Treating Bloat in a Pony ???

[cliodhna]

Hi everyone,
I have a four year old Connemara mare who I got last August. She has always been large and in spite of restricted diet (soaked hay, oat straw, grazing muzzle, starvation paddock), she has not lost weight. Lately, it is looking more like bloat. You can feel ribs and the weight is on the underside of her stomach. She is very deep girthed. Her stomach towards her hind is very soft, almost fluidy. I have never experienced anything like this before. Her worming is up to date, but I wormed her again today with Eqvalan Duo as a just in case. I have also order pink powder as some sort of digestive aid for her. I am thinking now of getting bloods done to see if she has liver damage or something along these lines from possibly eating ragwort before I got her.

I am at a loss as to what could be causing such heavy bloating. Does anyone have any suggestions regarding how I could 'flush her out'? Or what it may be?

Thanks for reading, apologies for the essay just really getting concerned

 

[lhotse]

Maybe she is in foal?
When you say that the stomach is 'fluidy' do you mean that there feels like there is fluid under the skin? Does it leave an indentation if you press it? If so, it sounds like oedema. Definitely get her blood tested, and for tapeworm and liver fluke, too and get a worm count done as well.
Failing all that, you might well have 2 for 1!!

 

[Rouletterose]

You need a vet.

 

[millimoo]

Get the vet - if shes as bloated as you're indicating don't think you should try and diagnose on a forum.
Hope she's ok... Does your local vet do a normal surgery on a Saturday morning? Realise you may not need an emergency callout.
Hope it's nothing serious. Liver damage usually sees them off their food and losing weight

 

[cliodhna]

She is not in foal. I am contacting the vet and am not looking for a diagnosis over the forum just some insight to tide me over as bloods obviously take time to process. Its not an oedema, its uniformly soft. Its a bit of a mystery at the moment. She is bright in herself, energetic and not off her food at all. I will get a worm count done, but like I said I wormed her again today just incase even though her worming is up to date. I keep a folder with when I have wormed them.