Sell/PTS or what? :(

Put pony in a grazing muzzle!!!!

My good doer had borderline lami in April after only 4 days without his muzzle on.

He is now muzzled ALL the time when out - even now into November! On a night he comes in and his haynet is weighed and he has a decent feed of fast fibre to ensure he gets all his nutrients. It just isn't worth taking ANY risks - the grass may look shoddy but there's no way of telling - your grass obviously still has nutrients as you now have a lami case.
If they can't be strip-grazed, kept in or on a true starvation paddock then a muzzle is your only option IMO. Take other steps like minimising rugging and upping exercise to slim them down. PTS is a little bit extreme when there are other avenues to explore.
 
I will go to the saddlery and see what they have in the way of muzzles, when I went in the summer they had sold out, but hopefully now people wont be wanting them so much and they will be back in stock?! Hubby has all the machinery for cutting so I will see if he can get back down there and do it, it was still just too wet last week.

They arent rugged at the mo, in fact he isnt even fat at the mo, just very very hairy!!! hopefully with your advice and the field shelter we will get there and my boys will be ok :)
 
Test for EMS/cushings.

Remove all sugar from their diets - no carrots, no apples, no polos, no cereals.

Are you sure she's footy from laminitis and not footy from soft soles/thrush? If thrush, pick feet every day and spray with iodine spray 2-3 times a week around frog area.

Hay them.

6 acres is a massive-sized field for 3 little good doers. ;-)
 
Sugar_and_Spice said:
I would not want to put a healthy animal to sleep either, but if its currently having an attack of laminitis (which it sounds as if it is) then the horse is not healthy. If you don't have the facilities to treat the laminitis, (if that's what it is) then PTS because no decent knowledgable person is going to buy the horse.
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Fencing off a smaller paddock/buying a grazing muzzle/controlling the pony's diet would more than likely bring it back to health. If he's footy and a bit tender then why take his life when he could give daughter so much more once he's well. It doesn't sound like he's foundering, just in need of some tlc.

nicolenlolly said:
Oh kellyb I meant to say, I don't have all that much grass, much of the field is a flooded bog and churned up to mud which is why I have now opened it all up, I can't rug them cos they just get out of them so I would rather let them be able to shelter under the trees in the big field which is still very wet so they will quickly destroy that too. I was told that the first frost took all the nutrients out of the grass, is that not true?
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Hi Nicole,

To be honest, sometimes short grass can be worse than longer stuff because it's fighting hard to recover from overgrazing/bad nutrition amongst other things.

I completely understand what it's like to find yourself with a pony that's laminitic for the first time. Last year we bought a pony that turned out to suffer with it terribly, and never having had a pony with it before, I felt like a terrible mother and a total lost cause. BUT... there's a lot of information out there and I'd like to think I know so much more than I did before she came down with it. It's really daunting at first, but do a search on the forums and have a look at http://www.safergrass.org/, invest in a grazing muzzle and some electric tape and make sure you supplement pony with low sugar/no molasses feed at least until you can figure out what's causing it.

Remember too that there are different triggers for laminitis. With mine I find a sugar overload will see her footy within hours and she's worse when she's stressed (like last week when the fireworks were going off and the week before when she was sweating in the mild weather). For others it can be a result of cushings disease or EMS or trauma to the hoof wall etc. Some come down with it when they're overweight, for others a few hours on rich or even just richer grass, or frosty grass regardless of their weight can kick it off. The key is to find out what the triggers are for your pony and treat appropriately.

The frost might reduce the nutrients in the grass, but it stops the grass from processing the sugar it's made in the day. I'm not sure how much truth there is in it, but they do say a sunny/frosty morning is actually the worst time to turn out a laminitic pony so bear all these things in mind when managing your pony's condition, if it is indeed laminitis.

It does sound really, really daunting and I was gutted when I realised our little un had it. After reasearching as much as I could and getting my head round the minefield that's out there, I figured out what caused it and she's been great for almost a year now. It's simple to manage now, and doesn't really cost me anything in terms of time or effort or stress.

In my case she wears a grazing muzzle all day which is when the fructins are higher (she can still nibble) and she's fed morning and night on molasses free hifi and speedibeet (again unmolassed) with magnesium and a little bit of "complete" feed (equilibrium low). I don't put her on rested/good grass, and if it's forecast to be frosty she goes in a little paddock/field shelter with no grass at all, just hay.

Hopefully this will help to put your mind at rest. Don't be afraid to ask questions, and soak in all you can. As I said, once you know what's causing it both you and your pony will be a lot happier and it isn't as much of a hassle as you'd expect.
 
Kellybee thank you. I guess I was giving up on him a little cos its so disheartening but you have given me hope so thank you from the bottom of my heart! You have given me so much to work on...I will invest in some feed and they will think Christmas has come early!! Unfortunately I couldn't get down to them today-stupid (but lovely) hubby went to work with both sets of car keys so I was stuck at home, thankfully the lady who overlooks them checked on them whilst on the phone to me and farrier is coming tomorrow instead he manged to swap me with someone booked in for tomorrow!

Once again thank you all for your advice, I really appreciate it and I will start implementing all that I can ASAP. Even mother in law is having baby for me so I have morning to devote to my boys :) suechoccy you could be spot on, hopefully all will be revealed tomorrow. I guess I have jumped to conclusions, it was more cos hubby suggested when we got back home last night that we might have to "out those two" in favour of somethig else which panicked me a little. I thought the other one had it and it was an abscess so hopefully I am really wrong again?!

Thank you again and night night xx
 
No probs, I wish someone had told me it wasn't as scary when I first got mine. Hopefully all went well with the farrier today, just remember every case is different. Chin up, it's not so hard when there's a light at the end of the tunnel :)
 
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