Man, June has been one long rolling disaster in terms of horse time. Either I’m working insane hours, out of town, or, well.
So, back up. A week ago, I had it on my schedule to longe Tris, but there were lessons in the indoor. Given his continuing shithead behavior in the outdoor, I dragged my feet, but the lessons ran super long and eventually I just said screw it and went up to the outdoor.
He was, predictably, an ass. He spent the first solid 15 minutes galloping around, and then when he realized he was attached to me, he did several circuits of a 20m circle bucking and squealing and kicking out.
But he settled in nicely, and gave me some really good work.
I took him back to the barn and hosed him down thoroughly in the wash stall. He hasn’t yet exhibited any Cushings-related heat intolerance, but I am neurotically careful in this weather, so he only gets worked into a light sweat, walked out thoroughly, and hosed down ASAP.
While hosing him down, I discovered that he had somehow taken a nick out of his LF – right on the back of the leg, just above the fetlock, directly on top of the tendon. I was a bit nervous, but he had to have done it in his initial flailing around and continued quite sound. There was no swelling, the wound was clean, and I’d used apple cider vinegar to help rinse the sweat off, and he hadn’t reacted to it at all. So I wrapped it with Corona and a little bit of vet wrap to keep it clean. Friday, there was still no heat or swelling or any indication of unsoundness, so I rode for ~20 minutes in miserable humid heat, and when he was done covered it in Swat.
I came out on Sunday to find localized heat and swelling and to find him off at the walk and the trot – more like slightly stabby with that LF than truly off.
I grant you that it’s not exactly a fat leg, but you can see it best on the bottom picture – mostly to the inside, just above the fetlock. His fetlocks tend to hold fluid anyway, so checking on it was a lot of comparison to the other leg, not to a perfect leg. You can’t even see the cut with the way the shade is falling – it’s maybe 1/4″ around. TINY.
Since then, I’ve been cold-hosing, doing standing wraps overnight, and doing a light vetwrap during the day to keep it covered. It’s been going down steadily. My gut says it was actually a reaction to the Swat more than anything – when that thought occurred to me, I looked at the container, and while I couldn’t find an expiration date, it had a label on for a tack shop I haven’t visited in at least 7 years. So…yeah. That prompted me to clean out my tack trunk very thoroughly and throw the Swat – among other things – away.
The fashion statement known as “somehow my mom arrived at the barn with only one black standing wrap.”
In the bigger picture: this was totally my fault, and totally preventable.
I’ve known for a few weeks now that Tristan is moving bigger and bigger. That’s a good thing! That’s what we’re working toward! I’ve put polos on him for his lessons for precisely this reason, and in the back of my mind I thought I should pull his splint boots out of storage for other work. I had not yet gotten around to it (part of my brain was engaged in some magical thinking about buying him some nicer Majyk Equipe boots rather than the $10 Dover specials I own right now, stupid brain).
I’ve pulled the boots out now (they were neatly packed away with his bell boots, my medical armband, and my XC gloves in a neat little XC box in my traveling tack trunk, sob) and he’ll wear them as soon as he goes back in work – which I hope to be this afternoon, fingers crossed, with a long walk and some trot to see how he feels.
Fuck June, anyway. I’d like to get back on some semblance of a real schedule, now.
beljoeor.com 