–for Connery–shots are no longer life-saving at all.  And believing that it didn’t have to come to this for either of them.

What do you do about shots for your critter kids?

Ahhh, spring.

Lots of horse hair.

The paddock glacier has melted.

And DuncanHorse is pleased.

When DuncanHorse is pleased, there’s just no telling what will happen.

One day, for instance…I might head for the barn to discover he’s been quite busy–and creative–indeed.

Yes, once these water troughs were sitting side-by-side. The one on top used to be to the right.

Duncan lingers in the vicinity to be smug. Note the tongue.

Because we needed a close up.

Still looking for trouble...

It's best to give him something to do, then. This is a new toy: oats sprinkled in water. (Bonus: it encourages Mr. I-forget-to-drink-and-then-I-colic into sucking down water.)

Classically, this is the moment he turns to nuzzle me.

Go ahead, Duncan. Just shove your face right in there.

Deeply happy horse sucking oats between his teeth. Win!

I’ve finally figured out the big secret to feeding Duncan.

It wasn’t any single discovery…it was sixteen years of observations coming together at year twenty.

The particulars:

1. Like most Lipizzans, Duncan is an air fern.
2. At random intervals, Duncan has the worst diarrhea ever.  White horse, beautiful long tail…a power scrubber would take days to undo the mess that results.
3. Times 5 if he has a blanket on; blanketing clearly contributed, though who knows how.
4. At other times, he’s far too dry.
5. Those other times have contributed (but not caused) both of his colics–the one he survived only by a miracle, 2 1/2 years ago, and the one a year ago that we caught early and was precipitated by a nasty virus that weakened him for months.
6. None of that happened when he was in Flagstaff on Bermuda hay, which is an unusual kind of high-protein grass that I can’t easily get here.

In the meantime, after the first colic, I started soaking his hay a few moments before he ate.  I didn’t soak it longer, because I had read that the hay loses nutrients in that case.

About six weeks ago, I read (in the online source The Horse), an report on a scientifically conducted hay-soaking study.  And it turns out that lengthy hay soaking doesn’t reduce the nutrients per se.  It reduces the sugar.

So, sez I upon reading this study–great!  I must try longer soaks, because I don’t care if my air fern gets less sugar and the grass will soak up more water.

Now, one of the things that changes pretty significantly between hay cuttings and even hay bales is the amount of sugar in the grass.  Environmental circumstances during grass growth, how long it lays after cutting…blah blah blah.  There’s no easy way to predict it, and you sure can’t tell by looking.  And if my air fern were off grazing as horses evolved to graze, he wouldn’t be facing these abrupt dietary changes.  He’s not a digestive hothouse flower so much as he is displeased with the changes man has wrought to his manner of eating.

Do you see this coming?  He hasn’t had a digestive upset since I started doing soaking the hay.

Not that they came so often that it was obvious at first.  But a siege of bad weather and blanketing drove the point home.  And not that it’s easy.  It means an elaborate set-up in the garage, hay strewn where we don’t want it, and–wuh–hauling nets of soaked hay down to the barn.  But we’ve gotten it down to a pretty good science at this point, and after all these weeks, I am still smug–SMUG, I tell you!–to have stumbled over the food management that overcomes issues old and new.

So we’ll continue to refine the soaking routine, and I’ll probably feel smug for a good long while, and meanwhile, just for fun, here are some Photos of AWWWness.

I was going to 'shop out Connery's evil glowing eye, but decided...nahhhh...

For those of you who wondered about Dart's outfit for the Weather on TD test day...

A sunset and crescent moon in the same pic. Can't see the moon? Clickie the piccie...

It’s 10am Christmas morning, which is a whole lot later than this day started.  Not because I have eager kids in the house, but because today was my chance to run a certification track with Dart Beagle.

In order to enter the TD (tracking) test, a dog must prove he’s ready.  That means passing on an informal TD track.  Ours was scheduled for Friday the 23rd–but we spent Friday snowbound, digging out from under the third storm in two weeks.

insert random beauty

Sunrise, right before the start of the storm...

Thirty-six hours later, as the sun is about to set...clearing skies with lenticular clouds sitting on the Sandia Mountains

So we rescheduled for Monday.  But then the certifying judge had to reschedule something of her own due to that same weather, and suddenly here we are on Christmas morning, squeezing in the track together.

It was 15F when we left the house; marginally warmer when I ran Dart’s little starter track (a wee morale builder).  Eventually the sun came up and that helped a bit–when we ran the certifying track a little after nine, it was all blue sky, bright sun, and eager Beagle.

And for Christmas this year, the eager Beagle ran a picture-perfect track and found the glove.  8)

Now I am off to celebrate!

insert random holiday cheer

My view from the office at Horse Feeding Time

Duncan feeling a bit jaunty in his power red blankie

The dogs say "Happy Holidays!"