A long day yesterday. We had to get Filly to the vets by 9am for her MRI scan. That was a one hour drive. She loaded ok, but again the travelling was not great. When we arrived at the vets the staff there took one look at her and ran to get a bucket, sponge and scraper to wash the sweat off her. They were so nice and helpful it gave me great confidence in them looking after her for the day. I had been prepared to spend the whole day looking after Filly, but when we saw how compassionate the staff were we decided we could leave her in their capable hands.
It then occurred to us that we were half way to JRFS so decided that rather than hanging around the vets we would go and see our friends there.
We had a great day watching Josh playing with 5 colts, some of which he rode and some he did ground work on.
He really fired difficult questions at us this time. Not just about horses either. He would give a scenario of a rider and a student and ask what patterns would be best for them to practise to progress. That made us really think about the purpose of the patterns and how to use them to help the rider and the horse. In the past as we were the rider we only had to think about the horse. Thinking about both was much harder to do as the pattern had to match the needs of both.
We had arranged to be back at the vets by around 17:30 in the evening. When we arrived we found Filly back in her box and wide awake. As soon as she saw me she gave a huge shout and got really excited, which was a great welcome.
Before we left the vet, Bruce, showed us the MRI scans for her front legs. They had taken a scan of both front hooves. They showed that both the front navicular bones have small chips that have aggravated the soft tissue in the area causing soreness. In addition the front right "deep flexor tendon" has a small amount of damage. The suggested treatment was for a hydro-cortisone injection into the effected area on the right hoove and a course of tildren ( a drug that helps prevent bone degeneration). The vet seemed optimistic that the treatment would help her and she would probably be rideable again.
I hope this turns out to be the case, but if not she will still be my online and liberty horse so out story is not over yet !
For the journey home I prepared her for loading as usual. The surgery has a lovely sand school that I used to prepare her for loading using the usual games. It was noticeable that on this lovely sand she moved so much better than in the school at Manor Farm.
The loading went very well. Again I used a lot of patience and as one of the staff watched us playing with the trailer Filly suddenly self loaded. This resulted in the staff member asking us loads of questions about our methods. She said she had seen many ways of loading a horse, but ours seemed to be very gentle.
We had given Filly a mild sedative for the drive home and she was very very chilled. She ate the whole way and arrived at Manor Farm dry and without having done a single dropping. She also unloaded very calmly and settled into her stable with very little fuss.
The farrier is coming today to put the shoes back on that had to be removed for the MRI. Hopefully the injections can be performed on Friday, but we have to go to the local vet surgery for that.
It then occurred to us that we were half way to JRFS so decided that rather than hanging around the vets we would go and see our friends there.
We had a great day watching Josh playing with 5 colts, some of which he rode and some he did ground work on.
He really fired difficult questions at us this time. Not just about horses either. He would give a scenario of a rider and a student and ask what patterns would be best for them to practise to progress. That made us really think about the purpose of the patterns and how to use them to help the rider and the horse. In the past as we were the rider we only had to think about the horse. Thinking about both was much harder to do as the pattern had to match the needs of both.
We had arranged to be back at the vets by around 17:30 in the evening. When we arrived we found Filly back in her box and wide awake. As soon as she saw me she gave a huge shout and got really excited, which was a great welcome.
Before we left the vet, Bruce, showed us the MRI scans for her front legs. They had taken a scan of both front hooves. They showed that both the front navicular bones have small chips that have aggravated the soft tissue in the area causing soreness. In addition the front right "deep flexor tendon" has a small amount of damage. The suggested treatment was for a hydro-cortisone injection into the effected area on the right hoove and a course of tildren ( a drug that helps prevent bone degeneration). The vet seemed optimistic that the treatment would help her and she would probably be rideable again.
I hope this turns out to be the case, but if not she will still be my online and liberty horse so out story is not over yet !
For the journey home I prepared her for loading as usual. The surgery has a lovely sand school that I used to prepare her for loading using the usual games. It was noticeable that on this lovely sand she moved so much better than in the school at Manor Farm.
The loading went very well. Again I used a lot of patience and as one of the staff watched us playing with the trailer Filly suddenly self loaded. This resulted in the staff member asking us loads of questions about our methods. She said she had seen many ways of loading a horse, but ours seemed to be very gentle.
We had given Filly a mild sedative for the drive home and she was very very chilled. She ate the whole way and arrived at Manor Farm dry and without having done a single dropping. She also unloaded very calmly and settled into her stable with very little fuss.
The farrier is coming today to put the shoes back on that had to be removed for the MRI. Hopefully the injections can be performed on Friday, but we have to go to the local vet surgery for that.
No comments:
Post a Comment