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Tierras de al Andalus

ENDURANCEX-Chile

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Tierras de al Andalus

ENDURANCEX-Chile

Heidi; I am sorry about the loss of your beautiful filly. That was a very sad story. (Also a loss to the gene pool !)

I am sitting here today, instead of riding on this beautiful day, because my horses had their vaccines on Friday, their Fort Dodge Fluvac  (E/W tetanus 4 way) and they are sick. One musing that I've had is, that bad crap seems to happen on Fridays, and more likely to be close to 5:00 p.m. , and even more likely if I am working all weekend, or going on a holiday. Note to self, don't do anything wierd like get the pets vaccinated on a Friday afternoon. All four horses got quiet and were not hungry as usual. The two riding horses were worst. One mare, Summer, was laying down and then would not eat, but did drink a lot. The other one was stiff, suspicious and paranoid---all weekend. My mare Summer would hardly walk, and stocked up within 4 hours of vaccine. She has stocked up after her shots..but usually the next day, not the same day. She kept flapping her lip. My vet recommended Bute. They got Bute. A couple times. Today..Monday, Passion is still giving me dirty looks and I notice a scleral hemorrhage (at least thats what its called in humans) a blood spot on the white of her eye. Which makes her dirty looks even more evil. At least the evil dirty looks are not as hateful as the ones she gives my vet. Summer still looks stiff and achey and stocked up a little. And I have caused them to do a little exercise to loosen up, by walking and trotting around, but I don't think I'll ride the poor dears this a.m..

Questions to vets...when we gave our children the hated DPT vaccine, we premedicated them with Tylenol so they'd feel better. I wonder if I should premedicate the horses with Bute before a vaccine, or does it decrease their immunity ( and thus the effectiveness of the vaccine) by altering the inflammatory process? I wonder if they could have something like Benadryl, does anyone give horses Benadryl? What if it is an allergy? Say the vet is long gone and then they have an allergic reaction of some sort, what do people do then?  How about, is it the Tetanus portion of these shots that makes them feel so crappy?

Then I was thinking (musing again) about Howard's  comments about 25 milers and his horses (six) putting out 300 lbs of manure a day. I remember reading a book, long ago, I think it was entitled "40 Tons a day". It was about race horses, and manure. I believe that the Thoroughbreds make about twice as much manure as the arabs, at least in my back yard. Which would give me that 300 lbs. Which by shovel load would be about 40 shovels or so, or if I was to join 24 hour fitness..."40 reps of about 7 or 8 lbs." Which may be why I am getting a "six pack", I swear, its true. And no sit-ups. But my right arm is getting bigger, it's assymmetrical.  I don't know how to shovel manure left handed, but I bet Howard maybe could.

But respectfully Howard, I must disagree with you on the "year of LD's" requirement discussion. Cause I usually ride 15 miles a couple times a week and sometimes 25 miles either in Tiffany's neck of the woods or at the state park, and  its free! I know that it would be hard to know if horses are conditioned with 25's by their owners if it's not official. But I also agree with Tiffany about "preserving our freedom, and not treating us like babies". I also believe that doing a year of 25's by obligation could become costly to people too.  It's probably hard for me to have an objective opinion about that because I did do a few years of NATRC shorter distance novice rides starting in 1990, and have done several years of NATRC open rides. I can tell you that I really don't want to go back to the novice rides' or the 25's cause I just see it as a waste of money  and gasoline for myself personally.  I would just rather drive myself and the horse to the ride venues for something spec ial and that would be a two day 50 (NATRC) or a one day 50 (AERC). 

Thank you, Beth Glover (who should be out shoveling my 300 lbs worth)