Four things have happened in the six days that Ace has been on charcoal -
- he gave up standing on his bed during the day and now stands on the yard or in a concrete/cobble floored stable at 2 days
- he seems less sensitive to stones when I rode, though this is very subjective and I could be wrong. 3 days.
- he put on a noticeable amount of weight at the 3-4 day mark due to being out without a muzzle on, and at the 5 day mark he lost most of it again overnight. This cannot be fat, to change that quickly, it must be water. Water balances are related to insulin control. The first thing that worried me about him when I muzzled him was that he put a large amount of weight on in about 4 days, so much so that a friend commented on it. If he put it on again (grass) and took it off again (charcoal) then things are coming into balance.
- his droppings have gone back to noticeable balls from being one splodge. I was waiting to see this, and it happened today. If, as I suspected, he was becoming balanced, then this would be the result I expected to see next, and this morning, there it was! 6 days.
I have been watching him stand today and he appears to be putting a lot of weight into his heels. He is not rocking his legs forward, but I am watching like a hawk to see if he is avoiding weighting his toes, which would suggest that they are hurting. He walked out well when I turned them out tonight, so I am hopeful that all the pronounced toe flick that he now has means is that he is happy slapping his weight into his heels. We'll see.
I took Radar out for a "quiet walk" just now after a day at work. "A what?" he said. "nope, not in my list of product offerings, quiet walk, sorry. Here, have a head-tossing march instead". I'm worn out, not relaxed!!
Finally I must share something from work today. There is a young man in handcuffs in the bullet proof glass dock. He's a career criminal who has been released from his latest sentence on licence, with a condition that he does not meet Fred Bloggs at all. A policeman who knows the pair of them extremely well spots them together. They see him and run. The CPS lawyer asks the career criminal "why did you run?" and he replies, with a cheeky grin on his face "I just like running!". It was as much as I could do to keep a straight face. I know the scamp is a menace to society but you just couldn't help liking him! It didn't stop us returning him to prison of course.
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points for cheek at least!
ReplyDeleteAt least you got a laugh out of it...afterwards. It would not suit at all for the bench to be giggling during a hearing. *LOL*
ReplyDeleteAll good with Ace so far. It's interesting following your narrative of his condition and treatment.
Oooh, I meant to add...did your career criminal somehow remind you of a certain horse we know? "I like running?" (Obviously not walking.....)
ReplyDeleteYes Claire 9/10 for cheek!
ReplyDeleteNot a good look for the Judiciary Jean, giggling like a besotted schoolgirl :-) Radar is far too innocent to be compared. I feel the attitude was more akin to the new Jazz!
I'm really interested in "Happy Tummy" even though the name makes me cringe... It doesn't seem obvious from the website what sort of quantities one needs. Can you tell me how much of it you're feeding Ace - just trying to work out the finances of feeding it:-)
ReplyDeleteIt costs less than any other gastric "settler" product you can buy Liz. A tub of 26 litres is £95 with delivery "free" and you feed a big horse like Ace about 60ml a day, so it's more than 400 days in theory. They sell smaller tubs which cost more per litre if you want to try it first.
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Thanks Caroline, I think I'll give it a try. I'm very worried about my big and very greedy mare. She's grossly overweight in spite of my best endeavours (restricted grazing, off the grass for as many hours as on it, now muzzled) and is getting recurrent episodes of mild colic which seem to coincide with wet weather/wet grass. Her worm counts are OK and she's been wormed for tapeworm (though I wonder if for peace of mind I should get her blood tested for it). The vets just don't seem to have a clue ....
ReplyDeleteShe sounds like a good candidate Liz. I'd try the charcoal before the blood test since you have seen a link with wet weather bringing on the grass growth.
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