Since I don't keep proper health records for them I'll at least note it here I did not worm the mini's I think they are fine until a hard frost, THEY are keeping weight perfectly fine, as were most of the big horses but shared paddocks means they all get wormed if I think one might need it.
Also had Shade's teeth floated today. Hopefully now she will bounce back to plenty of weight fairly quickly. I know overweight is not good for horses, butI I don't think I've ever had ours obese; not at this place anyway. They don't have any lush pastures to get fat on and I don't feed a whole lot of grain or lots of rich alfalfa.
I do not like seeing ribs on my horse unless she is bending so Shade was too skinny for my tastes. She usually has kept her weight pretty good so I hope the sharp edges on her teeth were the main cause, I'll be bumming if she doesn't bounce back with just light work now and giving her a little extra food. Dr Mike didn't think the teeth were real bad, but he doesn't have power dentistry tools so he doesn't float any more than necessary as it is hard on his body. No one else got floated today, just rabies jabs and RazzMo got his left hind leg checked out. He may have some tearing fairly high, right below the hock. That was the concern area for Dr Mike but hopefully Razz will heal up fine JIC mom actually gets back to riding regularly. I honestly don't think she would get into any serious riding anyway though. She prefers watching football and now I think basketball as well to riding even without any physical issues or at least any beyond what she has had for years. With luck I'll never find out what my discomfort threshold is where I'd rather do something else for more than a few weeks before I get the itch to be back in the saddle.
Hopefully we'll be lucky and not have any sore necked horses. 2% get sore from the shot in Dr Mikes experience, 9 horses done. I don't recall any soreness last time I did rabies 2 or 3 years ago so hopefully it will be ok.
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3 comments:
So floating teeth is just filing them down?
How do their teeth get pointy?
Horses are herbivores. I think their teeth keep growing to compensate for the fact they grind them down grazing. Any mis-alignment of their jaws or teeth can cause uneven wear, and then they don't utilize the hay as well because they don't get it chewed as thoroughly + in a group they are not eating as fast of the other horses.
Back in the dark ages when I was a 4-H youngster, one of the conformation fault areas to check out was how good was the jaw alignment. It seems like veterinary dentistry has made it an area that people pay little attention to anymore. The fix that helps horses with slight bite problems also lets horses with fairly bad bite problems be bred on.
I think chiro work and other stuff that can be done for lameness issues is doing the same thing with some back and leg conformation faults now. A horse that would have been unusable years ago may now be winning in the show ring as long as the owner shells out for all the extra "maintainence" it needs.
Huh, the only thing I did in 4-H was build rockets.
So much for survival of the fittest. We are doing to them what we did to ourselves.
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