Kind of been awol here for the last few days.... had a very upsetting week. My dog Tess went off her feed last week; I gave it a few days to rule out tummy troubles but she literally quit eating no matter what I put in front of her. I took her to the vet on Monday and they did an emergency surgery to remove her uterus which had a bad infection. Apparently common on older intact females- so if you have a dog who is intact and not going to breed her again- get her spayed and save yourself a lot of trouble! Lesson learned. However- the next day she was not looking good, still not eating and her temperature dropped so I took her back to the vet where they did blood work and found that the infection had spread. Long story short, they put her on IV fluids and a powerful antibiotic, and a steroid shot to stimulate her appetite and she bounced back and I was able to bring her home today. Still undergoing treatment, but at least I have her home!
Got a really nice ride on Gussie today. Took Tay and went through the pond which is about knee deep on Gussie; Tay had to swim. Then to the river and back. In the video there is one section where Gussie is doing her little running walk, almost feels like she is gaited when she does that it is so comfy to ride.
When we got back, we gave the neighbour kids a ride. I love to see happy smiles on them!
One ride wasn't enough so they each got two!
After that I worked with ponying lessons with Mesa. First leading both horses from the ground and then riding Gussie and ponying her.
The goal is to get her going well enough to be able to pony her on a few trail rides. This fall I will be doing a lot of ground work on her to prepare her for her 2 year old year; the more I can do this year to expose her to many different things the better.
Belle is in heat, I have been taking her over to visit Beamer. Not breeding her this cycle but with the crazy weather this year many mares are late cycling, some haven't even started, so I want to get her in the rhythm so to speak.
Beamer thinks that's just fine. I have also been letting Gussie visit him just to socialize, but I won't do that while she is in heat because I am not breeding her .
She just visits and then walks away. It's good for the ole boy to have some time with the other horses.
So in case you missed it, or haven't entered yet, I am running my foaling contest. Click on the link and enter your guess in the comments! It's a lot of fun seeing what the guesses are. Don't worry about entering if you live far away, I will think of a nice gift that I can send, maybe something that can be ordered on line. They don't call it the world wide web for nothing! So enter up!
Riding day 22
6 comments:
Thanks for the share. We are so happy that Tess is doing so much better. Sounds like it was scary at first, but at least she is feeling much better now. The smiles on those kids faces are priceless. It's something they will never forget and maybe they will be giving rides to kids when they are older. Have a great day and give Tess a little belly rub from us.
World of Animals
Yes we learned that also...one of my females was spayed after an infection when she lost a whole litter of pups and the other one would never consent to being bred so we spayed her too. I am so glad Tess is okay...scary for sure:)
I’m glad Tess is okay. I’ve heard of that before. It happened with the IW I grew up with when she was about seven years old. My female IW is now 8 and intact, but I don’t want to stress her body out with a surgery. I think I waited too long. So far she’s healthy and happy.
Gussie is doing great!
Linda- Tess is 11 and a half. I would do the surgery now. If she gets the infection it will be life threatening.
I know they area bigger dog and have a shorter life span, I guess all you can do is watch her carefully.
So glad Tess is doing better. I had no idea. The few female dogs I've had in my life were mixed & spayed. Gussie sure is being an all-around rock star!!
Post a Comment