vet day

I successfully managed to keep my negative medical procedure energy out of the way for today's vet visit, which I think is pretty good considering I have my own dental cleaning with valium set for tomorrow morning!

The pony had to be sedated to get his ear cleaned out and checked. He was a little booger, but when she got the last bit of gunk out, he lowered his head and leaned into her hand, which seemed to mean it felt good to get that stuff out of there! He got his Coggins' pulled and we didn't do the spring shot, but will do it later in the month. We also discussed the possibility of doing titers on him instead of vaccinating, given his sensitivity to the shots.

Our female vet now has a tech assistant who travels with her, and she was wonderful. She uses tapping to distract the horses from the needles, and although the pony was sedated, he still needed the tapping, which was a wonderful tool to keep him quiet.

His teeth are thankfully fine!

Everyone else got Coggins' pulled, the E/WEE/West Nile/Tetanus combo, which I had originally opted not to do, but the vet didn't have just EEE - so on we went, and had teeth checked. And they all got their homeopathic remedy to help with reactions to the shots.

Salina went next so she wouldn't work up any intensity fretting over the donkeys' getting their stuff done. She was a goddess of composure and it was REALLY good for me to hold her and realize that the two of us together can be calm. (for readers who haven't been here long, we had a sort of debacle with Salina last spring after Rafer's gelding, involving triple sedation, a twitch, knee injections, and me getting bowled over, which we hope never to experience again - and after all that, it was an abscess in her hoof, not her knee at all!)

Vet said Salina looks marvelous and the best she's ever seen her, and her teeth are great. We went over her new diet and discussed Equioxx as a possibility for later years if she becomes less comfortable. For now I use Bute the night before trims and that's it. For now, that is enough.

The donkeys were quite amazing, although Redford decided the clippers were directly from Hell Itself and we decided to pull blood without them. He and Rafer handled everything perfectly and were quite happy when all was done and they were able to rejoin Salina, who of course had watched every moment of the process over the stall door.

Cody needs to gain a little weight, which I'm sure I can facilitate, and we're going to get his teeth floated sometime soon just to keep on top of some ramping on his back teeth. Updated about his PSSM genetic test and the treatment protocol I'm using. Vet said she would NOT do the muscle biopsy if the protocol is so clearly working, so we're on the same page with that.

Keil Bay was his usual kingly self, arching his neck to strike his most handsome pose, but being incredibly easy and quiet about his needles and his teeth. His teeth look great as well, so that was that for today's visit!

The vet and I discussed de-worming protocol and some new info, plus some NC specific info, and we came up with a good plan. I mentioned wanting to learn to do our own fecal counts and she was overjoyed - so starting this month, I'll be doing fecals before and after the de-worming. This will allow me to only worm horses that actually need it, as well as test to see what drugs are working well on our farm and which, if any, are not working due to parasite resistance.

I'm excited, if you can believe it, about the prospect of putting horse manure in baggies, labeling with their names, and using the cool McMasters chambered slides with grids for counting worm eggs.

All I can say is this: I need never worry about running out of things to do and learn when it comes to horsekeeping!