Broodmare behaviour

wickedwilfred

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We have a 16 year old Thoroughbred broodmare who has always been a bit alpha female, but last year 4 trips to the stallion failed to get her in foal. When she came home she was irritable and started to kick holes in the stable and field shelter walls, as well as the occasional field companion and for no apparent reason. After one screaming match in the paddock at 10pm, I decided something had to be done and wondered if was down to hormone imbalance. I asked my vet if I could put the mare on Ritalin for a month to see if it would help. The effect was immediate and she became docile and calm once more and has been that way ever since. I am now about to put her in foal again and am wondering if this is going to upset the applecart and if anyone else has similar experiences with broodmares and advice to share.
 

JanetGeorge

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Sounds like bad stud management if she didn't get in foal and came back in a mood. Was she naturally covered - or AI'd? If covered, how many times? If AI'd, was she scanned 24 hours after AI to make sure she'd ovulated? Her behavior sounds like she had a persistent anovulatory follicle.
 

wickedwilfred

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She has always been a moody mare and although she has had 3 lovely foals and been an excellent mother, has always had this random kicking out trait. I had thought it indicates some sort of discomfort and on one occasion when she was doing it with a foal at foot, we put her on Feedmarks’s Settelex and it seemed to help. At least, if I gave her a dose with her evening feed, we were not woken in the night by the sound of her kicking holes in the stable walls - always seemed to miss the foal. We put our mares in foal every other year and she is TB so has to have live covering for racing but last year was covered 4 times without success. They are always scanned and washed out before going to the stallion. My vet said everything is clean and could see no internal problems. Just curious why REGUMATE should have had such an instant and effective result late last summer and she is showing no signs of repeat performance even though she was only on it for 1 month.
 
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