Halla's Eye

We went to WSU today to check out Halla's weepy, squint eye and we still have no answers. But there is no foreign body, no ulcer, no blocked tear duct, and she's reasonably sure it doesn't look like uveitis or glaucoma. They don't have an ophthalmologist there anymore, so this was a regular vet, but a very thorough vet.

My job now is to journal when it's worst. It could be an allergy or something.

Well, at least it wasn't something horrible!

All Good?

I'm not 100% convinced he's fine, but he's eating, drinking, and pooping a little bit. He doesn't seem painful. He still doesn't want his senior feed.

I went ahead and let him out of the stall because he just won't drink the water in there. That means I can't really count turds, but I can watch him closely.

His most recent oily poo

With how small his piles are, I worry that there's something partially blocking... I sure hope not. I'm a worrier.

We'll call this colic episode over unless otherwise noted. Let's hope we can just move on to another subject.

Like how cute Juniper is. She's so jealous of all the attention Sawyer is getting.

Oh, and Halla has an appointment to have her eyes checked at WSU next week. They're overly sensitive to light and the one just never stopped being a little runny.

But for now, I am going to get some sleep.

OK so far

Sawyer seems OK so far. He's passed a few tiny bits of manure and I've seen him pee twice. It's not dark. He's not eating consistently and he's not drinking. He would be happy to graze, but he just refused some senior feed. He's pretty upset about being locked in a stall.

His gut sounds were pretty slow, almost non existent on one side.  He didn't have much fecal matter in his colon and what was there was a little dry and had long stems. Honestly I didn't think he ate the stems in his hay, I thought he only ate the leaf. I'll be scheduling him a dental, it's about time anyway since his last one was a year ago, but he might be doing the best he can with his old man teeth.

His heart rate wasn't elevated but his respiratory rate is. He seems pretty painful if I were to guess, but he's not biting at his sides. He's licking with his tongue way out a LOT.

He sure didn't like the nasogastric tube. It must have tickled. Luckily he was lightly sedated.

Hopefully he'll be passing some mineral oil by morning.

Waiting for the vet

Sawyer wouldn't eat this morning. First thing I noticeced, walking out to feed, was that his gut looked sucked up, then he refused both alfalfa and senior feed. He looks miserable. I heard some gut sounds (just with my ears) and he has passed a small amount of gas, so that's good.

I also found some weird large bubble foam where he was standing. Assumed it was drool, but could be from urine or could have bubbled up out of the thawing ground yesterday.

A-ha! Just now we have a nice wet poo! Not huge, but that's OK. Nice.

I'll update later. He's probably fine.

Almost Springlike

Juniper is so smart. We saddled up in deep snow, her 2nd or 3rd time with the pack saddle on (I can't remember which), and she was like an old pro.

She did think about taking a second look at the giant pannier bags, but since I acted like it was nothing, it was nothing.

Making tracks, getting a feel for things.

We did a little off-roading. This was a big step for her but you can barely tell from the pics, or from how easily she went down.

No big deal, Ma.

The babies are getting big. They have the run of the horse trailer for now.

This one looks very proud. :D

Baseball season has started. It's cold.

But it was super cool, because there were bighorn sheep AND mountain goats in the hills. I'm not sure I've ever seen both in one day. They're in the picture but you'll have to take my word for it. I would have needed a much better camera.

I'm on a wee trip right now, and the menfolk are holding down the fort at home. I'll be back tomorrow. I hope they remember all the little feed details.