Author: Amanda

adventures with the vet · colic

They do make us worry…

Amanda1 Comment

Running late from work last night, I got to the barn with the intention of longeing briefly and then heading out to meet the boyfriend for a movie date.

Got to the barn, kissed Tris on the nose on my way past his stall, and went into the tack room to grab the longe line. When I got back to his stall, he was lying down.

My brain went into immediate overdrive. I watched him for a minute or two, and he was alert and looking at me. He stayed lying down when I got into his stall, but that’s not unusual for him – when I catch him napping, he’s happy to have me come in and sit with him.

I put a halter on him and asked him to get up, and he did so immediately. Three piles of manure in the stall, half a bucket of water gone, and the hay he’d gotten ~2 hours ago was eaten to every last scrap. He was interested in me but perhaps a bit quieter than normal. Good gut sounds – but perhaps slower on his left side?

I put him on the cross ties and grabbed his antacids; he ate them a bit more slowly, less enthusiastically than he usually does. He dropped two of them out of his mouth, and at that moment the barn owner came in and I explained to her what I was seeing. I offered him the antacids again and he ate them happily. Usually when I feed them to him before I ride, he mugs me for more, and he was just a little too quiet this time.

I put him on the longe line for about 20 minutes of WTC. He was perhaps a bit lazy again, but he moved out easily enough and did some stretching. I did some belly lifts with him, listened to gut sounds again – still fine – and he passed some gas on the walk back to his stall, then again in his stall. I started to feel a bit better at that.

I picked out his stall, and left the stall guard up so he could poke his head out. Manure was normal, not too dry or too wet. He begged shamelessly for dinner, and we gave him half his grain. I fed him 12 simethicone tablets (generic Gas-X), which he ate with more enthusiasm than the antacids, and headed in to town for the movie. After the movie, I drove back to the barn and he was acting totally normally.

I’m still not sure if I overreacted or if I woke him up from a nap and that’s why he was sluggish. Either way, he’s pulled out of it just fine, and the incident caused me to double-check the banamine paste in my tack trunk. It expired this fall, so I asked my vet for two more tubes – one for my tack trunk, one for the trailer!

book review

Book Sale Find

Amanda9 Comments

Last night, I dropped a book I’d finished off at the library (Under Heaven by Guy Gavriel Kay, which I’d thought would be more about horses given they are the catalyst for the whole plot, but…nope)

I glanced over the book sale cart because I am helpless in the face of books. And I made a GREAT find, for $1:

It is in gorgeous condition, and matches my copy of The Black Stallion perfectly (except my copy is kind of in pieces).
At one point I had dared Hannah to do a re-read of all the Black Stallion books. Maybe starting that will be a way to pretend that it will be summer again someday?
canter · winter

Always Winter, Never Christmas

Amanda6 Comments

I am becoming a weather atheist. There is no season but winter, and weather men are false prophets.

I took this picture a few days ago, but it still looks exactly the same today.

It was below zero again last night. On March 26. Below zero. Single digits so far today, and it’s going to hail & sleet later.

I did get to ride last night, and we had a credible fitness session, including two 10 minute trot sets. The first mostly loose and low, the second incorporating all sorts of lateral work and poles. He was holding up so well I went for some short canter sets. I initially thought 1 minute canters, but during the first I glanced down at my watch and we’d gone for 1:25, so I pushed it to 2 minutes. I did them all in two point, too.

Then 2 minutes of walking, then another 2 minutes of canter. He was barely winded. Huzzah for fitness! We’ll keep adding to that. I’d love to get him up to 20 minute trot sets and 5 minute canter sets this summer.

One point of concern is that he had a barely perceptible four beat in his left canter. He felt steady and strong, and I honestly wasn’t quite sure what to do to address it in that moment. I have some ideas going forward – poles, careful attention on the longe line, continued fitness, Pentosan – but would appreciate any thoughts.

adventures with the vet

Mamas don’t let your ponies get drunk on a Monday morning…

Amanda7 Comments
Spring shots and teeth day!

Tris went first, and I believe I have waxed rhapsodic about my love for my vet before but damn, guys. Not only is she an awesome vet and an awesome human being but she is SERIOUSLY badass.

What you can’t tell in these pictures: she is 8.75 months pregnant. Yep. Due in less than 2 weeks. She had another vet with her to help with difficult horses, and to help keep track of everything, but Tris is so good about things that he had his teeth done exactly as you see here: untied, with a mild sedative. He just stood and looked miserable.
Can I be done now?

He also got vaccines, all the ones I detailed here and we ended up going with strangles after all. It’s been around a bit in our area so the vet went with better safe than sorry.

Did I mention, by the by, that it was WELL below zero for this vet appointment? And that it was -6 this morning when I walked to work, which set a new record even for this frozen tundra we call Vermont? Worst. Spring. Ever.

In happier news, experiment the first is ON. Wedgewood is shipping me a bottle of Pentosan and it will arrive by the end of the week and I am excited. I will report back in detail.

road hacking · winter

Happy spring?

Amanda4 Comments

4 inches of snow this morning. Sigh.

Last night, the ring was occupied, so no longeing for me. (It says something about how quiet my barn is in the winter that I was a bit dumbfounded to find other people there.) I jumped on bareback and we did about 30 minutes of road walking, 20 of them on the hill.

I’m experimenting with Endomondo right now as a way to track these things, and it tells me that the hill is about 1/4 of a mile up, with a 330 foot rise in height. An online grade calculator tells me that’s a 25% grade…yikes, ok, no wonder he was working hard! We went up and down, and then I jumped off and we went up and down again. My legs, they are a bit sore today. I am officially out of shape.

Road walking buddy.

The BF heads off to Utah to ski early tomorrow morning which means a) as much time at the barn as I want!, b) things I clean will STAY clean!, and c) I get to eat all sorts of foods that he would not touch with a ten foot pole like frittata. I’ll probably miss him eventually. I think.

bits

Bits I Have Loved

Amanda9 Comments

Amanda at Keeping It Low Key wrote recently about her conundrum about bitting up for control, and I shared in the comments that Tristan used to go in a kimberwicke: bitting up is not a sign of failure. It’s a tool of the moment. Bitting up out of fear and then never working through the root issue? If and when it happens, that’s the failure.

So I thought I’d write a bit about what bits I’ve used on Tristan, since my riding life is super boring right now.

The first bit Tris ever went in was a plain eggbutt snaffle.

You’ve seen them. You’ve ridden in them. They’re the milquetoast of the equestrian world. It was a decent starting place for us, but it didn’t last. Tristan doesn’t like single-jointed bits. So we moved on.
Not much further, though. Double-joined eggbutt snaffle: this would be our go-to for many, many years on the flat and inside.
Then we started to school Tristan XC. As part of that, I was doing hillwork, and Tristan, still being very much the green horse at this point, pulled a series of bolting and spinning antics that would put a reining horse to shame. He ran uphill. He ran downhill. He took dangerous flying leaps over anything in his path including drainage ditches, patches of dead grass, small fences, you name it – especially when he was headed back to the barn.
So we bitted up.
MY PRECIOUS. This is an Uxeter Kimberwicke, mullen mouth, medium port. I remember with perfect clarity the first day that Tristan tried to bolt for home and the curb chain on this bit engaged. It felt like he stopped in mid-air and came back to earth, shocked, utterly still. The wheels in his had spun in place. I was awed at the immediate, amazing change.
This is not a subtle bit, you guys. This combination of features has one goal, and one goal only: WHOA THE FUCK DOWN, HORSE. And oh, did he ever whoa. This was our go-to for XC and any outdoor riding for 2+ years. And over time, we slowly used it less and less often. First,  he could be ridden outside (in the outdoor arena) without trying to bolt. Then, he could be flatted in open fields without it. Finally, we could go XC without it – I could tell when engaging it a bit took him off the pace rather than made him sane.
So we moved on.
Full-check french link snaffle. This is the bit he still goes in today when he’s going XC or jumping. It lives on his figure-8 bridle. It can also occasionally be a good choice for trail-riding when he’s fresh, or any kind of galloping. I’ve been known to put it on for trot sets just as a change of pace. For the first year or so, I used keepers on it to get a bit more leverage action; now, it’s just loose. We experimented briefly in using it on his dressage bridle, but that didn’t pay off.
We did make a few more changes to his dressage bit, however. Over time, the eggbutt lost its charm: he spent a very long time not unhinging or moving his jaw at all while being ridden, and we wanted to encourage him to chew the bit.
Enter the double-jointed loose ring snaffle. This is still the bit he goes in today. His mouth is small enough that a 5.5″ bit has never pinched his cheeks, and he still likes the loose ring action. Double-jointed is still the way to go.
That said: I am in the market for a new bit. When riding with my trainer last fall, she felt that he would go better in a thinner bit. While the rule of thumb is generally that thicker = softer, for some horses with a low palate and relatively narrow gap in their teeth, a thinner bit can be kinder. For the first time ever, a trainer of mine actually put her hand in Tristan’s mouth and felt the way the bit lay against his tongue and his gums, and explained to me what she was feeling. I felt dumbfounded: after eight years of riding this horse, I was still not there yet! So I borrowed a thinner bit from the barn and it did make a difference. Then I went out and bought what I thought was a thinner bit, only it wasn’t.
So we haven’t made the switch full time yet, because I am the worst. But I have my eye on it, and will likely try to find what works for us at Everything Equine next month.

What bits have you tried? Have you thought a lot about your horse’s bit or do you tend to find something and stick with it?

road hacking

Four More Days Until Spring

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At least, by the calendar.

Couple of nice rides. Longeing on Friday, then trot sets Saturday night. Focus on rhythm, straightness, and stretching over the topline, building fitness and muscle both. We did two 8 minute trot sets and a few canter sets that went trot-canter-trot over 5 minutes. We also did about 6 minutes of a trot that included a trip down a line of poles on the center line with each pass: poles, turn right, poles, turn left, and so on. He was all-over tired and relaxed when we were done, and recovered quickly and well.

Today, a hack out, about 30 minutes, up and down dirt roads and up and down the big hill, bareback, with fleece quarter sheet. It was bitterly cold when the wind was up, but sunny with melted snow runoff glistening on the dirt roads. Actual temperature around 12 degrees but it never felt like that: always warmer or colder.

I was extremely pleased with how happy he was to be out, firm and swinging and forward even heading away from the barn, and how straight he held himself through his body. We went straight up the hill, no meandering, just push and swing from the hind end, and the same back down. He was tired and moving slowly at the end of it. His balance was far better going downhill, as he held himself inside his body: no stutter steps, no swerving through the shoulder.

This week will be difficult with evening work commitments, but we’ll see what we can salvage for a schedule.

adventures with the vet · winter

#VermontProblems

Amanda1 Comment

Tristan did not get his spring shots yesterday after all; my poor vet had a day entirely filled with emergency calls, and finally mid-afternoon sent a text that started like this:

“Hello girls! Just left a goat found buried in a snowbank…”

Apparently a poor goat wandered off in the snowstorm, got lost, got stuck in a snowbank, and they found him just in time. She thinks he will be ok. Poor goat!

Today, it is in the 20s and 30s, hallelujah, so I will ride tonight after work. Tomorrow, hack; Monday, we’ll see what happens since I have a full day of meetings scheduled on my day off and it might not get into single digits. In MARCH, god damn it, Vermont. Enough already!

adventures with the vet · crunching the numbers

What vaccines did my horse get?

Amanda2 Comments

In case you haven’t noticed, I am a fairly obsessive record-keeper and chronicler and monitor of all things Tristan. Someday I’ll post about his medical records binder. It is a thing that even the most hardened Pony Club stable management judge would admire.

Tristan is scheduled for his spring vaccines later this afternoon, so I thought I’d do a bit of a table of what vaccines he’s received over the years. (Yes, I know it’s not spring yet; my vet is 8 months pregnant and we are avoiding her due date!)
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
Rabies
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
E/W/T
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
Flu/Rhino
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
Potomac
X
X
X
X
X
X
West Nile
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
Strangles
X
X
X
X
X
Botulism
X

Assume he got a Coggins every year as well (though not 2000-2005; he was in his first home and then the rescue), too. All vaccines were given based on the health outlook of a horse in a boarding situation in New England; some boarding barns were busier than others, but all were a minimum of 10 horses.

E/W/T = EEE, WEE, and Tetanus

As well-acquainted as I am with Tristan’s medical history, a few things surprised me.

First, though this chart does not reflect it, those first few years there were typically flu/rhino and Potomac boosters in the fall. That was apparently a thing we did in Vermont at the time.

Second, how clearly certain vaccines align with certain barn trends.

Look at strangles, f’rexample. 2006 and 2009-2012. 2006 I actually remember really well: it was a barn-wide vaccination after a horse at the fairgrounds 10 miles north came down with strangles during a summer show. Every barn in the county was on quarantine, and most vets recommended vaccinating, so we did.

2009-2012 were years at a specific barn that strongly recommended it, though not as strongly as others I’ve been at. By far the busiest showing barn I’ve ever boarded at, so that makes sense.

But interestingly, take Potomac. Those gap years, 2010-2012, also overlapped with that same busy barn, and it was not a typical vaccination for that barn. Why? I wish I had a better answer, but my memory is hazy.

This is my basic list, and usually I tweak Potomac and strangles at the recommendation of the vet administering the shots. Some of those vets I’ve had close partnerships with; others I’ve barely had a passing word with. (For all the many, many vets Tristan saw in 2012, the vet who administered his vaccines, ie the barn’s go-to, I never actually met; we always called in specialists for his foot.)

Last but not least, the outlier: botulism. I did not even know such a vaccine existed until this year, when the barn went on round bales for winter turnout and suggested that the whole barn get the vaccine. It was by far one of the most expensive I’ve ever done, with three rounds at $20 a pop. It was…not required, but strongly suggested.

In all, vaccines are cheap insurance for me. Tristan doesn’t react to them at all – some of those he’s gotten all in one day, and one or two years he got a five-way (E/W/T/Flu/Rhino) and didn’t bat an eye. There’s never been any difference in soreness or demeanor whether he gets ’em all in one day or spaces ’em out. For which I am grateful, and lucky!

Of all of these, the only required to be given by a vet are rabies and the Coggins, but I’ve had every single one of these done by a vet or the barn staff. I’ve never given a shot, and I go back and forth about whether that’s ok. Part of me thinks I should suck it up and be more hands-on. Part of me is glad to pay the vet to do it, since I get hands-on and an opportunity for a conversation. If I ever move to my own land, I will absolutely learn how to do IM and IV, but for now – this suits me, I think.

How about you? Do you do your own shots? What shots does your horse get? Are there some you’ve gone back and forth on over the years? Any regionalisms that you see, either in this list or in your own list?

stupid human tricks · winter

That’s a nooooooope

Amanda4 Comments

Still snowing hard, temperature dropping fast, and no barn for me today. This is what it looked like outside my office window last night; add another foot of snow and you’ve got this morning.

Good news: I have finally downgraded to a normal(ish) bandaid on my hand after either wrapping it or using the XXL size for a month.
Better news: the oddly shaped yet adorable My Little Pony bandaids I bought like 6 years ago are perfect for my purposes!