Her name is Annabelle and she is 8 weeks old even though she is not much bigger than the newborns. She's been having problems since she was born. She was tiny to begin with and struggled to grow at a normal rate. There were many times I thought she was going to die. I finally pulled her twin once he got old enough and now she appears stronger and standing straighter so she may just make it after all. But of course with Annabelle there is always something. Last night I noticed the head tilt. She'\s active and hungry just walking around with her head tilted. Farm Girl looked it up and thinks its an ear infection so we gave her a shot of penicillin and will monitor her behaviour from there.
I will be calling our vet today to come out and take a look at Blossom.
However he is our dog and horse vet only as he doesn't treat small ruminants, though if I ask him a question, he often has an answer so may have him take a look at Annabelle and give me the dosage needed of meds. But back to Blossom, she has what I fear is founder. I've never had a horse with this issue so not entirely sure, but from photos I've seen that's what it looks like. Hard to believe really since she is on a hay only diet and doesn't receive any rich grain. It was too dark in the barn this morning for a photo but will try to upload one later of her foot along with the vets diagnosis.
On a positive note, Beatrice is doing far better.
I twittered the other day that she had major diarrhea so we administered her pepto-bismol which settled her stomach and had her eating again and then dewormed her with Safeguard which within hours made her bowl movements more solid and within a day back to their usual pebble size. Unfortunately I forgot to take a photo but after I discovered she had diarrhea I noticed immediately paleness around her eyes, usually they are pink but that morning they were pale. Then a look at her gums revealed they were white and not a healthy pink as they ought to be. So hence we treated her for worms. Two weeks prior we had administered a dose of Ivermectin and then followed up with the Safeguard. It seems to have worked, she is having healthy bowel movements, eating and drinking and nice and alert. It's a good thing too because we are pretty certain she is due to deliver her kid any day now.
I have a feeling it's going to be a great day and all these issues will be taken care of and all my critters will be on the mend. After all, the temperature is already looking up even before the sun rose.
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