My Horse is Obese and Other News

Guys. I'm officially a fourth year vet student. How did I get here already? I can't believe I'm actually getting to treat patients for real!

I know I don't post a whole lot, but for those who do continue to read my blog, I have a few questions.

First off, I'm going to be working a lot of long hours. Medicine and surgery rotations are notorious for super long hours (and I have 3 months total of those rotations). It's fairly common to have shifts longer than 12 hours, and not unheard of to have shifts that are 24+ hours. You don't get breaks to eat or sleep, so I need to figure out some sort of system with food that I can stick in my pockets that doesn't need to be heated. I don't like Cliff bars (they taste like dirt to me), so does anyone know of something that can be eaten as a meal replacement bar that tastes somewhat palatable? I feel like a lot of bloggers would know things like this. Also, I'm willing to make things too if anyone can point me in the direction of a recipe.

And secondly, I'm not sure what to do with this blog. I enjoy blogging, especially when people take the time to comment, but I just don't have a whole lot of time. What do people want to see?

• Posts about vet school? Things like advice for people wanting to go to vet school, what the daily vet student life is like, or "educational" posts about interesting things that I learn?
• Baby horse updates?
• Details of training, clinic, and show rides with Jetta?
• Product reviews? I have a lot of things I could review at the moment, just haven't gotten around to it yet?
• A mix of all of the above?

I'd really love some feedback! Please and thank you :)

In the pony world, both girls have been slightly neglected. I've had finals, orientation, and getting the house in order for me to go into clinics plus a new roommate moving in. It's been a little hectic!

Jetta and I got to go on a fun trail ride with PR after finals that was MUCH needed. Unfortunately we got over half way around the loop... and the trail was closed for logging. So we had to turn around, resulting in a 10 hour trail ride, definitely longer than intended!

I love my long-legged hippo mare <3

Jetta got a fairly good cut to her hind leg that I discovered when we went cross country schooling. I kept it wrapped for a few days with some corticosteroid cream to try and keep it from developing proud flesh. It was healing nicely so I let it go naked and it looks fine, just refuses to heal completely, which is a bummer. Jetta's not lame per se, but she's definitely a little sore. But holy smokes guys, my horse is OBESE. This is not something I ever thought I would say about my thoroughbred that takes forever to put weight on. She has gotten a little chunky in the past, but never like this. She's seriously a 7 out of 9. She's typically between a 4 and a 5 which is perfect. She's getting very little grain right now, but her weight just took off when the spring grass finally came in. She may be getting a grazing muzzle very soon...

It looks so much worse all wrapped lol

SO FAT

Other than that, I have a glove review to do here soon! I won a pair of Roeckl's from Hillary's contest which was awesome! I've never owned a pair since they are just too expensive for me, but I can't wait to ride in them a few more times.

PS. I got to do a photoshoot for PR and her horse Bailey and I LOVED it. I'm always trying to convince my horse friends to let me take fun pictures for them and they were such good models. My favorite gift to give people is pictures of their four-legged babies. This is my favorite picture because she looks like a fairytale princess <3




Thank you in advance for any and all comments!

Roller Coaster Ride

The horses are sure keeping me on my toes! It's been a roller coaster ride over here. I'm so, so, so busy right now in school and it's been insane so I think the horses think that they're not getting enough attention!

Jetta decided to colic last week and that same day, Maisie somehow got out of the pasture and the only way she could have done that is by jumping. There are no gaps, open gates, or anything. I guess she was bred to be a jumper?

I think Jetta was just eating too many apples and not drinking enough water with the temperature swing. My parents had the vet out and she tubed Jetta and gave her some fluids. She had decreased gut sounds which is always worrying. Maisie wasn't too much worse for the wear though she scraped up her legs jumping the fence. No idea why she did it, but luckily all the scrapes were superficial.

Maisie's cut leg from a week or so ago is trying it's best to granulate to the extreme so we've resorted to pressure wraps and cortisone cream to try to keep it down. Fingers crossed! She's become a pro at bandage changes though, I don't even have to halter her!

Trying on her new rope halter!

Naughty baby

Cute baby

She's so big she has to contort her neck to reach the udder lol

  

Size comparison:

Birth (top) and just over one month old (bottom)

Almost 3 months old!

Trask has been by alternating days, amazing or awful. Some days we have fantastic rides where I can barely believe he's only 4 years old and other days I get off and am ready to give him back. I think part of it is due to the weather change - cold air is good for being spunky! But he's also just a growing baby and you have to test the boundaries every so often. Our canter is coming along for the most part (except when it isn't) and our shoulder-fore has progressed to some real shoulder-in and we even had a pretty good start to haunches-in the other day!

He's developing so nicely!

He has also been trying his hardest to destroy all the blankets. I put a cooler on him the other day after a bath - it has chest, belly and leg straps so I've left it on Jetta many times - and he SHREDDED it. Completely gone, he bit at it and tore it to pieces. I got him a turnout sheet since KP only has a medium-weight blanket for him and it's not quite cold enough for it yet and he has since bitten two holes in the chest of it. We'll see how long it lasts... little stinker.

Trask - 2, Blankets- 0

Weekly Update

It's been awhile and I'm excited to write about Vante!

He's such a fun little guy. I love working with baby horses cause they learn so fast and there's always such a huge difference in where you started and where you end up. Vante is such a sponge, he has soaked up a lot in a short period of time.

We have 5 rides so far under our belts and he's been great.

He's such a character!

He started out being pretty naughty - I guess one day he decided that the barrels that sit in the corner and never ever move were scary and he spooked pretty hard, slamming his owners foot into the wall and breaking it. Ouch.

The next time I rode, he was fine going to the right, but as soon as he saw the barrels to the left, he spooked and froze, refusing to go forward. I tapped him with the whip (I specifically rode with it for this reason!) and he reared and back pedaled across the arena. We worked on it a few minutes, with every time he threatened to rear, I turned his head and made him move his hind end around to get unstuck. Eventually we got back across the arena to the barrels and he sniffed them and took a break. After that, he was much better, though he still wanted to spook really hard, he held it together with just some counter-bending and trying to run his inside shoulder through my inside leg.

Finally confronting the scary barrels

The next ride had much less spooking and now he barely looks at them. We did try to ride outside one day to cool out since the weather has been so nice, but it didn't last very long. The horses in turnout started running when they saw him, and he grew several inches, arched neck, tail in the air, complete with snorting and prancing so I got off and walked him instead. Eventually we'll get there once we have better steering and listening skills :)

Such a different view with these ears!

A few of my favorite things - peach iced tea lemonade, sunshine, and horses!

Our last two rides have been absolutely fantastic though. He's picking up on taking contact. While he's still very inconsistent and he just doesn't understand why being a giraffe is not allowed, he's doing a lot better. While I haven't been insisting on it at the moment just because I'd rather have a forward horse who's steering appropriately, I've been having a steady light contact and he's really picking up on what it means. He's moving off my leg better, both laterally and in the forward direction, using the whip to reinforce it is helping a lot. Our circles and straight lines are more resembling what they should instead of odd jagged shapes.

While he does need to work on basically everything, our trot-canter transitions really need some help but once we start schooling them he does a lot better. He tends to die a lot in the downward transitions (but at least he stops well!), and I'd like our 20 meter circles to start resembling circles. He is going to have a hard time learning a free walk and stretchy trot, so we'll see how that goes. He's such an upright horse that stretching downward is so odd to him.

But I'm having such a blast with him!

And he's so handsome!

Jetta hasn't been forgotten, though I'm sure she wishes that she had been. She got a bath the other day, which she was very upset about, but it was very necessary. I've just been grooming her and lunging her, so she's been enjoying her pregnancy leave. Roughly 80ish days left!

In other news I got to go to my first derby party! It was super fun, I really enjoyed dressing up and making my fascinator and watching ponies.

My first mint julep aka adult snowcone

 

And my last kinda exciting piece of news... I did my first ever "surgery". Not real, just on a foam model, but it was really fun to go through all the steps of opening the different layers of skin, going through the linea alba, performing a bowel resection and anastamosis, then putting it all back together again. My sutures are getting better and better, though still not as "pretty" as I'd like them to be yet!

Apple a Day

I went to an equine dentistry dinner talk last Wednesday that I thoroughly enjoyed. The speaker is one of the veterinarians that have influenced modern equine dentistry. A lot of the tools that we have now are because of him and his practice is 90% dentistry. The university brings him in to help teach the 4th year equine dentistry class. Between 12 students, they will perform dentals on over 600 horses for the course.

It definitely got me excited about taking this class in a couple years! At this point I have a handful of dentals under my belt so I'm beginning to understand the basic technique for a healthy equine mouth and I can't wait to learn more.

Drunk Jetta after I did her teeth

The speaker, Dr. Greene, was thoroughly engaging and obviously excited to share what he knows. This was a client education presentation, so not as academic as I would have liked, but I really liked what his message was for the general horse owner.

Some general notes from points that stuck with me:

• It's important to evaluate the horses mouth in it's natural position, but it is not necessary to perform your dental in a natural position once evaluated if you are proficient enough in how the horse's mouth works
• The horse's mouth moves in an ovoid pattern when chewing
• Unlike humans who have a layer of enamel over the whole of the crown of their (brachydont = short crown) teeth, horses have layers of enamel, dentin, cementum on their (hypsodont = long crown) teeth 
• The cementum is what becomes discolored due to the natural pigments in forage, this is normal
• Tartar can accumulate around the canine teeth (something I hadn't seen before!)
• Something I've heard many times: you NEVER take away all the ridges on the occlusal surface of the teeth, horses need a rough surface for chewing. You level things out so the teeth are better able to move against each other and don't get hung up on each other
• Dentals are necessary because horses are meant to be grazing course forage for 16-18 hours a day which most modern horses do not do, many horses also have poor mouth conformation, and are asked to carry a bit. The natural silica in plants is what helps wear down the teeth
• The purpose of a dental is to ensure the horse has a comfortable chewing pattern in addition to make carrying a bit more comfortable - aka COMFORT is the primary goal
• The horse's tongue occupies the entirety of the space in the mouth at rest. When putting a bit in the mouth, it flattens the tongue and can push it against sharp points on the lingual surface of the mandibular molars (inside bottom teeth). The cavesson can push the cheeks against the points on the buccal maxillary molars (top outside teeth). This is why it's important to remove sharp points
• He puts a bit seat in EVERY horse that is going to be asked to carry a bit. The bit pulls the corners of the lips inwards which can push against the edge of the first molar. While there is no scientific evidence that this improves the horse's comfort, there is also no evidence that it is harmful. He believes that it is important to make every effort to make the horse comfortable
• A bit seat entails taking off a millimeter or two of the leading edge of the first molar (not aggressive, not going to have any negative effect)
• He uses motorized tools in all horses except geriatric horses that can't handle the sound or feel of a motorized tool
• While hand tools are virtually impossible to take off too much tooth (unless you have incredible amounts of muscle) motorized tools have allowed us to not only treat so many more issues in horses that previously went untreated, but horses can also be done much quicker (= less sedation and stress needed) and with less mechanical stress on the veterinarian (in case you didn't know, being a large animal veterinarian is incredibly hard on your body)
• While he thinks it's important for veterinarians to work with Equine Dental practitioners, they cannot legally practice on their own, they must be under supervision of a vet. While they may be very knowledgeable about the mouth of a horse, they are not knowledgeable in other areas, such as the pharmacodynamics and pharmacokinetics of anesthetics on the horse which can be very bad if you administer a drug that interacts with another drug that the horse is on or if you have a horse with liver or kidney problems
• Additionally on the topic of equine dentists - since there is no governing body there is no certification program and thus no repercussions on a dentist for doing a bad job, whereas if your vet does a poor job you can report them to the board
• He also mentioned a disease called Equine Odontoclastic Tooth Resorption and Hypercementosis (EOTRH) which I'd never heard of and can happen relatively commonly in the PNW - they do not know what causes it yet and there is no treatment except for tooth extraction. It looks pretty crazy!

Overall, a great talk and I'm really looking forward to taking the Equine Dental 4th year elective!

Weekly Update

"Remember how far you've come, not just how far you have to go. You are not where you want to be, but neither are you where you used to be." ~ Rick Warren

^^A little vet school/riding inspiration for myself and anyone else who needs to hear that this week!

Midterm season has begun in full force... I have one today, one Monday, one Wednesday, one the week after, two the week after that, one the next week, then TWO WHOLE WEEKS off of big tests (usually not the case) and then finals. Fun, fun, fun.

Anyways, horse-y related stuff.

Hmm, belly is looking a little bit bigger to me! (possibly just fat, lol)

Starting with last Monday, I had a nice ride after basically not riding for almost 3 weeks. The weather was gorgeous and spring-y so we rode outside in the outdoor. I didn't do too much exciting, but it was nice to be out and on a horse!

SUNSHINE

Tuesday I went to a talk about orthopedic bone disease in young and growing horses. Yay more things to worry about in my baby! But very interesting to learn more about OCD, bone cysts, etc. since they are topics that we're covering in radiology right now and I can actually find and diagnose them on radiographs! (most of the time at least)

Lots of lunging

Friday I went to an absolutely awesome talk on equine cardiology at the Endurance conference. It ended up being a 4 hour talk, but it was so worth it. We had a really, really rough cardiology unit in physiology that wasn't well taught last year so it was nice to have all of that drudged up again and explained in a way that made a lot of sense. Plus I definitely remembered more than I thought I would. We got to hear different types of murmurs in horses, lots of physiologic murmurs from endurance horses (cool note - fit, hard working horses are pumping their blood very quickly and efficiently causing turbulent blood flow which can make a low grade murmur when at rest, that goes away with exercise, typically not a huge deal - crazy to think about when you always hear about murmurs always being so bad) and it was great that the vets attending had the same issues with diagnosing systolic vs. diastolic murmurs, etc. that we were having.

Cutest little mini-me. I need him.

I've been doing a lot of lunging Jetta in the vienna reins since I haven't had too much time to ride. I think it really helps keep her in shape because when I finally got to ride again on Saturday, she felt super nice, really lifting the base of her neck, reaching for contact and lifting/swinging her back. We had a short ride, but it was a really excellent one!

More lunging this week, then I rode yesterday. I didn't lunge before I rode since I lunged her the day before and she was super hyper so I'm pretty sure she got that all out of her system! She felt really good again when I got on and we had a lovely start to our ride. It kinda ended up snowballing as I started picking at her transitions and getting more bend, etc. She decided bracing was a much better technique, sigh.  Our canter-trot transition is the worst thing ever right now, but upward transitions are really doing well, shoulder-in is great, spiraling in and out on a circle at the trot is great... it's really just that downward canter-trot transition!

I'm not bad, I'm cute

I'm hoping at some point the stars will align and it'll be dry enough for a trail ride without me having too much on my plate to study for. I need to be in the forest for an hour or so on my pony, it's been too long!

Slurping up her bran mash I made for her

Tacos in Texas

I was in Texas for this past weekend and I'm pretty sure I ate more than my weight in tacos. Breakfast tacos? Check. Lunch tacos? Obviously. Dinner tacos? Of course. I could live off of tacos!

Why can I not buy breakfast tacos here?

I was down for a Equine Wet Lab for veterinary students at Texas A&M with a fellow eventer (though way more badass at eventing than I am), PR. Holy smokes, they say everything is bigger in Texas and they aren't kidding! The veterinary school is massive. I come from an itty-bitty veterinary college with a class size of 56. The class size at Texas A&M is three times that (which most school are a lot bigger than mine) but our entire large animal hospital, small animal hospital and teaching school are in one building that can fill up half of just one of the many Texas veterinary school buildings. It was MASSIVE.

One of the many buildings that Texas A&M College of Veterinary Medicine has

(Unfortunately this post is not going to have many pics because we sadly weren't allowed to take any for liability reasons)

We arrived on Friday in Austin and drove to College Station. The lab was on Saturday and we got to participate in four labs of our choice (there were over 20 labs to choose from). I ended up in Endoscopy, Abdominal Exploratory, Lower Limb Surgery, and Mare Reproduction. They were all really awesome.

Endoscopy was done on the teaching hospital horses. While we didn't get to participate hands-on in this lab, it was still very interesting. Especially because the horse was so chill about passing the endoscope whereas Jetta had been fighting like a madwoman last week when she had her colic. Anyways, while we had seen pictures, as second year vet students we haven't gotten to do much "in real life" stuff. Plus we got to learn about a new disease (to us northerners) that we'd never heard about, but apparently very common in Texas, Louisiana and Southern California, called cicatrix. This horse even had a mild case of it - it's an inflammation and scarring of the nasopharynx. Apparently it can get bad enough that horses affected usually end up with a permanent tracheostomy and the cause is unknown, though there are multiple guesses as to what it could be (reaction to fertilizer used on pastures? fungus?). It was awesome to explore the guttural pouch on a live animal and then go down to the stomach.

This horse even had some mild pyloric ulcers which look very different from ulcers elsewhere in the stomach, being puffy and red versus actual depression (ulcerations) in the wall of the stomach, though they are also much more difficult to treat (requiring almost 3 times the length of treatment than other ulcers).

Next was abdominal exploratory where we got to work with a recently euthanized horse and work through what we'd do on a colic surgery, how to relieve a gas colic, work through the intestines in order and figure out where the pain is coming from (intusseption, strangulating lipoma, dead intestine, etc). It was fascinating and very cool to see what you can do - pulling the intestines out, sorting through them and then replacing them just how you found them so you can recover the horse who is now supposedly pain free. Very neat!

The lower limb surgery was also very cool - we got to practice neurectomies of the lateral and  medial palmar digital nerves for horses with navicular and heel pain, and cutting the distal check ligament for horses with contracted tendons and severe club feet, on cadaver legs. I can't imagine doing this procedure on a live, standing horse but it was very neat to actually do it in person versus just reading about it.

Cool mural because ponies

And finally mare repro. I always jump at the chance to do some reproduction work with horses because it is so difficult to get real life experience with horses. Horses are very delicate and you can easily tear or introduce infection, whereas cows are much more hardy so that is where I have all of my experience. We practiced on preserved reproductive tracts, but we got to practice taking a uterine biopsy and placing the AI pipette into the uterine horn. Additionally we practiced placing and removing Caslicks.

Overall an awesome day of learning and I hope to be able to go back next year. I have my eye on some other labs - Advanced Lameness, Rectal Palpation, Emergency & Critical Care and Necropsy. They have a lot more resources than we do, so it's a really great experience for us!

Almost bought this cute mug while out shopping

They had a student pub crawl that evening, but we went home relatively early and ended up watching too much Say Yes to the Dress (my guilty pleasure reality TV show of choice) that night and slept in wayyy too late the next morning so we got a pretty late start for the drive back to Austin. 

Once in Austin though, I got to meet up with Lauren! I failed at documenting, but it was so nice to get to meet one of my favorite bloggers in person. I apologize for being the most awkward conversationalist ever, but hopefully it wasn't too awful. She took us to the most amazing tacos - Torchy's tacos - that were definitely the best we had all trip (fried avocado tacos? sign me up!). I also would have taken a large container of queso back with me if I could have.

That afternoon we explored South Congress street then I got to meet up with some cousins I hadn't seen in years for dinner, then found some live music to round out the night! I definitely enjoyed Austin immensely, minus the fact that I got to experience my first tornado warning. No thank you. But it is such a neat town, I can't wait to go back and spend more time.

The next day we were supposed to go to Waco because we are also obsessed with the show Fixer Upper so we wanted to go to the Silo's, but we decided that three hours of driving round trip was a bit much, so we went to the Dover store instead and did a little more exploring of downtown. Dover was great because they had the shirt I've been drooling over for the past year on clearance and the only one they had was in my size! Plus I picked up some bran mash for Jetta since I don't want to buy a 50 lb bag of wheat bran just to make a couple mashes.

Overall, a fantastic horse-centric trip!

It's Always Something

This was supposed to be a post about our first trail ride of the year and all the snow we've been getting, however, Jetta had other plans...

Sooo much snow for our area

Snowy confo shot

I borrowed my roommate's trailer and made it to the barn all excited to tack Jetta up and head out. Instead, when I got there I found Jetta pawing in her stall. Not that unusual since she just had her stall cleaned and she likes fresh bedding, but when I put her in cross ties she could not stand still, pawing agitatedly which she never does. She pooped twice in those first few minutes so that was good. I started walking her around the arena and she got worse, legs buckling, trying to kick her belly and bite her sides. I gave her a dose of banamine and continued walking her, I couldn't get a hold of my roommate (the vet I usually use) so I called another vet and he said to give it 30 to 45 minutes for it to kick in and if she wasn't comfortable he could come see her. 45 minutes later she was magically much more comfortable, eyes bright, ears perked and no longer pawing or trying to lay down. I was so relieved. I've never seen her in so much pain, it was so hard to see her like that. I stuck her back in her stall where she nibbled at her hay that she had left that morning (which is so unlike her to leave food uneaten).

I took the trailer home and put my truck away and came back. Jetta was now laying down in her stall. She didn't seem 100% comfortable, but she was no longer breathing hard and didn't show any signs of trying to roll. She had pooped again. I asked the BM to keep an eye on her and went home for a shower.

When I got back an hour later, Jetta was still laying down, she was kind of grunting with every breath and no longer seemed happy. Though she still wasn't trying to roll. I called the vet I talked to previously and he was worried that she was brewing an impaction so I might want to take her to the vet school hospital. I finally got a hold of KP (the roommate vet) and she said that I could bring her to the house so she could palpate and tube her when she got home from work.

Poor uncomfortable baby

My friend KG came to keep my company and brought me warm things to drink while we waited for roommate's husband, DG to come pick us up and take us to the house. I had bought Jetta a heated water bucket and she drank about half of it before we loaded it up to go home.

Once home, KP palpated Jetta but didn't feel too much. Nothing seemed impacted, but her colon was pretty full. We tubed her just to be safe. Jetta did NOT like having a tube stuck up her nose, even with sedation on board. So that was a struggle. But she got a bucket full of water and mineral oil on board so hopefully that helps. Her heart rate was still at about 60 bpm before the whole ordeal so she still wasn't very comfortable.

I woke up at about 2am to check on Jetta. If her heart rate was still at 60 bpm then I could give her more banamine to keep her comfortable. She ended up being at 42 bpm so I held off on the banamine. I gave her a couple handfuls of hay (she was very angry that she was not being given any food) and went back to bed. In the actual morning I checked her again and she was quite upset that she hadn't been given any food. She could barely stand still while I took her heart rate again, it was about 36 bpm so that was good! I gave her half a flake of hay, she pooped again (basically this post is all about the poop) but she hadn't drank any water.

Feeling a little better

At lunch I checked on her again. Still no water drinking, I couldn't see if she had pooped again, but her HR was 32 bpm and she was bright and happy seeming (besides being starved to death). She got another half flake of hay and some electrolytes to see if that would get her drinking.

And then tonight, she seems to still be doing well. But still no drinking. She had pooped and still had a HR of 32 bpm. I gave her some gatorade in her water so I hope she likes it! Fingers crossed she starts drinking (because I might have to) soon because I can't take any more stress right now.

Pre-colicking snow selfies

We'll take any and all good thoughts we can get!

Weekly Update: Boring

 Apparently I missed a week? I was completely unaware of this and I can't even remember what happened... oops.

Well this last week was a bummer. Basically no riding was done, several trips to the vet hospital were made and there were 2 lame horses.

So, starting at the beginning...

Monday the 21st - I went to the barn and found Jetta with a swollen right hind. I lunged her and she didn't seem lame, so I was wrapping her legs when MK came down from the upper arena calling for me. Dundee sliced his coronet band open and it was gushing blood. He had been leaping and bucking around while being lunged, but there wasn't anything for him to slice himself on and he was wearing bell boots, so that was talented. We hosed it off and tried to see how deep it was but he was extremely painful and wouldn't let us touch it. We wrapped it up and he was dead lame, wouldn't put any pressure on his hurt foot. He almost fell down in the crossties he was freaking out about it so much. KP came out after she did a farm call and checked it out. She thought he should not be that lame and was worried about joint involvement. I trailered him to the school hospital and they did an xray and joint tap, everything looked clear. They kept him overnight to watch him.

At least she's pretty

Tuesday the 22nd - The next day Dundee's foot checked out all good and the next day when I picked him up he seemed almost sound! Such a princess. I was studying for a tough midterm the next day, so I just undid Jetta's wraps. Her legs looked nice and tight so I left them off for the night. 

Wednesday the 23rd - I went to see Jetta again, and just lunged her. Her legs weren't swollen and she still looked good on the lunge line. 

And she's adorable

Saturday the 26th - I went to the barn to ride and... now the left hind was swollen. Again, still sound but I threw her wraps on. At this point I'm not sure what to do about it - I'm pretty sure the deal is that she's kicking the stall because she's bored of being inside 24/7 now. I think the game plan is to ask the BM to put Jetta in the small paddocks outside during feeding time so that Jetta won't kick, and then bring her inside after everyone gets their grain.

Cankles

Monday the 28th - I undid Jetta's wraps and her legs looked good, but now she had cankles below where the wraps ended. She was absolutely wired so I tacked her up and lunged her. She looked fairly good. Every so often she took an off step, but it looked more like foot soreness stepping on the hard/rocky parts of the arena rather than actual soft tissue lameness. I got on and she was an absolute freight train. I couldn't even tell if she was sound or not she was so all over the place. Once I got her not pulling and working over her back she felt just fine. I got off and cleaned and put everything away, she had a little puffiness over her suspensory on her RH, but I think it's just a bruise. It's not tender when I press on it and according to KP she should be very sensitive to it if it was a suspensory tear. So now I just need to get her to stop kicking the dang wall!

Drama queen

Almost invisible bump

I really wanted to take her to a open jumper schooling night tonight, but given her puffy legs, absolute crazy hyperness, etc. I think I'm going to have to skip unfortunately. Lame horses are the worst! I just want to ride my pony...