At 6:15 am I noticed Oksana up by Valiant and went running out to see if maybe she was in season. She wasn't in but most concerning was her foal was not with her. I checked her udder and it was not at all full so the foal must have nursed not too long ago. I started searching the pond pasture hoping he was just out of sight. Oksana came with me but stopped at the corner of the pond so I searched the woods in that area. Around 6:30 am I called Mike and Diane to come help. Mike brought his 4 wheeler so he could cover more ground but still nothing. Only after search all the area did I think maybe he could be in the pond and started searching that. We found his body not too far from shore. He must have fallen in and drowned. Mike got the yanmar to pull him out of the pond.
We have been putting mares and foals in this pasture for 20 years and this was a FIRST time we have EVER lost a foal by drowning in this pond. It had to be a freak accident.
After getting him buried Mike took the last load of riding horses out to Middle Grove and went to check on Jewel's filly and Sheena's colt. He found Sheena's colt covered in diarrhea and lethargic. He brought Sheena and Loxley home. I was with mom for the morning so as soon as Anna arrived drove over to the cabin, checked on him and it was obvious he was not feeling well. He was given 1 cc of banimine under his tongue and the vet clinic called to see if he could be brought in today. They had an opening around 2:30 so as soon as Rachel arrived to take my place with mom I drove up to the barn, cleaned out the trailer took that to the cabin field, cleaned up Loxley and sprayed both horses down with fly spray before loading them into the trailer and leaving for Morton. Peaches were being delivered at the Farm n Fleet at Morton starting at 2:00 pm Joan was in line so when I arrived there Joan had a box for me which she loaded into the truck and from there drove the last few miles to the vet clinic. Dr. Hoerr was not yet back from another call so Sheena and Loxley were put in the airconditioned stall to wait. While we were waiting Chris and Emma had me help update the Horsemeister files. We had 159 horses on their file. Of course most were foals that needed coggins and health papers before leaving the farm so a lot of them were marked inactive. A calf arrived needing attention while we were waiting.
When Dr. Hoerr arrived he went right in to work on Loxley.
He was dehydrated and not at all feeling well. Dr. Hoerr drew blood, ran the blood work and it came back a bacterial infection. He was put on IV's and given antibiotics. Below is the video of getting the iv put in. What was most impressive was all of this was done with NO sedation.
He really IS a special well behaved colt.
No video of the fluids going in as I was helping with that part. We finished and I was back on the road for home by 4:45 pm. As soon as I got home they were unloaded and put in the indoor then it was time to get supper going. Tonight we had left over pizza from Sunday. It was really delicious as I added cheese, sausage, onion and black olives. Mark ate 2 and I at the last piece then ran over to mom's to pick up some egg cartons for Marli who had 4 dozen eggs for me but no egg cartons to put them in. From mom's to Marli's to pick up the eggs and once the eggs were in my fridge over to Diane and Mike's to show Mike how to flush Loxley's IV. He took Sheena and Loxley over to the cabin field and will be flushing the iv tonight and tomorrow morning. On the way home I noticed the barn lights still on and drove up to turn those off but Mark was busy working in there on the electric outlet for the 5th wheel. He needed a little bit of help to finish that but that is now up and running. If I have any time tomorrow will set it up, get pictures and then get it advertised. The last job of the day which didn't get done until 8:30 pm was to get the orphan colt fed. What a long hard day but I am thankful we caught Loxley's sickness early.
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