Day 52

Doc has been pretty frisky lately.  I took him out to trot yesterday, and before we started, we played our 7 games.  I felt like I had a wild mustang on my hands.  He was one of those horses with a lot more "go" than "whoa".  When we circled, I would ask for a trot, and I would get a gallop.  Then, when I tried to disengage his rear end, I got a rearing horse!  We definitely had a few lessons in who was boss.  Needless to say, we didn't go very far from home on our trot. 

Today, he was a completely different horse.  Doc was energetic, but attentive.  He was willing to try anything I asked, as long as I went slow.  I tied him to a tree while I treated his wounds, and we had lots of lessons in standing still and softness.  I was patient with him, and rewarded him for the slightest try.  We built our partnership today by being respectful of each other.  On our trot down the road,  he was much more respectful, and we did lots of "follow me" exercises.  He was so soft when he followed me that I couldn't even feel him on the rope. 

Alicia tells me that Doc is now best friends with her horse, "Rolex".  The two of them spend their days mutually grooming over the round pen fence.  We are thinking of letting the two of them out in a pen together.  We won't be able to release Doc into the general population of horses (with mares) for two months, but it sure will be good for him to have a horse buddy.

We'll post photos when (and if) the introduction happens!

~Jackie

Day 49

Doc seems to be healing very well.  With the couple of days of sunshine, we were able to get a good look at his incision.  It is still draining pretty well, and the swelling looks like it is going down.  We are still trotting him, but yesterday he trotted himself for a very long time in his own pen.  Alicia let down some lines so that her horses could run around and get some exercise.  Doc got excited with all of the activity, and he was frolicing all over his pen.  Several of the horses came to meet him over his fence.  He enjoyed that.

The plan for today was to try ponying Doc with my horse, Cohasset... 

The boys meet

 When we first started out, everything was going very well.  Doc just latched onto Cohasset's side, and off we went!  We went straight, then we turned around, and even went off road a little.  I decided to go ahead and try to go down the road for a while to see how far we could get.  We did fine until Alicia's property ended, and so did the horse fence.  Neither horse wanted to go any further away from home.  I was able to convince Cohasset, but Doc was having none of it.  He put on some excellent breaks, which forced me to give up some line to him (thankfully I had the 22' line).  After that, we just started making a tangled mess trying to negotiate around trees, away from fence line, etc.  Nothing terrible happened (whew!), but I decided that we needed to stop before we had a wreck.  I would really like to take Doc down to the arena and try that again though!

Our first attempt at ponying

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving!

~Jackie

Day 45 (really, already!) Trotting, trotting, and more trotting...

In order to keep things healing (and draining) nicely there in Doc's nether regions, we must trot a minimum of 20 minutes twice a day, which is easier said than done! I guess we should be grateful that it's not 115 degrees outside!
We're working on the circling game, but he likes to run out of steam about the time he makes it behind you, and so we ask again, and he'll putter out, and again we ask, and well you can see the pattern now. I decided to take trotting out of circles and into a journey.
Yesterday our adventure took us to the back yard. We played stick your nose on the weird object, with much success (he's so brave), while we trot here and there. After a while he decided he did not want to play my games anymore, it was much more fun to rear up and then lope in circles, occasionally throwing in a buck or crow hop for good measure. Once I was able to get one circle without any silliness we moved on to the road out front...and here we had a great time.
I've only had the experience of really playing with one horse, our mini horse, Foozball, LOVES to play hide and seek! I hide behind a tree, he runs and finds me, I chase him until he hides behind a tree and then we start again. Doc was matching my steps foot for foot, I'd jog, he'd trot, I'd jump, he'd jump, I'd swing my head, he'd swing his head, we had a blast! He was my mirror!!! Afterwards we shared a special moment when he just placed his face into my chest and let out a long sigh, I told him how glad I was that we'd met, how special he was to us all, how much he was loved, he licked and chewed and sighed again. I smiled until my cheeks hurt.
This morning we adventured all over the place, up and down the roads, through the woods, past the scary donkeys, into the unknown. His send is oh so nice. We worked on following my speed, walk, walk faster, trot, walk, walk even slower, trot, stop, back up, with him standing by my side, following my footsteps yet again. A couple cars drove by, one stopped (it was my daughter's friend) he stuck his nose in her window to say hi. I remember when a car would drive by his pen and he'd flip out! Now he's practically climbing in the driver's seat!
I tried to take a couple pictures...but it's hard to catch the action shots while holding a 22 foot rope and a stick n' string!

Swelling before exercise....

Journey down Dead Critter Rd.

Look he can eat grass now!!!

Less swelling after exercise....Hooray!

Phew.... home at last.

Thank you to everyone for all your support!
((hugs)) and more ((hugs))
- Alicia

Day 42 - Gelding Day!

We did it!!  The rain held off long enough for Dr. Jen to successfully complete Doc's "brain" surgery.  Of course, the first thing that she said when she saw his legs was, "Oh WOW".  Yet again, the pictures don't do the wounds justice.  She has some concern about the damage to the tendons and veins underneath all of the proud flesh and scar tissue, but seems optimistic that we can get him fixed up.  She doesn't want to start cutting on the wounds until they have shrunk down more, and some good old-fashioned exercise helps to start re-building the structures underneath.  She wants me to continue with the ointments, and gave me some guidance on which ointments to apply at what time.  She also wants to wait until spring to do any surgery because of the improved healing time during the warmer months.  She says that if we were to cut on them now, going into winter, we would have a much longer recovery time.  In essence, we would be swimming upstream.  It sounds like a good plan to me because I wasn't looking forward to daily bandage changes in the frigid rain and muck.

She and her team were so gentle and kind to him, and she allowed Alicia and I to stay with him to help comfort him.  I am very grateful for that.  It was important to me to not make this a horrific experience for him, and it certainly wasn't.  In fact, I think he enjoyed all of the attention!  He got a little skittish when she inserted the needle in his neck, but after a second or two, he allowed her to hit the vein and sedate him.  The surgery went very well, and after a day of rest today, he needs to be exercised for 20 minutes twice daily to encourage drainage.  Alicia has the first shift in the morning (in the rain!).

Here are photos... if you are squeamish, you may not want to look...    :)



"You are getting veerrry sleeeeepy"




Go team go!




Snip snip!




Throw them behind the horse please!

 Dr. Jen educated Alicia and I on the proper etiquette with horse testicles after they have been removed:  If it is a racehorse and you want it to go fast, you throw them in front of him - that way he will always be racing to catch up to them....   Needless to say, I preferred to throw them behind the horse, thank you very much!

Huh???  What happened??



My tongue doesn't fit in my mouth anymore!



"Would you like a blankie?"

Poor baby was shivering a lot after waking up, so he got a crash course on blanket wearing, and we stopped to buy one for him on the way home. 
His new halter also arrived today!  Hooray!!   Doesn't it look great??   http://www.horsenheart.com/  Thanks Maryann!

Sporting his new clothes!

In addition to all of this, he also got his vaccines today.  It was a big day for our boy!  Oh, and a new name to consider popped up today:  "Drifter".  What do you think?

I just want to tell you how grateful we are to those of you who have donated to his cause - in whatever form.  The money you have sent all went towards his surgery and vaccines.  If it hadn't been for you, we wouldn't have been able to give him the excellent care that he got today.  Thank you!  Also, thank you to everyone who has been reading this and giving us your emotional support.  I can't tell you how much it means to have you all rooting for us.

He is going to need a lot more care by Dr. Jen, so I am just going to put this out there again:  If any of you can help us out financially, we really do appreciate it.  We are not a formal rescue group, we just saw this horse in need, and Alicia's big heart brought him home.  When you see a helpless animal in pain, you don't think about the money, you just do what you have to do to help.  He is going to need a lot of help.  We set up a rescue fund at Dr. Jen's clinic for him, and any donations (cash or checks) can be sent directly to her:

Dr. Jen Powers
Above and Beyond Animal Care
22294 Spyder Lane
Palo Cedro, CA  96073
(530)524-7044

Just tell them to put it towards Huckleberry Diamond (aka: Doc) under Alicia Mosher's account.

Thank you!
~Jackie

Day 41

Making baby faces at Mac

Everyone please pray for sunshine tomorrow!  If it rains, Doc's surgery will have to be postponed.  I guess they have to do it out on the lawn, so it can't be raining in his surgery "suite".

We have to start loading up at 7am tomorrow, but can't find out if the surgery is a "go" or not until 8:00.  His appointment is at 8:30, and we are supposed to leave at 7:30.  Is this adding up??  Nope, not for me either.  I will watch the weather forecast, and look at the sky in the morning to get a better idea of how the day is going to go.

Wish us luck!
~Jackie

Day 39

Our field trip to Cottonwood Creek Equestrian Center was lots of fun!  He rode in the trailer like a champ, and we spent about 2 hours playing at the arena.

Gail got to meet Doc, and her first words when she saw the wounds were, "Oh my God!!".  (I guess they are a little worse to look at in person?)  I am so used to seeing them that they actually look pretty good to me now!

Doc was again a very brave boy for our adventure.  He took right to the idea of the playground, and went over the wooden bridge without any problem.  He also thought the tire jungle gym was interesting, and without much coaxing, he even went through the cowboy curtain!

Thanks to Gail, our photographer  :)

Inside the arena, we explored everything:  the nice new dirt, the flag, the sweet smell of other horses' urine.... 

I let him go free in the arena for a while, and he mostly stuck to me like glue.  I had fun running the length of the arena with him trotting happily right beside me.  We did a little bit of the circling game, and also got a great start on going sideways at the rail.

Outside the arena, we played with the squeeze game some more:  in between buildings and rails, under the giant fallen tree, and under the barn overhang.  I think it will be important to be really good at that for Friday in case we have to get into stocks or something.

We also played some freestyle games in the round pen.  Doc got pretty frisky in there, and started to show me a little bit of attitude, so I made him run a little more than I planned on.  Because of his wounds, he has a bit of a bunny-hop on his hind end.  I hope that improves once the wounds are healed.

 

Standing tied without pulling anymore!

Thank you, Melissa and Robin for the information on how to predict his final height.  I still have to do the string test, but according to the test from the elbow, it looks like our boy might top out close to 17 hands.  Wow!  It's a good thing we like big horses!

~Jackie

Day 38

Friday is the big day!!!

Doc has his appointment on the 19th at 8:30am to be gelded, and see what we can do with those wounds.  Dr. Jen is generously going to allow Alicia and I to hang around and watch the procedure.  It will be a first for both of us, so personally, I am a very nervous mama right now!  I have seen hundreds of surgical procedures on animals (I am a registered veterinary technician), but never on a horse.  All of my years of experience have been on small animals.  I know what to expect, but seeing it in person is always exciting the first time.

I am working on increasing the distance that we drive with the trailer loading lessons.  Today Doc loaded in the trailer like a pro, so after a couple of ins and outs, we closed the door and took off for a drive.  I decided to take him somewhere different to unload this time, so we drove the two miles along the dirt roads to my house.  I unloaded him in my driveway and we wandered around exploring the yard for a while.  I was really impressed at how calm he was.  I made sure to close the gates because I wasn't sure what kind of horse I would have once I got him out of the trailer.  Amazingly, even though he was nervous and sweaty from the drive, he simply stayed alert while we wandered around and checked out the sights.  He sniffed at my two horses, but they were more worked up than he was about the visit.  He likes the taste of my lawn, but not enough to stop for very long.  We played some of our Parelli games for a few minutes, then I decided it was time to see if he would load again...  Ha ha!!  Not so easy once he has ridden in the trailer for a while!  I had to go back to basics, and it took about 1/2 an hour to get him loaded again.  Of course, I couldn't just slam the door as soon as he was inside either.  I had to let him get in and out 3 or 4 times before I could shut him in.  Sometimes these things are really a test of a person's patience, but it is sure worth it in the end! 

Did I tell you that I was able to measure him?  Our boy is 15 hands tall, and about 1000lbs.  That is a big horse for only 15 months old!  Does anyone know how to predict their ultimate height?  Please e-mail me if you have any tips:  CalifJackie@aol.com

Tomorrow I plan to take Doc down to Gail's equestrian center and play for a while in the arena and round pen.  It will be good to give him a few different experiences in the trailer before we do the "deed" on Friday... 

Wish us luck!
~Jackie

Day 35

Gail was right (of course)!  We loaded up a couple of times, then closed the door, and off we went!

Loading up



Here we go!

  We went down to the end of the road and back twice.  The first time we got home, he was pretty nervous, but still under control.  The second time, I rode in the opposite hay manger (just to see what it was like) while Alicia drove.  Do you know how noisy trailers are on dirt roads?  Wow!  I am amazed that any horse tolerates that, but besides being a little jittery, he did just fine.  Our next trip will be to a neighbor's house, just to give him a little exposure to new environments.  We will play in her round pen a little, then head home.

The view from my perch inside as we go down the road

 Of course, we took little breaks from trailering to play some other games:

Turning a tangled leg into a game:  follow the feel of the pressure
aka:  Leading by the legs

I had requests for side shots of his legs, so here you go:

Left side

Right side

I got a lot of goo off of the legs today - look how nice and pink they are underneath:

And the tying lessons are going well too.  He pulled back once today when I was picking out his feet, but quickly recovered and walked forward to relieve the pressure.  He is really getting the hang of this stuff!

Until next time...

~Jackie

Day 34

Trailer Loading day 6:

We are coming along nicely!  Today we worked on getting in and backing out of the trailer over and over again.  He is so soft now, all I have to do is direct him in, and he goes.  And when I want him to back out, I gently lift his tail, and add a little tiny wiggle to the lead rope, and out he comes, slowly but steadily.

Since that was going so well, we also worked on closing the back gate.  I started by opening and closing it for short moments, and gradually increasing the time.  He didn't mind that at all, so then I closed the gate and held it closed until he started to back up.  I let his rear touch the gate, and as soon as he moved forward from the pressure, I opened it and backed him out.

In between trailer loading sessions, we worked on all of our Parelli games, and even went for a short walk around the neighborhood.  We played the squeeze game over a few obstacles since that seems to be a sticky point for him.  By the end of our walk, I was directing him over logs, ditches, and yes, trailer ramps!  :)

Gail says it's time to put him in the trailer, close the door, and go for a ride around the block.  So that is what we will do tomorrow!  <<Yikes!>>

Here are some feet shots for the hoof junkies  :)


Left Front



Left hind

Sorry the feet are so dirty - this wasn't easy!

:)

Jackie

Day 33

Trailer loading day 5:

Ta da!!!!!!!!!

 It didn't take long to coax Doc into the trailer today.  He got plenty of carrots and alfalfa once inside, and I let him hang out there for about 10 minutes before asking him to back out.  I did it very gently, and rewarded each step in hopes of having a very calm, controlled back up... and that's what I got!  After a short rest outside the trailer, I offered for him to go back in, and he took me up on it.  After one small hesitation halfway inside, he went right in and started munching away.  I gave him a good rub-down and did lots of scratching and pressure around his hind end.  Then I took the butt chain (I don't know what you call it), and just held it around his back end.  He didn't seem to mind at all, so I continued that will a little pressure while he ate his alfalfa.
 

Getting lots of carrots for being such a good boy!

I also did some shaking and bouncing around in the trailer to see how he tolerated the racket...  he didn't mind that at all!  Tomorrow I will practice loading, unloading, closing, and opening the back gate.

Oh yes, and look who is progressing nicely on standing tied!

This is what his left hind leg looked like tonight before I took away all of the goo.  Do you see all of the black stuff just below the pink stuff?  That is one giant glob of scabby, goey tissue.  Underneath that is fresh, pink, healthy proud flesh.  Each day I take a layer off the top, and each day I think it is a little smaller.  What do you think?

Finally, I wanted to say a big "thank you!" to Maryann at http://www.horsenheart.com/ for helping me get Doc set up with his very own halter and lead rope.  She is going to custom make him a rope halter that fits.  Hooray!  If you are ever in the market for high quality, custom made, affordable halters, lead ropes, reins, hackamores, etc., this is the place to go!   
(And no, this is not a paid advertisement... I just really like her!)

:)

~Jackie

Day 31

We did it!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Between the two of us, Alicia and I managed to coax Doc to put his fourth foot up on the trailer, and after that, he sniffed around a few times, walked calmly all the way inside, and started munching on the alfalfa hay that was waiting for him in the manger.  Hooray!!!!!!!!!!

He was a little nervous and jittery tonight (probably because of the time change and the neighbor with his tractor pushing a bonfire around), so it wasn't as easy as expected.  We started the session out by going backwards again in the training before he decided that it was OK to get down to business.  I continued to work from the front end, and he was consistently only going as far as his two front feet.  Alicia prompted me to push him a little bit more to get him past that hump, and I asked her to drive him a little bit from the hind end too.  She had the magic touch that drove him right up onto the ramp.  We were amazed at how calm he was once inside. 

After that, we gave him a nice long break, and lots of love.  The greedy side of me wanted desperately to do it again, but Alicia talked sense into me (yet again), and we quit on the good note.  Thanks Alicia!!  :)

Sorry there aren't any pictures today.  It was all done in the dark due to the time change.

Doc has the day off tomorrow, but I am considering working with him again on Wednesday.  Is that greedy of me? 

Hug your horses!
~Jackie

Day 30

Yes!  Three!!

Doc was even better today than he was when we left him yesterday.  He put two feet on the trailer ramp in no time, and it was fairly easy to get to three.  Because we got from two to three in such a short time, I got greedy and wanted to try for four feet up, then back him up and quit at that point.  I didn't think it was out of reach, but being human, I didn't take it slow enough.  We both ended up getting a bit frustrated, so we had to stop, take a deep breath, and go back to the basics. 

After finally getting three feet back on the ramp, we quit.  I am still extremely happy about hitting our goal today, and when I left him, Doc was begging for more attention.  I love it!! 

Front two feet inside the trailer,
 left rear stepping up to the ramp.

Tomorrow is the day... four in four! 

Dr. Jen, here we come!   :-)

~Jackie

Day 29

Trailer training day 2:

What can I say?  Two feet in two days!  Hooray!!

Today I did a lot more of the circle game mixed with squeeze game in front of the trailer ramp.  (Thanks to Gail again for the advise!)  Each time he came around in front of me, I was one-half a step closer to the ramp until he had no choice but to go over the ramp.  Well... once we got to that point, I eventually got him to put one foot on the ramp, and we took a break.  When we went back to it, he was willingly pawing at the ramp, and even put one foot on it several times.  He just didn't want to step up onto it with both feet.  So we tried a new direction:  straight in.  And, wouldn't you know it, he put both feet way up on the ramp and stayed there for a second or two!  We ended the session on that very happy note.

Thanks to Alicia for being there to coach me through the sticky spots.  You are a fountain of wisdom!  :)

Will we make it three for three tomorrow?
I'll keep you posted...

~Jackie

Day 28

Trailer Training, Day 1!

Before you jump out of your seats, no, we didn't get him loaded today, but we made a lot of progress in that direction.

I enlisted the help of Joni, Alicia's Mom, to spot me when I took Doc out in the open for the first time.  She was a big help in protecting him from the mares as I walked him through their paddock.  He went through the gate like a brave soldier, and we even took a nice stroll down the driveway to the house.  When I took him over to check out some fresh grass, he started getting frisky in the soft ground.  He did rear up and turn away from me, but not so much as I would lose control.  I just let him have some rope while I got in a better position to bring him back to me.  He was still very good about coming right back to me after a little excitement.  I was a little too close for comfort on one of his excited bucks....  No harm done, but I was lucky.  Lesson learned.  I was really glad I had the 22' line anyway! 

Our first taste of freedom!

One sad fact:  He doesn't have the slightest idea of what to do with fresh grass.  On one of our breaks, I led him over to the grass to graze, and he did eventually nibble on it, but then he didn't seem to know how to chew it.  It was very strange to watch.  Poor baby.

Trailer loading was easier than expected in many ways, but also much more tedious.  It was easier because Doc read the rule book.  He didn't do much pulling away, and seemed to understand that we wanted him to go forward when we drove his shoulder or hind end.  He also kept himself pretty straight when we were asking him to move forward.  He was, however, very reluctant to take that fateful first step onto the ramp.  I worked with him, off and on pretty steadily, for about 3 hours before Alicia came home and lent a hand.  He did step onto the corner of the ramp during my session with him, but only as he was on the move away from the trailer. 

Alicia had more success.  He stepped up onto the ramp with one foot two times for her!  We called it a day after the second step up.  Way to go Alicia! 

Tomorrow will be another day, and we will take as long as it takes to get all four feet in there.

After our lesson, Doc came to the house and hung out with the family as we stood around and talked.  He is really coming out of his shell, and had to investigate every family member to make sure they belonged.  I remember when he didn't want to be anywhere near humans.  It is fun to see all of the changes in him, and his personality to start to show through.

Here are his legs today:

~Jackie

Day 27

Yesterday I went to see Doc, mainly to just treat his wounds, but we ended up making a lot of progress while I was there.  We worked more on the squeeze game, and I found the perfect place to play it.  Just behind the round pen, there is about a 3-foot isle way between his pen and the electric fence.  The fence wasn't turned on, so we made use of that path, and I was able to send him along it and just follow behind him as he walked through calmly.

Today we made even more progress with me sending him through the isle way, then having him stop and back himself out... so tomorrow will be the big day!  I will bring the trailer up there and start with simply working him outside of any enclosure.  That task will be challenging enough, but my goal is to have him loading in the trailer by the end of the day.  It may take several sessions, and we will definitely take our time, but at least we have a goal.

We also worked on standing tied today.  I just draped the lead rope over a tree branch while I worked on his feet and legs.  Never once did he try to pull back.  He did do plenty of side-steps around the tree, but he never pulled away.  I got some great pointers from Gail today on how to train a horse to stand tied, so now we have one more project to work towards.  It would be nice to be able to secure him in the trailer once we have him loading!

I also treated his wounds today, and got a lot of goo off again.  I think it is good when I remove a layer of exudate like that.  Underneath is always fresh, pink tissue.  I want so badly to scrub at it with a good disinfecting soap, but Dr. Jen said no water.  So more ointment gets applied instead.  :)

Doc is getting so much better about his feet being worked with.  I am now able to pick out all four feet until they are clean.  So far, the underneath side of them doesn't look as horrible as we expected.  He doesn't have too much thrush.  Mainly just in the center.  All of his frogs are shedding out right now, and he does seem a little tender-footed when we are walking around the pasture.  The real truth will be told when Alicia watches him walk out on the driveway.  I can't wait for her to get a hold of those feet!

I'll let you know how things go tomorrow...

~Jackie