Sand Impaction Colic on Clay Soil and Surgery

[Charmin]

Friends 12 year old dressage horse is presently at Leahurst having undergone major coilc surgery. Sand Impaction was found in the colon. He is still very poorly as the sand has irritated his bowel and toxins have entered his blood stream. The owner is at a loss how? Has anyone experianced this before and can shed any light? The horse has been grazed for >7 years, Winter & spring daily in the same clay paddock (Summer goes to another paddock, again clay) He is stabled at night on quality feed & haylage. Next to the Winter paddock is a school with coarse sand & rubber. There is a limestone drain between the paddock & menage & a large hedge as a boundary. There is no obvious signs of sand in the paddock and he is a fussy eater so does not eat his grass right down. The soil will be tested but has any one heard of sand impaction from clay soil before??

 

[MargotC]

Oh no. Hope your friend's boy picks up soon. Can't shed any light on it I am afraid. But when my old boy colicked however the vet deemed it to have been caused by ingested sand. He came right on his own with painkillers and a jab so I cannot tell for sure that that was it.. If it was it must have been caused by very small amounts. We were all baffled as the entire area is clay soil and notorious for landslides. Only sand/gravel nearby was on the track between the smallest paddock and the stable, however he had no access to that except for when being led in and out. Feeder was on opposite side of field. No other changes to their routine had been made and no horse had ever colicked on the yard before or did after. Chalked it up to a freak incident but it'd be interesting to hear others' experiences.

 

[suffolkmare]

Oh poor friend and horse, hope he will have a comfortable night and be on road to recovery. It's alarmed me after moving my boy (as advised by Rossdales) and now he's on very muddy clay rather than short (non-) grass on sandy soil. He had a lot of sand in his belly when he colicked, luckily avoided surgery. He wasn't the first on that yard though.
I can only say that it must be an area requiring more research, to find out which horses might be more susceptible, despite our attempts to prevent/manage the risks. I even wondered if the Saharan sand that was blown here last year was a possible, if unlikely, contributor.

 

[OwnedbyJoe]

Hullo. I live in the sand colic capital of the world in Western Australia... And I am a vet.
Firstly, healing vibes and fingers crossed for your friend's horse.
There's so much we DON'T KNOW about the condition. Some horses will colic with small amounts of sand: others will have VAST amounts on board and not have a problem. Yet others will be fine with sand on board until someone decides to start a clearing out treatment and stirs everything up. In my own stable I have one horse who likes to have a mild colic every year due to sand(he is treated by drenching annually). Then there is a second who has had one colic due to sand shortly after we got him and he had HUGE amounts of sand in his system which he must have picked up before we got him. It took a long time to clear him out, but thankfully he never impacted.
It does seem that some horses will carry sand in them for quite long periods so it might be worth looking at where he was before your friend even got him. Also water with sand in it can be an issue so does he have access to the drain you mentioned and does it carry any run off from the arena?
Lastly, one major issue here is horses grazing new grass (in autumn here, would be spring over there) which basically uproots rather than being bitten off. The whole plants comes up complete with some sand on the roots, and thus it accumulates in the horse. It might be worth looking at his grazing management in the early spring.

 

[racebuddy]

Fingers crossed hes had a setted night any news ? I've known sand colic but not clay bit worrying as my horses are on clay x

 

[Charmin]

He had regular colicking episodes, scoped a treated for ulcers. In bad periods he could be colicky once a week There's never been a call for surgery as it's never got to that point but it's become so regular opening him up was the last port of call and the impaction found.

Thank you all for your thoughts. Such a sad thing to happen. Last I heard he was still on a drip but had managed to pee. We've got everything crossed for him.

 

[Midlifecrisis]

A friends horse was treated for colic today - we are on clay soils - the owner feeds quality feeds...sensibly..always has hay in field if grass frosty...never grazes frosty grass on empty tummy and we are at a loss as to why today things went awry. He was much happier this afternoon but the vet who visited said a lot of horses were being affected at the moment and was wondering if its the icy grass/not icy grass scenario of this strange weather pattern. Fingers crossed OP friends horse recovers well and soon.

 

[shergar]

So sorry to hear about the horse with sand colic I hope he will soon be feeling better .

There are some interesting videos on youtube type in HOW TO TEST A HORSE FOR SAND for any one who is worried you can do a test yourself, another video on there is SAND COLIC STOP IT BEFORE IT STARTS.

 

[racebuddy]

How is your friends horse doing ?, hope things are going in the right direction x