Monday, January 19, 2009

Cisco seems to be doing fairly well. He has pooped, and he seems happy (and HUNGRY) but he's not drinking. I've given him 3 meals of soaked beet pulp with a little soaked hay, and he's getting water from that, but it just doesn't seem like enough. Maybe six gallons at most. Would that be enough in a 24 hour period? Why on earth would a horse not drink? He's not sick, as in septic or something that would make him quit drinking. I've got water in 2 different containers, so if he's offended by one he could drink out of the other. I've put salt in each of those meals I've given him.

I'm just going to keep him locked up, watch him, and make sure he doesn't get any dry hay for another day.

On another note, I made something the other day that I'd been meaning to make for a long time but I couldn't find the right rope. I needed supple cotton rope, and all I could find was really stiff rope. Finally found the right stuff though. See:

My mustangin' rope! It turns out splicing cotton rope really isn't all that hard. I'd tried it once before, but it was a loose cotton lead that had been broken, and it ended up looking messy. I made this because I needed a lunge line and I decided to put a ring on the end to make it more versatile. The clip is a bit big and heavy, it's actually for something else, but I have a smaller one around here somewhere...

Now check out this thing I found and tried:
It's called a sailmaker's whipping. It said to burn the end of the rope to make it look neater, which didn't make much sense to me on cotton, but I tried it anyway and it looks icky. But I think the whipping itself looks really cool. I'm probably going to take it off and back splice the rope though, so it's thicker on the end. I love playing with rope.

4 comments:

arlene said...

I'm glad Cisco pooped. I don't know why he won't drink but about 40 years ago an old gypsy (who was a genius with horses) told me, "if a horse has got his head down eating, then he's alright". Something like that.

Lady Of Chaos said...

If you're really worried about him drinking enough and the salt doesn't seem to be working... Try gatorade in his water. My horses prefer the 'berry' flavors. :) Or try some mollasses in the water.

Hopefully he'll start drinking on his own soon.

Lea and her Mustangs said...

You will like the rope. Bob has made a couple of them and they wor wonderful. Hope Cisco is doing better.

Linda said...

Andrea, is he on any kind of pain reliever like Banamine? If not, he's doing pretty good--eating, standing, pooping. If he was in pain, he wouldn't be eating. I don't understand the not drinking. I had one not drink because the metal waterer was touching the electric fence and causing a shock in the water. (Stupid me). I've also heard of this with automatic heated waterers--and I suppose it could happen with stock tank heaters as well. I make my horses warm bran mashes--which is probably a lot like what you're already doing. 6 gallons of water seems like just a bit under what the normal would be--which, if I remember right, is 8-10. Someone correct me if I'm wrong--it's not something I think much about now that we have the automatic waterers.