She's All Legs

I've been doing my best to come up with a Master Plan for Gogo's current stage of rehab/desperate weight loss need. I have a basic idea of what I want to do, but of course, Gogo's incredibly awkward legs have other ideas, and have decided they are just going to do whatever they want to do, rehab be damned!

Gogo is the queen of Random Mystery Leg Swellings With No Lameness. For YEARS she has been getting mystery swellings, which were mostly due to cuts and scrapes; however, they have been known to arise from anything under the sun, all the way from generalized bangings (getting cast in her stall, getting tangled in a roundpen panel, etc) to wild reactions to new batches of shavings (balloon legs on her, but nobody else!). Generally, when it comes to Gogo, if there is a cut or scrape on one of her legs, I can bank on it swelling dramatically no matter what. Not a single one of these Mystery Leg Swellings was lameness-inducing. And this time, it's no different: Gogo's right front is lumpy and fat, and in the past two days has switched from the inside of the leg to the outside. All four legs have a little fill to them too. Why? Oh, I dunno. Might be....




MYSTERY TEXAS DEATH FUNGUS.
Or something like that.

Seriously, what the heck is going on? A mystery fungus that pops up on all four legs in the middle of the hottest, driest summer Gogo has ever experienced in her life? I might understand it if I was bathing her a million times a week in the middle of a soggy Connecticut spring, but here? It popped up as a bunch of scabs on the backside of all four legs, right where you'd expect scratches to be (save for the right front, which has scabs on the front of the pastern as well). When you pick them, they come off, and bleed - a lot. They only showed up in the last week or so - coinciding pretty well with the move to the new facility. Texas is desperately dry right now, so it's not like she's standing in mud. And is it even a fungus? Her field has some bull nettle in it, as well as several other types of completely terrifying pokey plants in it (they're not cacti, but I wouldn't want to run into them either way), so it's possible she's reacting to getting poked and stabbed by plants she's never been exposed to either. But I think if that were the case, it wouldn't be localized so much... hmm.

I always tend to associate scratches with having an autoimmune issue. But in this case, it does coincide pretty spot-on with her move to the new place. I wonder what is actually going on... fungus, or scabs due to many little cuts and scrapes from nettles?

Either way, washing with Micro-Tek and Desitin aren't going to hurt anything, so we'll give that a try. As for the fat right front, I dunno... the fill doesn't go away with movement (the case in her other 3 days), isn't sore, is warm but not hot, and is not lameness-inducing. It is also partly localized as a lump on the outside of her leg.


The other VERY INTERESTING thing that is happening? Gogo is growing a COMPLETELY different foot. I mean SERIOUSLY different. Rememeber four months ago when I pulled her off Gro N' Win? I mentioned then that Gogo has always, always has a small bit of white line separation, always - for years! It never caused her a problem but it never went away. I had always chalked it up to the horrible, soggy New England climate. Gro N' Win has a soy base, and when I removed it from her diet, I mused that while I didn't think she had a soy sensitivity, it would be interesting to see what would happen.

Gogo's feet at the start of April:






With the same danged-ol' toe cracks that she has had for five years. She has noticable indentations in her coronet bands on both fronts, which is where the problem originates. They've never been a problem, and so far nothing has ever made them change or go away. They've always looked pretty much like that - you might not notice they were there unless you looked for them.

Until April happened, and the grass grew in. Suddenly, Gogo's feet were dramatically changing right before my very eyes. Her beautiful feet deteriorated with such rapidity that I didn't hardly know what to do with myself. They were different EVERY day. Aside from the underside of her foot warping, the most alarming thing that happened was that both toe cracks split open pretty wide all the way to the top of the hoof. That had NEVER happened before. It didn't cause her any problems, thankfully, but it was still startling to see. All because of the beautiful pasture she was on.

Beautiful grass pastures are my sworn mortal enemy. At this point, after seeing what the grass did to her, I think I'd rather have her in a stall/minimal turnout situation than out on unlimited pasture ever again. She was never sore or lame, but she could have been. If you eat too many sugary candy bars, you are probably going to end up as a diabetic someday. Horses are NO exception.



Thankfully, we have fast-forwarded three months, and are onto a new chapter in Gogo's feet. Gogo has been off the Gro N' Win now since the beginning of April, and her vitamins and minerals are coming from a supplement instead. The new non-soy foot Gogo is growing in is beautiful and quite a LOT tighter than the one she had before. Look where the big crack stops - RIGHT at the event line. How about that. The grass caused the cracks, but taking her off the Gro N' Win seems to have prevented them from staying. Interesting... very interesting.




Not the greatest picture, but you get the idea. Excuse the recently-bathed coronet/periople wetness. Oh yeah, and there's the fat leg too!

If you notice, that foot in comparison to the hoof picture above it has a LOT of length to it. Gogo was trimmed barely two weeks ago, but after she was pulled off the grass for good, she completely exfoliated her sole on all four feet.... AGAIN. This is the fourth or fifth time in the past few months that she has done this. It just finished its full exfoliation, and of course this now has left about half an inch of hoofwall that is standing above the sole. It's trim time - immediately!





Oh Gogo. You are my greatest teacher.


PS: she has a fan club of little girls at the new barn already... and guess what their favorite pastime is with her?





She loves all her little minions.


More soon on the rehab process and what actual, concrete plans I have in store for her - and how her first time back under saddle went!

GRAIN UNDER ATTACK!

I'm pretty sure that I have been given repeated signs from the gods of horse obesity that Gogo's days of grain-eating need to temporarily be over, and I think after this last one I need to listen. Firstly, Gogo is clearly gaining weight rapidly, and should not be carrying extra weight around on that leg, so if I can find any way to cut out extra calories, I should take it. Secondly, I already lost four bags of (incredibly expensive) Gro N' Win that I purchased in Connecticut when water leaked into my trailer during the snowstorm on the drive down to Texas and contaminated the grain. I managed to salvage a bit, but didn't have much, and searched desperately high and low in search of a grain dealer anywhere remotely near me that carried Buckeye. I finally found a place in Grapevine, over an hour away from my house. It was worth it, and I made the trek out there and brought a few more bags of grain home.

Things were going well until a few days ago. It is unclear whether or not this particular nuisance originated inside a bag of already contaminated grain, or if they came in through my open screen door, but I started noticing a massive influx of teeny tiny little beetles gathering near my door. I store my grain in my house specifically to safeguard it from rodents and bugs (you have no idea how terrifying Texas bugs are... I've already found THREE scorpions in my house... SCORPIONS!), but apparently, as my old landlord pointed out to me, I guess I should have gone one step further and gotten galvanized steel garbage cans. Worried about my grain, I went out and brought home some more intense storage containers, and poured the little bit of my first bag of Gro N' Win into the bin. When I poured my second bag into the bin (why did I do it second??), I pulled back the empty bag, looked into the bin, and gasped. It was CRAWLING with THOUSANDS of bugs!!! Closer inspection of the bag showed lots of little holes all over the bag that I didn't see before. Did the beetles sneak into the bag, multiply and start busting out, or did they bust in?

Either way, my entire remaining store of grain is gone. And my house still is crawling with bugs despite my best efforts to eradicate them. They don't bite, they so far haven't gotten into my food, and they haven't done anything except be annoying, but if I can't get them under control I'm going to have to bomb the house. Damnit all. Thought I could protect my grain in here, but noooooo, apparently not...


Anyway, I threw in the towel and gave up. The grain is impossible to get and impossible to store, Gogo is a Fattie Boomblattie, and she's not doing anything but eating right now. For the first time in four years, I'm taking her off of the Gro N' Win. Instead, I contacted SmartPak, went through their list of multivitamins, and ended up picking the SmartVite EZ Keeper Grass Formula. From now until she's presumably back in work someday, she won't be getting any grain. I also went ahead and ordered SmartShine, seeing as my bag of ground flax also got destroyed in the buggy process. It's cheap, although it's probably completely unnecessary. I loved the freakishly amazing shine that flax brought out in her last spring, and some extra Omega-3's won't hurt her. (If you notice in that picture from the shavings in her tail, she hadn't even been groomed yet that day... she was just that shiny standing around in her stall!)

It's a minor calorie reduction, but it's something to try and counter her ever-growing foodbelly. The other interesting thing is that this is the first time Gogo will ever be on a soy-free diet. (I mean, nearly every horse feed and supplement has some sort of soy base or derivative, but I guess you could call it for the most part 'soy-free.') While I don't honestly think that Gogo has a soy sensitivity, I am interested to see if removing soy from her diet will cause her white line to tighten up - a common problem with soy sensitive horses. Her hooves are rock-crunching and always have been, but she's had just a hair of white line separation and very slight flare on all four for pretty much ever. It just hasn't really ever gone away. I had attributed it to the soggy mushy climate of New England, but it's still here now that she's been in Texas for four months. Gogo easily drops a whole new foot in about six months. It will be interesting to see as her foot keeps growing down what happens. Trust me, nobody loves Gro N' Win more than I do, but you never know!



Can you find the Mami in the picture? :)

Product Review: De-Lyte Bites

A little while ago I was contacted by Heather, one of our readers, about her product De-Lyte Bites, an electrolyte cookie designed to replenish minerals in the hardworking equine athlete. Because Gogo isn't exactly in ridiculous, desperately=-needing-electrolytes hard work, I agreed to take on some samples for a taste test instead. I received several packages of cookies, and distributed them amongst my pickiest eaters. I of course gave Gogo her fair share too, even though she is the equine equivalent to a garbage disposal. I have some fussy eaters in my barn, and was interested to see what I would find!

The cookies come in an easy to open package, four cookies to a single serving. This makes it easier to space out distribution over the course of a horse's workload - good if you are off to Tevis!:



De-lyte Bites are marketed as a complete and balanced electrolyte supplement. I can't speak for the nutritional information as it isn't clear on the website whether or not these minerals are sodium chloride and potassium chloride (and calcium chloride) or just sodium and potassium (I assume not but it just says 'sodium and potassium' on the website), but I will give one disclaimer: these are not treats for horses with metabolic issues! They have less than half of a teaspoon of molasses in each cookie but that is still too much for a horse with any sort of metabolic problem. There are a lot of sugar-free electrolytes on the market that are more suitable for IR horses and the like... although come to think of it, I'm not sure I know any metabolic horse who is capable of hard enough work to warrent electrolyte supplementation. So maybe this doesn't apply! (Acute laminitis being the exception. Then again.... if your horse is acutely laminitic you probably ain't goin' to the show today!)

My role in this review was to taste test. A product is no good if your horse won't eat it! The cookies are firm with a slight give to them - hard but chewy. Great for storage in your saddle bags on an endurance ride as they won't crumble or break! I even bounced one off the floor, and it sprang off and was fine! Our test subjects for the day were Bella, Pollux, Max the pony, and of course Gogo. Maybe Heather can clarify, but Max is a small/medium, and his requirements are different from a horse like Pollux who is about 1300lbs. Are there different doses for different sized horses and ponies? Different workloads? Something to consider!


Onto the taste testing.... Gogo of course thought they were deeeeelish:



She made 'hey this is very chewy!' faces, but wanted more right away. So she got two ;) Mmmmm!

Pollux, one of our pickier eaters who we suspect had ulcers when he came over from Europe last fall, also thought they were very chewy but definitely tasty (he had dinner on his nosey already):



I think I gave Max a heartattack when I showed up at his stall with a cookie, but I quickly bribed him over and he snarfed it right up:




And last but not least was Bella, another picky eater who also thought they were chewy but tasty:





For more information about supplementing your horse with electrolytes, visit thehorse.com's great article. Electrolyte supplementation is a very tricky business and potentially hazardous if done wrong. Aside from hard working distance horses, the vast majority of riding horses out there don't need anything beyond a little NaCL and KCl for hot days in work. Seek a veterinarian's advice for help determining if your horse is a candidate for extra electrolyte supplementation.


In conclusion, all of the horses that sampled the De-Lyte Bite cookies thought they were chewy but yummy, even the finicky eaters. In terms of helping replenish vital minerals in a hard working endurance/distance athlete, a portable, durable cookie is an excellent choice over annoying and messy pre-dosed syringes. They don't crumble or break, taste great, and are a good value for your money if you need electrolytes on the go. Mmmmm tasty!

Official AEC Countdown: 15 Days!

The AECs are now only 15 (almost 14) days away. Gogo has had the past three days off due in large part to a major chiropractic adjustment that she had on Monday. It was a sort of last minute thing, but I am REALLY glad I got it done. Something was telling me she needed this one last little boost to put her fully back on track, and it looks like I was right. Score one for me (score zero for my pocketbook).

Dr. A is seriously awesome. I mean, seriously. Gogo was pretty tired and butt-sore as hell on Monday, which was understandable as it was her first big effort since the Doxy took such a hard toll on her a few weeks ago, and the courses were tough. She had some fill in all four legs despite wraps and poultice the night before, and since she's found she has a right leg after all post hock injections, and is figuring out brand new ways to unload it, her left side needed some major work. In fact, when Dr. A ran his hands down her scapula on her left side, she turned around and almost bit him! Gogo, biting a human! I think that's never happened before in her life, I didn't know she had that in her! Her neck and shoulder were pretty locked up on her left side, so he did some major work there, and various points down her mid to low back needed work as well. Her sore, sore butt had some serious acupuncture and B-vit injections done to it, on both sacral points and on several varying places on her left side including points on her low back and hip triads. Those muscles worked very hard, and while there wasn't much to adjust there, it needed a little love. The part that surprised me was that he needed to adjust her navicular in her RH (I didn't know you could do that!), and that there was some crazy stuff going on in her LF that very easily could have turned into a major injury. Her accessory carpal bone (the big one at the back of the knee) was out of alignment, putting stress on her suspensory. As a result, she was sensitive to palpation there (and I about died when that happened... having lost my last one to a neverending suspensory, it's an evil word to me). Dr. A was quick to calm me though, and said that he would see what we could do chiropractically. As it turned out, once he adjusted her accessory carpal bone, the sensitivity went away. Her navicular was also jammed, so he adjusted that too with his funny chirpractor hammer thing. I was SERIOUSLY relieved and eternally grateful to both him and my funny little intuition - as Dr. A said, a misaligned accessory carpal bone is a common way to stress out - and injure - a suspensory, which I didn't know. To play it safe, we decided to give her the following two days off and to ice, liniment and wrap her. Good news - the following day, I palpated the crap out of that suspensory, and she wasn't sensitive in the slightest to anything I did. She also jogged out sound as could be, and the fill disappeared. I feel as though we may have narrowly avoided something that could have turned into a very bad situation. THANK YOU DR. A SERIOUSLY. As per all the other things he adjusted, she's been standing with her head and neck lower than normal, especially when she wasn't feeling well, and after all that adjusting he did, her head and neck were back to the height she always used to hold it at when she scared non-horsey friends for looking so tall (she's barely 16.1 and a half so looking tall really means something... she's a shrimp compared to everybody else here!). I think she is feeling good and comfortable all over now, given her improved posture, but I'm seriously glad I had that adjustment done. She needed it. It cost a little more than he usually charges me, given the tons of acupuncture he did, but I see it as such - I'm not shelling out $400 for shoes every 6 weeks, so $150 every three months is a good trade off!!

The other really interesting thing he did related to the kinesiology he and his wife do. You can read a little more about the kinesiology he did last time here. (And I like that post because it talks about everything falling into place before Groton House, and how I felt like we were ready to play with the Big Boys there and how we had a good chance of doing well. Yea we did!!) I told him about the Lyme, the Doxy, and the aloe juice, and he asked about her diet. Then he did something I didn't expect - he checked her through the kinesiology to see if each feed was actually agreeing with her GI system. Gogo, as of Monday, was eating 2.0lbs of Gro N' Win (Buckeye's ration balancer) and 1.0lb of Triple Crown's Complete, spread out over 3 meals. The Complete, I told him, was just a source of empty calories and could be replaced with anything. The Gro N' Win was the only important part. He took a handful of the Gro N' Win, placed his cupped hand over her croup, checked the energy through his wife, and found it to be good. He checked the Complete through the same method, and found it to be in disagreeance with her system. We checked the other available grains that we feed that I would consider giving her as a source of empty calories, and found Senior to be in disagreeance as well, but the Safechoice was good (it's a low starch medium fat Nutrena product... even though I'm not too keen on it because it's a "least cost" product, which essentially means that as long as the company gets in the required percentage levels of whatever they promise on the feet bag, they can use whatever ingredients they want to achieve those means. And they can and do change without warning, and from batch to batch of grain. For instance, during the beet pulp shortage? Beet pulp disappeared from it. This isn't something specific to Nutrena, any feed company can be guilty of it. I would TOTALLY chose Nutrena over Purina any day, just so you know, I'm not ragging on them at all!) I wasn't really keen on any of them, but figured I needed to go with the one that agreed with her system. He tested the aloe juice as well, and found that to be fine. I know it sounds REALLY weird, but hey, I believe in a body's energy flow so I think there's something to it.
As it turned out, Shannon had been talking about barley as a product that a woman she used to know swears is great for putting condition and topline on horses, and I've heard similar comments elsewhere. While barley itself doesn't have anything particularly glaring in it that would bulk up a topline (lots of carbs, not too much protein, about 11-13%), and as a stand-alone grain isn't good without other supplementation, we figured that on top of the Gro N' Win, why not? We'll give it a shot and see what it does. As a whole, unprocessed grain (except for being crushed prior to bagging), it's simple on the GI system, it's a decent source of energy, and it's inexpensive. If it doesn't work, we'll just pull it easy as pie. I used to feed Metro barley to go along with his Prime... poor guy needed nearly 15lbs of grain a day and as much hay as I could shove into him to keep condition when he was showing. Gogo, not so much! 3lbs of grain and she's likely going to balloon. I'm keeping my eye on that!

So we'll see what they barley does. It's gotta be better than the Complete, anyway! She is now eating this:
6am: 1 flake grass hay, 0.5lbs Gro N' Win, 0.5lbs crushed barley, sprinkling of electrolytes, DMG, raspberry leaf, 50 Doxycycline
6:30am-12pm: Turnout... as much hay and pasture as she can eat! (If she is for some reason in at 9am or 11am, she'll also get a flake of hay at each. We feed hay 6 times a day)
2pm: 1 flake grass hay
4pm: 1-2 flakes grass hay, 1.0lbs Gro N' Win, 0.5lbs crushed barley, sprinkling of electrolytes, Cosequin ASU, 50 Doxycycline
8pm: 1-2 flakes grass hay, 0.5lbs Gro N' Win, 0.5lbs crushed barley
She also often gets grazed at night on the really good stuff, mmmmmmmm.


We're back to work tomorrow with a nice relaxing hack (or maybe not so relaxing.... she has had three days off, you know!), and then back to dressage Friday and Saturday. Sunday we'll go on our conditioning hack, Monday we'll gallop, and Tuesday-Thursday we're back to dressage. I'd like to get just one last XC session in with her, but we may not be able to swing that. I want somewhere with a nice water complex with banks in and out, and I don't think I'm going to be able to find that with Town Hill now closed. We shall see!


15 days and counting!!!!!!!!!!!!!




(Gogo being a ham after winning a combined test at South Farm last summer.)

Behavior

I admit it, I'm a bit of a behavior Nazi. My horses stop when I stop, back when I back, and walk when I walk, on a loose lead. They stand when I tell them to, and don't move until I tell them to. They stay out of your space unless you invite them in. They don't nibble on anything - people, crossties, nothing at all. Mouthiness is NOT acceptable AT ALL - they don't open their mouths unless I'm putting something in them (yes, I do handfeed treats, and she knows not to ask for them). They stand still when near grass and don't go to eat until they get the word "Okay" from me. They don't paw for food, or while standing on the crossties. They pay attention to me. They open their mouths for the bit and put their heads down into bridles and halters. They stand quietly with their ears forward when being girthed up. And they are my friends. I dictate where their feet go, and they are happy to accept their role as second in command. If I need to reprimand, it is quick, and it is without emotion. I also am quick to reward if they've done the right thing.

I don't understand why it should be any other way, but a lot of the time, it is.


Readers, I want to know - what bad behaviors or manners drive YOU nuts? Since I'm crazy pretty much ALL bad manners drive me bats, but chewing on things and leading poorly top the list, I think. What about you?


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In other, better news, Gogo was an absolute peach today. I only rode for half an hour - I think a new record for getting a good dressage-y ride in a short amount of time - and she was just awesome, right there for me when I picked her up. I didn't canter on a loose rein, just walked and trotted and then picked her up right from there. And there she was! We leg yielded, we lengthened, we serpentined with ease. We did some shallow loops in canter, performed 10m circles to leg yields, and did a few shoulder-ins to 10m circles and back to a bit of haunches in down the long side. Complicated, more along the second level lines, but she understood and did her best. I finished with a perfect square halt, looked at my watch, and was astonished that it had only been 30 minutes. Delightful!

But that was really the big highlight of my day. The rest of it pretty much just sucked. Hopefully tomorrow will be better, but I can't make any guarantees.



The entry for the ENYDCTA/Old Chatham H.T. just went out in the mail tonight. I sent it in electronically on the opening date, and sent out the checks just now. This is the Area 1 Novice Championship show.... who's excited? I'm excited!!

Now, if we could just get these darn clueless owners to behave themselves and to stop getting mad at me for caring about their horses' health... then everything would be sweet.



Gogo showing jumpers a year or so ago, winter '08.



(One final note. There was a rotational fall at Devon last weekend, in a Big Eq class. Everybody's okay, but that's pretty scary. Even in the hunters, as totally harmless as they seem, awful things can happen.)

Snafu

The title of this post doesn't have much to do with anything really. I just like the word 'snafu,' much as I like the words 'jabberwocky' or 'catawampus.'

Yesterday we jumped! It was more of a breath of fresh air for her than an actual school, something other than boring ol' dressage. We did a simple gymnastic, set like this:



The distance was set pretty short for her. She definitely favors the long spot, so exercises like this help her be very tidy and quick with her body, as she must tap the ground pretty cattily and come right back up again. She had one time where she came in a little quick and shimmied through it a little awkwardly, but every time before and after it, she put it together pretty easily. I had Shannon help me put the whole grid together as we steadily warmed up through it, and I also had her put two poles together to form a triangular chute propped up against the top rail of the final vertical. I really like what it did for her straightness and tightness up front. We didn't go for too long - about half an hour - but I felt that she was excellent and saw no need to continue. As Shannon said, she's not a horse that needs to really be schooled per se over fences. She, as this point and at this level, is point and shoot. There isn't enough I can set up at the farm that'll really challenge her. I do want to, in addition to the jumping lessons I'll be taking, set up a few steep slices and a few really narrow skinnies for her, just to see how honest she'll be. She really seems to have grown up over the winter, and she's being more honest on her own than she ever has. Last year, I felt very strongly that I had to be there to hold her hand for her to every fence, and this year I feel like as long as I'm pointing her sort of towards the right fence, she'll take it no matter how we get there. I've been really, really impressed with her.
The other thing I did yesterday that I haven't done in well over a year is jump her in her snaffle. I usually have her in the waterford, but really and truly, she just LOVES that blue plastic bit. She was dead quiet, completely response, and took a half-halt like you don't know. Maybe I was just being softer, but seriously, I think that's as responsive as she's ever been to a rein aid while jumping. I'm not about to go gallop XC in the thing, but man, blue plastic bit is my friend right now!

Today, more boooooooooooring dressage! Or well, that's how she sees it :) Gogo actually came out feeling AMAZING and completely responsive RIGHT off the bat, and was giving me awesome trotwork and leg yields right from when I first picked her up. I thought about just getting off and calling it a day, but I went on to work more. And, of course, the more we worked, the hotter she became. And she got HOT. Not sure exactly what happened, but wow, she was HOT AS HELLFIRE by the time we were nearing the end. Our second canter was, in fact, a large disaster, although for some reason this didn't really bother me. She was racing around a 20m circle completely inverted, flinging her head in my face, completely in gallop mode for whatever reason. I just sort of sat chilly and waited... and waited... and waited. Finally, she quieted down and gave me something resembling a quiet circle, and I went back to trot and cantered the other way, which was much better. Much, much better, actually. I dunno if her brain just finally settled down or what, but after that, we did a little more nice quiet trotwork and called it a day on a perfect halt. Mares!

This is the eternal dilemma with a pretty fit event horse like mine. It might be only Novice but the fitter she gets, the hotter she gets. I wonder how confusing it can get for her doing everything in the plastic snaffle. She now hacks, gallops, does dressage AND jumps in it, which is great and kind of bad at the same time. She has no real way to differentiate between what we're doing based on tack alone - and she's the kind of horse that would definitely know what different bits mean. I don't ask her to come round while galloping, as I want her to have her own head for balance, and while actually doing a course I don't bother to mess with her head while I'm jumping either. Hacking is usually done on the buckle or a loose rein. This is the other problem - I'm working all sets of muscles, the bad ones included. I'm no fool to think that all this dressage is going to eliminate her ewe neck, especially when her natural balances lies within a high head carriage. I'm not going to fight nature when she needs to balance that way. Her neck looks awesome for her right now, but in the grand scheme of things, it's a pretty unimpressive neck. We do what we can, and I try my hardest to make sure she knows a distinct difference between everything we're doing. King Oak was proof enough that if you leave her alone, she'll go there on her own. Home is for trying to school her through that mindset. Dressage is slowly and steadily becoming more of a conversation between the two of us as opposed to me quietly hoping she'll decide to play the game that day. Now, I feel as though I can ask her a little, and while she'll have moments where she's not totally connected, she'll go where I ask her to go, and she'll take my corrections instead of fighting them, although sometimes it's with a grain of salt. I like this new direction.


And... um.... Gogo's fat. I mean really, I look at her and go oh man. Fattie. I tried and tried to tell everyone here that she's an easy keeper, and nobody believed me until now. I put a little weight on her over the winter seeing she was on the thin side after the long trip out here, and that seems to have backfired as now she won't LOSE the weight! I've cut out all the Ultium except for a tiny cup of it at nightcheck just to give her a little something along with everyone else, and she's now eating 2lbs a day of the Triple Crown 30% ration balancer, which I actually don't think I like much, and about 10 flakes of okay-ish quality hay. Not sure what else I can cut out, as she's at the low end of the Triple Crown's recommended poundage for a horse doing her kind of work! I MAY have found somewhere to get Gro N' Win though.... here's hoping that works out!! I thought about putting her on Platinum Performance instead of the ration balancer, but I'm pretty sure she won't be getting all the protein she needs on that system. Nothing replaces a quality ration balancer in my book.





Vroom vroom!!

Wild Woman!

It's been one week since our huge distaster on the lunge, and seeing as it's Wednesday and lunge day, I figured it was time to revisit the issue. Since my chambon is obviously broken, I asked if Vicki had one I could borrow, and she did. Well, it's NOT the same as my own - hers is a piece of string with a nylon strap attached to it. That's it. I had to use double-ended snaps to clip it to my surcicle, that's how barebones the whole thing was. But at the same time, I liked how it didn't have any give. Going to the left anyway.

Yes, going to the left Gogo was quite exceptional. She was almost exceptional going to the right too, but given the fact that she didn't go outside today due to the HUGE ICE STORM that dumped sleet on us all day, she was feeling a little uppity and made a huge leap into the canter near the end of the workout, just because she was fresh. (This was the direction she panicked going last week, I might add.) She hit the chambon, which was NOT forgiving like mine is, and totally lost it for a minute - bolted straight backwards with mouth agape against it and almost fell over, then galloped off for a few panicked laps around me before I could drag her into the middle of my circle to stop her (there were no downward transitions in this runaway moment, I just had to figure out a way to stop!). I stopped her, lowered her head, stood there and let her chill out for a few minutes, then walked and trotted again. And we did BIG TROT... big, worried trot. We also did some big, worried canter, but after a few minutes of quiet transitions, she settled into it a little better, and calmed down. I just wanted to make sure she was relaxed and not thinking about last week's incident, or whatever else she was thinking about that was worrying her, and we finally got a few good sneezes and a loose and swinging back, if only for a few ending minutes. Back in the barn, when I went to pick the arena dirt out of her feet, I found that in her moment of panic, she had ripped one of her back ergots clean off... CLEAN OFF! In its place was a big, raw, open fleshy area that was not bloody but definitely oozy. Oh Gogo....

These moments of hotness, irrationality and flight behavior are really cropping up as of late. In all honesty, I think I really have to be downright honest and blame the Ultium for it. I LOVE how she looks on the Ultium. I LOVE how her topline is filling out. I do NOT love that this is a really high-octane feed and is definitely contributing to her irrational acting out. She's a wild thing and always has been, that's for sure, but she's REALLY been acting out rather violently when something worries her or she doesn't understand something. I mean tonight, just for that brief time, she REALLY blew up. She almost ripped my arm off tearing away from the pressure on her mouth and poll. And she's been HOT lately. REALLY, REALLY HOT. I like the forward energy, I just don't like the explosions that seem to be coming with it.

But here's the other problem. WHAT kind of grain would I switch her to? Do I even want to switch at all? Will she calm down in the summer when it's hotter? Will she be wilder? Is she too fit? Is she not getting enough work? Is it this, is it that? I don't know.


Tomorrow, dressage. Friday, dressage. Saturday, off. Sunday, JUMPIE!


Lazy, lazy lunger.

Your girl, she's a renegade, a hurricane that keeps you there safe...

Not horse related: everyone in the world should go download the song "Look Up" by Stars. Because I said to. Because it's so wonderful it makes me cry.



So anyway. Dover FAILS! Remember when I said something about ordering a sheet that never turned up? Well, it turned up. It's been in the Lake Erie College mailroom for two months, just chillin'. WHY they sent it THERE is a million miles beyond me. I haven't lived on campus for three years now, and I KNOW I've ordered other stuff from Dover since then.

My schedule seems to be fussy on Mondays sometimes... meaning it changes when I don't mean it to. It's generally supposed to be a dressage day, but it NEVER seems to end up being one, or at least a successful once. Sundays are jump days, because all the clients that come that can't seem to steer around jumps aren't around on Sundays, but this particular Sunday all of the jump standards were PLOWED IN by the snowplow guy. Literally, plowed in. Gone. So covered with snow that you couldn't see them. I should have gotten a picture of the enormous mound of snow covering them. The other thing on Sunday was the fact that Vicki was doing a Pony Club clinic - a MILLION Pony Club kids and their hairy little ponies trailered in and took dressage lessons with her all day. This clinic ended at 4pm, which was lame because on Sundays I get off of work between 2:30-3pm. So instead, I went on a conditioning hack out on the roads for an hour. I wanted to go for two hours originally, but the gorgeous day disintegrated pretty rapidly once I was out there, and with the incoming clouds came a huge plummet in temperature. I did about 10 minutes of trotting, mostly in an effort to keep both of us from freezing to death! Winter needs to be over, seriously. I'm not totally sure about trotting around on paved roads for any length of time either. I don't really know what kinds of hurt this can cause in the barefoot horse, but I personally have felt the shin splits I get from jogging/walking on pavement for any long period of time, so hm.

Monday was supposed to be a dressage day, like I said, but once again it did not end up working out that way. Instead, Elisa (who actually owns the jump standards) went and dug them all out with a shovel, and declared Monday night jump night for the week. And I said what the hell, me too! The problem with jumping with these two is that they have a four year-old and a horse coming back from an injury, so the only thing they set up was a crossrail with a pole before it and after it (set up for the trot) and a tiny square oxer with a pole before and after it. Boring. The distance they set the oxer up for was confusing to Gogo at first, and not set for a horse with an enormous stride and a hot head, and she flailed through it a couple of times before finally putting it together. She and I really need to do some more complicated gymnastics, because things like this aren't helping.

And today we had a dressage lesson, which actually went quite well. She started off very relaxed for a change, then became more up and tense as we started to work on more complicated things. It's becoming increasingly obvious... sometimes, my horse really just does NOT take a half-half well. Sometimes, a half-half just causes her to drop her back, disengage her hind end, and crank her neck in and up, which is just an ugly feeling and an ugly picture. But when she's totally through (and I mean she has to be TOTALLY through), half-halts go through to her and compress her quite nicely. I guess that's exactly how everything is with her though.. done at the wrong time and it's a disaster, done at the right time and it's brilliant. Gogo, can't you ever be mediocre? Anyway, we attempted to challenge her with an exercise that really unfortunately got the best of her at the trot, but that she finally understood at the walk. We started going down the long side in shoulder-in, let the shoulder-in come off the rail and into the second track, and then bring the shoulder-in back onto the track with the positioning still there - sort of thinking about it like doing a reinback in shoulder in, so that the haunches are still the first thing that make it back to the track. It REALLY engages the outside hind leg, and encourages the horse to really take the outside rein. This was WAY too much backwards thinking for Gogo however, who, in her Gogo way, panicked about it and threw herself around for awhile in an attempt to escape my outside rein. We slowed it down to the walk and tried again, and she continued to be a bit panicky about it until she finally got one or two really good steps of it, and with a lot of hearty praise suddenly realized that she understood what I was asking and could do it perfectly. Mares! That's just how she is though - if you introduce something new it really needs to be in bite-size chunks, or else she doesn't understand and completely acts out against it. And the second she makes a step in the right direction, you HAVE to tell her she's done the right thing, because she instantly relaxes when she realizes you aren't going to snatch her in the face or rip on her or whip her or whatever other number of horrible things she's had done to her in the past that these fearful responses must trigger in memory. Patience, patience, patience. And then, after we finished with that exercise, I just went off and did transitions between all three gaits. A million of them. It's good to end with something simple that she knows well, that gives her confidence to do. And they were AMAZING, and the quality of her gaits was AMAZING. We finished with that, and a few more textbook shoulder-ins. She felt SO good at the end. I love ending a ride with that.

Gogo is a brave horse. She's not a nervous, flighty animal, not in ANY sense. She really just does have moments of total panic under saddle related entirely to memory, I think. Not to mention she is totally prone to fits of belligerence. God, but she's been hot here. Hot, hot, HOT! I really think the Ultium has a lot to do with it. It really just is a high octane feed.


Tomorrow, we're going to see if we can dig up a chambon and revisit the lunging incident from last week. And trust me, I've learned my lesson... if this new chambon breaks, LESSON OVER!


By the way, I got an e-mail today with a link to an article about biotin. Being as OBSESSED with feeding the hoof as I am, I found it super informative and think you all should go read it too.

A Big Hodgepodge of Things

There was a whole bunch of stuff I meant to blog about this week but did not, so I'm attempting to get a jump on that and remember all the little blurbs of stuff I had in my head....

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1) Gogo had her 4th trim this week, on Monday specifically. It was nice because I had ridden her out on the pavement, so she wore her feet down a little for me already! It was a hair over two weeks, and I have to say I much prefer the two week schedule to the three week schedule. I'm getting better and better at this! Once again, I didn't ever manage to get any really good pictures, but I have a few decent ones.





It's becoming fairly easy to wield the tools now that I'm building a bit of muscle memory about it. By the way, her cracks look AWESOME. They aren't going anywhere anytime soon, I don't think, but they look very tight right now and as long as I keep touching up the roll there's no reason for me to believe that they won't stay tight. I've been reading about Pete Ramey's special soaks he does for horses with chronic cracks... perhaps I shall look into this more and maybe give it a try. Or maybe try the tea tree oil thing that was suggested to me....


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2) Supplements. Supplements are always an interesting topic to me, as is anything relating to nutrition. Currently, Gogo is getting regular Cosequin and Mare Magic as her two oral supplements, which I get from Smartpak. I LOVE Smartpak, and I'll totally keep using it if my other plans don't work out, but I was thinking about both supplements and wondering if I should change them.
Mare Magic is red raspberry leaf in a pretty package. That's all it is. And it REALLY helps. It's not something that prevents mares from coming into heat. What it DOES do it make her heats much more tolerable and much less crampy for her - she stays loose and giving in her back, whereas before she'd hold a lot of tension just behind the saddle, and it also keeps her head MUCH more level during that 'special' time.. lol. Mare Magic, in monthly Smartpaks, is $10.95 a month. Now, that doesn't sound so bad, right? But think of it this way: the actual bags of Mare Magic are either 8oz ($19.95) or 32oz ($55.95). There are 16oz to a pound, so that's half a pound and two pounds. Online, you can buy bulk red raspberrry lead (the kind you make tea out of) for between $9-10 for a pound. 32oz is supposed to last 240 days... so 16oz would last about four months. Which equates to about $2.50 a month. $2.50 a month or $10.95 a month.... well, that's easy. Buy bulk, screw Mare Magic.
Regular Cosequin is good stuff. It's REALLY good stuff. Now, however, they have a new product on the market called Cosequin ASU, which I keep hearing is a far superior product. Directly from that website: "Cosequin ASU goes above and beyond the traditional glucosamine/chondroitin sulfate products on the market. Cosequin ASU contains NMX1000™* avocado/soybean unsaponifiables (ASU) formulated with FCHG49®* glucosamine hydrochloride and TRH122®* low molecular weight chondroitin sulfate. Plus the addition of high purity MSM! This sets Cosequin ASU apart from any other joint health supplement for horses. And all in a tasty, easy to administer powder!" Cosequin ASU is also more than double the price of regular Cosequin. Hm. The options here are to find it really cheap somewhere and buy it in bulk (not huge amounts of bulk, just enough bulk to save money), OR to try another product I'm interested in: Promotion EQ. Go read that website... does that not sound too good to be true? You get a FULL money back guarantee if you're not satisfied, so what do you have to lose? I recently talked to someone in person who is a total believer - had a very lame mare with stifle issues who had been on Cosequin for many years and was still lame, to the point where they were going to euthanize her. She put her on Promotion EQ, and within a few weeks, the mare was running around the pasture. She no longer drags her toes, and she's not lame (not rideable either, but not in pain). So I'm very interested in that! I don't think it currently comes in Smartpaks though, so that's the other problem. If it doesn't come in Smartpaks, and I'm not going to use Mare Magic anymore, well.... sorry Smartpak.

What I'm going to do I think it order one more Smartpak, and then next month order some Promotion EQ and bulk raspberry leaf. I reaaaaaaaally love the ease of Smartpaks, but..... well......


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3) I am very angry right now at Dover. In November I ordered a sheet for Gogo, and.... well, it's January and no sheet. I finally was like, all right, this is ridiculous, and I hunted for hours to find all the tracking codes and things to see where the package ended up (or didn't end up). THEY SHIPPED IT TO OHIO. IN NOVEMBER. I did NOT put Ohio as my shipping address... I put Michigan!!!!!!!!! So right now Dover is on my shit list, and I shall have to call them and yell at them. On the other hand, isn't that sheet pretty in ice blue?


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4) I cannot wait for the summer months to come. Why? Because there are some awesome clients here who keep saying things like, "oh you want to go conditioning? I know ALL the places to go, I'll totally go with you, I'm not afraid to gallop!" and "Hey want to go swim your horse in the ocean with us? We go every year, it's great!" And one more thing: "Hey, Heidi White is coming for a clinic, want to go with us? You can stable with us for free at my friend's house!" NO WAY! I totally want to go to the Heidi White clinic. I've heard she is refreshing, insightful, kind, and really intelligent, and breaks down exercises carefully so each rider has success at them. The clinic is in June, which works out perfectly because I have no shows at ALL in June... sweet!


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5) Dude. My grandmother called me the other day and was like, "I know you're poor and you want to horseshow. How much money do you want."

AWESOME. More on that later.

Mouthwash A Go-Go

Hmmmmmmm. Well, Gogo's week obviously hasn't been quite the week I had planned for the start of a new year. The week went something like this:

Sunday: Very small jumping exercises: 3 tight bounces (trot in) set at only about a foot high, two canter poles with three strides inbetween them, one tiny 2' vertical with a really, really long approach (worked on putting as many strides as humanly possibly in to it, and halting immediately afterwards quietly). She was very hot, but by the end was well behaved. I was getting sick and was exhausted. Hacked out for a few minutes after the lesson, saw Reba in the field and almost had a heartattack. Think we need to CUT THAT GRAIN. TOO MANY CALORIES.

Monday: I was sick in bed with the flu, or at least we think that's what it was. I literally slept for almost 36 hours nonstop. I didn't even see her at all on Monday!

Tuesday: Given yesterday's unintentional day off and my still being horribly ill (but still working in a cold, damp barn anyway, which is wrong on so many levels), I decided to lunge her in the chambon. Well, her little bits of head fussiness from last week were REALLY violent - she was even trying to strike at her own face with her front legs, and then bolting off, as well as doing the tongue funkiness and the mouth gaping. The lunge was entierly unproductive, and I finally just got one quiet circle out of her and stopped. It wasn't her fault that she was behaving poorly, something was really bothering her.

Wednesday: Tried something to try and determine if it was arena synthetic dustiness or bitting that was bothering her - put her on a lunge line in a halter and lunged her. She was a bit exessively high in her headcarriage (maybe a little moreso than usual) but I saw her twitch her head in a very small way only twice, so....

Thursday: Took a LOVELY walk hack down the road for about 40 minutes... sadly ran out of time for more than that. She was HOT and JOYFULLY WIRED. I mean, I've never seen her marching THAT forward anywhere! She was jittery and jumpy too, but still very well behaved, aside from starting at every little thing there was to start at. We finished the ride with a trot back up the hill to the farm driveway, and that settled her very well. She's just so much fun to hack out.... she's always, always, always under control on a loose rein. She might start at something for a moment when she's feeling this fresh, but she never goes anywhere when startled, and she always just walks on afterwards.

The head weirdness is still unresolved though... she didn't do it ONCE when we were hacking out, and instead of a hackamore I had her regular loose ring in, just to see what she would do. Which makes it look more like it COULD be synthetic dust irritation-ness? But, then again, we didn't do more than walk, and trot for like two minutes.

Well, the plan is I'm going to take a one or two hour hack again today (preferrably two, but it's definitely only 18 degrees out there right now and that's kinda coooooold) just because it's supposed to be a gorgeous day and I think it will be so good for her brain. She was SO HAPPY when we finished with our ride yesterday. She's such an amazing horse to ride out, she really is. Part of me is excited for when she's an oldie retired from competition and regular riding, because she is going to be the best trail horse EVER. And tomorrow, I'm going to ride her in the ring again, just to see if there's any difference in the head stuff. Hopefully, it will have passed on.

About the irritation bits... well, I got in there and got a better look at them, and.... they don't seem to actually be irritations. They're not sores, they're not open or anything, and they DON'T hurt, which is weird. I poked and pressed at them as hard as I could and got nothing out of her, so maybe they're NOT causing this head weirdness after all. Agh. Weird.

I can't decide if I want to body clip her again this weekend, or next. She's got a layer of re-grown in fluff that she pretty much grew in the week after I clipped her for the first time! I want to get a good picture of her after a clip and a clean-up job (not that she's actually dirty) so you can all see her current BCS. I like what the Ultium has done for her, I think. She's put on a good amount of weight... almost too much, really - but her topline looks better than usual. And Gogo, being the Ewe-Necked Wonder really could use all the help she gets with her topline, because proper riding apparently just isn't enough for her. I cut her grain yesterday too, and it pains me to say this, but I have absolutely no idea what the poundage is. I hate not weighing feed. It's meant to be fed in pounds. How on earth can you be accurate with it if you're not going to feed it the way it is supposed to be fed. She was on 4.5 quarts before, which maybe was around 6lbs.... maybe. That was my rough guess, anyway. She's now on 3 quarts.... so who the hell knows what THAT equals? At least I have my security blanket of my ration balancer that she's still on. At least I know she's getting her base of vits and mins.


Quarts = bad.
Not weighing grain = bad.
My hot, high horse on too much Ultium = bad.
Not knowing what the poundage of her daily grain intake is = bad.
Mouth weirdness = bad.
Not getting her proper workouts in this week = bad.

Getting a good snuffle in my hair every time I go over to say hello to her = all worth it.

Ration Balancers

Because I am such a nutrition freak, I thought I might talk a little bit this morning (I slept in til 6:30AM!!!!!) about ration balancers, and their place in my life. A ration balancer is a lot like a vitamin-mineral supplement for your horse that also has the added benefit of protein and additional calories that a regular vitamin-mineral supplement doesn't have. They are usually fed to balance the nutritional content of a horse's total ration (daily hay, grain, pasture) and are meant to address whatever nutritional imbalances one might have - for instance, an easy keeper getting a few handfuls of a pelleted feed that is meant to be feed in high poundage amounts will have a diet lacking in nutrients. Feed companies design their feeds to be fed in specific amounts because those specific amounts, if fed correctly, will (or well, should) give your horse all of their daily vitamin-mineral requirements. Most "complete feeds" are fortified with all the vitamins and minerals that your horse needs, so if you are feeding at least the minimum recommended amount, your horse is covered. However, many people don't feed that much fortified grain, often because it provides way too many calories for their horse, or because they don't understand the idea of vits-mins per pound of feed. There are tons of horsepeople in this world - this barn for instance - who feed a quart of this sweet feed, or half a coffee can of that pellet. There isn't enough nutrition in a few ounces of a complete feed to come even remotely close to meeting a horse's daily nutritional needs. This is especially evident in the Northeast here, where supposedly most of the hay is deficient in selenium. Ration balancers differs from a vitamin-mineral supplement in the amount of protein and calories that they add to a horse's diet and the amount you feed: rather than giving your horse just a few ounces, as you would in a regular vit-min supplement, you generally feed 1-2 pounds of a ration balancer. This is an excellent solution for an easy keeper or a metabolic horse, like that horse I was just chatting about a few sentences up that is getting a handful of the grain that is meant to be fed in high poundage amounts - Fatso gets 1-2lbs of grain instead of 8-10lbs of grain, and still gets all his vits-mins and protein requirements in for the day. Ration balancers are super mineral, vitamin and protein packed, so technically they are a top dress, and NOT an actual feed. A word of warning: Don't feed this higher amounts of ration balancer if your horse isn't maintaining his condition on it! If you feed more than the daily recommended poundage of a ration balancer to your horse, not only are you going to be way overloading their system with vits-mins, but you are going to be bucked off into the rafters when all that excess protein hits your horse's system. Protein is a very poor energy source compared to fats or carbs, but horses do need high quality amino acids every day (especially evident visually in the haircoat, hooves, and muscle tone), so excess protein either gets burned up as energy or peed out. Most ration balancers come in varying high protein levels - for example, Buckeye's Gro N' Win is a 32% protein, compared to something like a regular pelleted feed, which comes in 10%, 12%, or 14% options. A lot of ration balancers can also come in lower protein levels - Purina, for example, makes a 30% and a 12%. What you choose to feed depends on the quality of and protein level in your forage. (Remember: don't be scared away by the fact that the protein levels may look ridiculously high! Remember that you are feeding only a small amount of a 32% protein ration balancer, whereas you typically must feed several pounds of a 12% or 14% pellet to deliver the same nutritional punch. For example, if you are feeding hay or pellets with a 10% protein content, you would need to feed 15 pounds for your horse to get 1.5 pounds of protein per day.) Every horse has different daily protein requirements - growing horses, mature horses in heavy work, idle maintenance horses, minis, easy keepers, hard keepers, etc.

In short: a ration balancer is a nutrient-dense, high protein top dress grain (not a complete feed) meant to deliver all of a horse's daily vit-min requirements in a small, lower-calorie quantity, versus a large-poundage, higher-calorie complete feed. (I'm using the term "complete feed" very loosely.... technical complete feeds are designed to be fed with or without hay, if you have a horse that, for whatever reason, cannot consume hay.) Ration balancers deliver, in a 1-2lb package, all of your horse's daily vits-mins, and some protein and calories too.

Another direct quote found on the internet somewhere:
"So does feeding a ration balancer completely eliminate the need for other vitamin/mineral supplements? It depends on the quality of your hay or whether you are still feeding some fortified feed. The best way to build a completely balanced diet for your horse is to start by analyzing your hay, supplement to correct vitamin and mineral deficiencies, ensure that your horse has an overall protein intake of about 10% -12% and then add calories to maintain weight if necessary. For those of us who have limited storage capacity and a changing supply of hay, that’s impractical. Your mileage may vary depending on what else you feed."

And that's the ideal thing to do - test your hay, find our what your horse is missing, and supplement that way. Pete Ramey has an awesome article on it: Feeding the Hoof. Very unfortunately for someone like me, this is really not ideal at the moment, but if/when I ever have my own place and can dictate where I get my own hay from (that isn't changing all the time), I'll be able to follow this.

What I did when I was in Ohio was this: my mare was VERY fat when I first got her, so in order to correct that, I had her on 2lbs of Gro N' Win daily, and around 10 flakes of THE best quality grass hay money can buy. This was all she needed in terms of calories, protein, and vits-mins to maintain her body condition at around a 6 or so (slightly heavier than ideal, but at some point there was nothing I could cut out of her diet anymore and still ensure that she was getting everything she needed!). During the eventing season, when our hay and pasture changed and she lost weight, all she needed was an added fat supplement top dress grain called Ultimate Finish, which is fed in very small poundages as well (.5-1lbs daily). Fats are an excellent addition to an already balanced diet that just needs additional calories.

The ideal world for me? An exact-poundage, high-quality ration balancer fed in accordance to the recommended poundage needed for an 1100lb horse in moderate-heavy work (1.5-2.5lbs), free-choice excellent (and I mean EXCELLENT) quality grass hay, and a high-quality fat supplement (.5-1lbs) on top of this if my horse could not maintain her condition and needed additional calories.

(This is what I mean by excellent quality grass hay - that the whole bale looks like this:)

(ALL LEAF! NO STEM! :) 2/3 of the protein and 3/4 of the calories in grass hay is found in the leaf!)

My current situation? 10-14 flakes of fairly low quality (sometimes decent quality) hay, 1lb of Purina's Enrich 32 ration balancer (which I personally think is the lowest quality RB out of the Big 3: Buckeye, Purina, Triple Crown), 6lbs of Purina's Ultium (highest-end Purina grain). She's maintaining her condition - she's adding more muscle as well, or so it seems, which she needed to because she was dropping weight again. When she was in Ohio on the great diet, her weight never really fluctuated and she always looked awesome.... sigh.

And like I said, not all ration balancers are created equally. I found this SUPER AWESOME AMAZING Ration Balancer Comparison Chart online, and as it turns out, it looks like Buckeye is the best offered after all.

Very Handy Ration Balancer Comparison Chart
(By the way, the Purina ration balancer is no longer called Born to Win.. it's Enrich 32 now. Same product, different name.)


I'm interested to see what the longer term effects of the Purina products are. Because 2lbs of Gro N' Win and 1lb of Ultimate Finish is WAY different from 1lb of Enrich 32 and 6lbs of Ultium, and I definitely DON'T like where this looks to be heading. Unfortunately, it's difficult to afford buying my own grain right now as a super poor working student/groom, and Vicki offers some pellets, some sweet feed, and some Ultium, so... that's what I went with temporarily.

But you better believe I'll still be supplementing with a ration balancer, unless she goes up to the full 8lbs required daily for a horse her size and with her workload. And the day my easy keeper needs that is the day I shoot myself in the head.

I also wonder if her feet will change. I had a recent revelation about biotin - a horse has a daily requirement of 1-2g, and Buckeye feeds are all fortified with additional biotin. Purina products are not - which means Gogo is no longer getting any sort of additional biotin. BUT, biotin is a water-soluble B-vitamin (actually used to be known as Vitamin H, I didn't know this!), so a horse is actually manufacturing it herself (in the horse, B-vitamins are synthesized in the hindgut). So TECHNICALLY a horse with high-quality hooves shouldn't need additional biotin supplementation, because she is already making it herself. BUT, a lot of factors go into why a horse may or may not be able to absorb all of its nutrients consumed and produced... hell, if you let the tractor idle too long in the barn aisle, the fumes can negatively effect the absorption of biotin (and other things.... not to mention the other 9 billion things wrong with letting a tractor idle in a barn aisle). Supposedly high-quality lysine is the big deal with Purina's feeds, but I was under the impression that methionine is more important for high-quality hooves... oh amino acids. Flax seed also has biotin in it naturally.... I didn't know that either.

We'll see when she grows a full new foot in whether or not there's been any change. She's pretty resilient, and so is her body, so it'll be interesting to see if there's any change at all with this new feed regimen (let's just hope there's not.)

Off to handwalk the beast on our day off.... I'll blog about changes in schedules and flexibility next!

Baby's First Tummyache

UGH!!! Well my plan for tonight was to come online and blog about how much I hate giving a bran mash once a week in place of a meal, but before I could do so I headed out to do night check at 8 (they got their mash at around 5). Now I can add one more reason to why I hate bran mashes - they make my horse sick!!

Why do I loathe said once-a-week big, warm, mushy mashes? Because the horse's digestive system is SENSITIVE. When we feed them one type of forage or grain and keep it steady, their systems adjust properly to it - the proper hindgut flora adapt to that type of forage and flourish and can easy and efficiently break down all the nutrients available to them. Their flora ADAPT to those types of forage and grain, and the whole sytem is happy and in balance. Well, in comes once-a-week dinnertime bran mash, and the gut flora go HOLY CRAP! What the hell is this stuff, I'm not used to this!! and freak out, thus producing the commonly seen diarrhea. Bran's tendency is to irritate the bowl linings. In order to have an actual laxative effect, you would have to feed HUUUUUUUUUUUUUGE quantities of it, and we just don't feed that much, so the idea that giving a bran mash once a week has a good laxative effect on a horse is just RUBBISH. He's pooping out water because you've just trashes his good gut flora! Now they have to readjust again because you threw them all out of whack! By the way, feeding bran daily over a long period of time can actually contribute to the formation of enteroliths, which are SO much fun. And don't think that a bran mash encourages gut motility - there is NO scientific evidence to prove it. AND do you really think that if your horse is getting plenty of forage that a bran mash is going to give him some much-needed fiber? Hello - hay IS fiber! You're not helping him by giving him a bran mash - give him some more hay!

Another thing about bran mashes: the calcium-phosphorus ratio. Calcium and phosphorus, as you know, work together to build bones and help muscles work correctly, BUT they need to be absorbed in correct proportions, which varies for growing horses versus adult horses. If there's not enough calcium to match the phosphorus in a bran-fed horse's daily feed, his body will pull extra calcium from his bones in order to balance the excess phosphorus in his gut, and that is not so good! If a horse gets too much phosphorus over too long a period, his body will take so much calcium from the bones that it can weaken the skeleton and leads to bone disorders. By the way, grass hays contain the exact ratio of calcium to phosphorus that horses need, versus wheat bran and rice bran contain - which contain about 10 times too much phosphorus, on a per pound basis. Don't get me going on alfalfa either.

So what's the moral here? If you feed a fair quantity of bran a day (or worse, in place of other grains and forages), then your horse's hindgut flora WILL be adjusted to it - but your calcium-phosphorus ratios will be WAY screwed up. If you feed a once-weekly large bran mash instead of a meal, you won't have calcium-phosphorus issues, but you WILL kill off a bunch of good gut flora, which can lead to digestive issues. Would you ever do this to your horse: "Hi Spot, you get 2 lbs of Gro N' Win (Buckeye ration balancer) a day, therefore once a week I will give you 5 lbs of Ultium (higher-end Purina feed) with warm water to get more water into you/have a laxative effect on you/warm you up/increase gut motility." NEVER. Because we KNOW how sensitive a horse's digestive system is. So WHY do people think bran is exempt from this? Giving a big bran mash is EXACTLY like giving several pounds of a different feed that the horse is not adjusted to. We watch the changes in our hay, we are careful to give the exact amounts of X grain (and make sure that it is the correct type of whatever grain is in the feed room) but we STILL think that bran mash is somehow in a special non-tummyache-causing category of its own? WRONG. A once-weekly bran mash constitutes an abrupt change in a horse's diet - so no wonder they get the runny poops and the achey tummies.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So that was the ORIGINAL post. Here's what I have to add to it:

In the two and a half years I've owned her, Gogo has NEVER even ONCE had a tummyache or digestive problem in her life. We even had her scoped for ulcers when she dropped a ton of weight this summer (the barn manager was starving her, but we didn't know that at the time, we thought she might have ulcers) but even then, her digestive system was in prime working order. I attribute this mostly to a lot of exercise, time to be a horse, large amounts of good quality grass hay, and minimal amounts of fortified grain. Every change I've ever made to her feed was made over the course of at least two weeks. Gogo has never, ever had a bran mash in her entire life, until tonight. The kids working today were like, here's Gogo's mash!, and it was rather huge, which bothered me a little. I let them give it to her against my better judgement, and figured I would come back at nightcheck and give her her actual grain dinner myself.

Nightcheck comes (a few hours after her bran mash), and I go out to toss hay. I toss Gogo hers, and then look in on her a few minutes later - she's ignoring her hay and covered in shavings, and her stall is a right mess. As I watch, she paws, gets down and rolls, then gets up, gets back down, gets up, and by the time I get in her stall with her halter she's down again. GREAT. Her first EVER tummyache - I can only attribute it to the bran mash. I pulled her out, take her TPR - it's totally normal, thankfully. HR is 36bmp, temp is 100.3, RR is 12bmp, totally normal and fine. Gave her a dose of banamine, off we go into the arena to walk, where she proceeded to chuck herself on the ground twice, once to roll until I got her back up, and once to lay flat out on her side for a few very long minutes while I knelt down and stroked her face. She decided to get up, and was much better after that - we walked until a good half-hour had passed, until I was sure the banamine was kicking in. Brushed the arena mess off of her, tossed her blankie back on, and put her back in her stall, where she sighed, took a long pee, and started snuffling around for the hay scraps leftover (took the other hay out of her stall). I was out there for another 10 minutes with her, and she seems to be totally fine. That was a good half-hour ago - I'm going out in a few minutes to check on her again.

UGH.



SO. In conclusion:

Myth #1: Bran mash warms my horse up.
Truth: Temporarily, in the same way a mug of hot coffee warms you up. A better option is to give the horse some more hay - much better all around for them. A byproduct from digesting forage is HEAT - hence why we feed horses extra hay in the winter. By merely consuming extra hay, their bodies are internally heating themselves from the inside.

Myth #2: Bran mash gets much-needed fiber into my horse.
Not really. HAY gets much-needed fiber into your horse, or haylage, or pasture, etc. If your horse is getting enough daily forage, a bran mash is of no benefit in terms of additional fiber.

Myth #3: Bran mash gets much-needed water into my horse, especially in the cold winter months.
Truth: Well, technically, yes. However, a much better option, if you really are worried about it, is to wet your horse's grain. Same benefits, without destroying any healthy hindgut flora.

Myth #4: Bran mash has a laxative effect.
Absolutely no scientific evidence supporting this theory. Also, if it WERE to have a laxative effect, you'd have to feed WAY more than your horse could EVER consume. Your horse can have diarrhea the next day because you have, in effect, just killed off his healthy host of hindgut flora. A once-weekly bran mash is a very abrupt change in a horse's diet, and those hindgut bacteria thrive on a steady, unchanging environment.

What to do instead? Lots of hay, and wetting your horse's grain - much, much better options.


DAMN YOU, BRAN MASH.

Gogo, A History (Part II, 2007)

Apparently I am in the blogging mood tonight. I'm actually just part excited to have a blog, and part stalling because I really need to start packing for my move to CT. I'm currently in MI at my parents' house temporarily while I'm prepping to make the move. I just got a groom job at a very nice dressage barn with some great people. I get an apartment, a stall with full training board, AND a salary on top of that... sweet! I'm looking forward to actually being in training with someone for the first time ever since I've had Gogo. Our dressage scores are always good, but I want them to get better. I also want... well, there's a lot I want. This post isn't about that!

Anyway, back to where we left off. New Zealand! It was an amazing journey. My roommate of the past four years also went with me, and I couldn't have asked for a better travel buddy. I didn't get to ride much when I was there, but we did take a couple rather terrifying flat-out galloping trail rides through the En-Zed brush. I have about 83727495934729299492021910 amazing pictures from all the tramping we did, but I'll just leave you with one of my many favorites:

Wow. And by wow, I mean HOLY FREAKING GOD. It really was the trip of a lifetime. We saw (and tramped in) all 14 national parks, and it ain't easy getting to them. I remember fording an actual river with a rental car once to get to one outside of Wanaka, and then driving through cattle pasture after cattle pasture over cattle grates... on the way back, we actually got stuck IN a herd of cattle while we were driving the car. New Zealand style rush hour...

Back to Gogo. Well, I didn't hear much from my mother, who promised to send me updates all the time. She is extremely non-horsey (this is the woman who told me that it was very important to do a pre-purchase Metro, "in case he's caught founder."), so her updates weren't helpful. I heard things like "she's learning to not be a princess" and "switched from Gro N' Win to Safe and Easy." First off, WE were paying for her grain, and I TOLD her to leave her on the ration balancer. What did she do? Switch her almost immediately without my permission. From 2 lbs of Gro N' Win to 8 lbs of Safe and Easy. WHY. So after a few months of literally hearing NOTHING, I finally got the trainer's number and called her from New Zealand, because I couldn't stand it anymore. What I heard freaked me out - I was told she was stupid, had no work ethic, was spooky and bullheaded, and dull to work around. Now, this to me sounded like the kid in kindergarden who is very smart but feels mistreated by the teacher, so he then withdraws from classwork and social activity instead of flourishing. The teacher then tells the parents that the kid is too stupid for whatever level of work they're supposed to be doing, and demotes the kid to special 'slower' classes. Which makes that kid feel just awesome. The woman also told me that at that exact moment in time Gogo was standing in the aisleway behind her while she was on the phone "with her ears and lip drooping." Now, Gogo was - is - ALWAYS very alert and in tune to her surroundings. She never lets her guard drop, so this was a bit startling to hear. Second, STUPID? No, not stupid. Stubborn, yes, but NEVER stupid. I was worried. Very, very worried.

And it was rightfully so. I got back from New Zealand in late June to find this:




A NIGHTMARE. I watched the trainer ride her at the facility and it was clear that all she had done was lunge the horse excessively, then very rarely get on and try and force her into a frame, which resulted in Gogo learning how to rear and becoming horribly claustrophobic when it came to any sort of contact at all. Her haircoat was dull, her feet were a huge mess, she had ZERO topline muscle down her entire neck, back and rump, she was thin, and she had a dull, zombie-like expression, like she was withdrawing from the world to someplace inside herself in defense. She was skittery as though she thought I might hit her, and she had scarring on her nose from where she had been shanked excessively. (I've NEVER used a chain on this horse save for once or twice when she was learning how to have her mane pulled). I was horrified. HORRIFIED. When I went into her stall when I went to pick her up, the mare that always greeted me at the door was standing in the back of her stall with her head down. She didn't even look up at me when I walked in, nor did she show any emotion at all when I went to pet her. I almost broke down and started to cry right there.

About Gogo's feet: Sherry is a highly-certified AANHCP field instructor. The woman I chose to trim Gogo's feet while I was in NZ was also an AANHCP certified practitioner (who is now a field instuctor too) who ended up doing a rather horrible job with her. I'll have more posts later relating to the title and rating system in the AANHCP and the AHA, but not now. About Gogo's feet, it was partly nutrition and partly the trim, but I wanted to punch the trainer in the head when she smirked at me and said, "See? That barefoot hojo doesn't work. I'd recommend putting shoes on right away." I wanted to slap her and say, well OBVIOUSLY YOU know what's best for horses. I also, on my way out, saw a horse in a stall with a literal MELON-sized growth of proud flesh on one of its legs. It was also skin and bone. "Oh, that," the trainer said. "Well we rinse it off every day." O.O

It was hard. I pulled her then 11-inch mane ("Well, I didn't know if you wanted it pulled" - HELLO she's a SHOW HORSE and she came to you WITH A PULLED MANE, AND I TOLD YOU to pull her mane!), gave her a bath, and immediately switched back to Gro N' Win and as much hay as the barn owner would let me give. She threw me twice in the first week I had her back, once into a huge ditch and the other into the arena fence. She was sluggish, afraid, and explosive. She didn't really start to improve until I moved her back to college, for a lot of reasons really. I had already signed up and paid for a few rated shows while I was still in NZ (because the trainer ASSURED me she would be ready to show right when I got home), so I managed to struggle through those. One was Waterloo July Dressage in MI, and that was pretty awful. The other was the South Farm H.T. in early July, which kind of went better but not so much. She somehow managed a 39.0 on her dressage, and finished on that score in 6th place. She jumped around the stadium course well, but the x-country was prettttttty scary.



But she looked cute! Not every show was a failure - we got our first blue ribbon at Grand Haven Summer Dressage in August in Training 2, winning the class with a 69.3%! The best score I'd ever gotten, holy crap! The other Training tests went all right too, but that one was the best by far.

It still wasn't going too well though... once particular jump lesson in early September nearly ended in disaster when we crashed through a small fence for no real reason. She had been bolting through my hackamore (which had, up until that day, been working very well with jumping), and we were just trotting in to this fence. She randomly just didn't pick up her feet, got a rail tangled in her front legs, and we both wiped out. I tore something in my shoulder, and it's still a bit deformed today and gives me problems from time to time. The MOST exciting and horrible thing that happened to us was at the Erie Hunt & Saddle Club H.T. in late August. My poor parents came all the way down from MI to watch me, and it was their ANNIVERSARY that day too. We trailered out the day before the show, and I was going to school her that evening while they went back to the hotel. I should have known something bad was going to happen when I dropped the butt bar of the trailer, which I had done 9 billion times before in exactly the same way, and she pulled back, broke her halter and almost fell backwards out of the trailer into my non-horsey parents' laps. While I was schooling her, she was being rather horrible, and I started gradually moving to the other side of the field where we were riding. She spooked at a very small pile of non-scary things (on purpose, I think!), bolted sideways, lost her balance somehow and fell.... on my head. I remember a split second of the fall, then there's nothing until a very hazy image of people overtop of me telling me something about where they had taken my horse (apparently, she stood up carefully overtop of me and was immobile, looking down at me like OH MY GOD I'VE KILLED HER.) I remember bits and pieces of the next few hours (and days, and weeks...), I apparently had a very bad concussion. So THAT sucked. And my poor parents spent their anniversary in the hospital eating crappy hospital food and sitting around for hours while their daughter got CAT scans and x-rays. Nice.

The rest of the summer and fall was spend getting her brains back, playing, working some on dressage, and putting weight on her. We went on lots of trail rides, and even went to a fun contesting show where we won like, every freaking class.



We FINALLY started to come together at the end of the year, and won several of our Training Level classes at Lake Erie College's Winter Dressage in November, including getting another 69.9% on Training 2. I just can't break that 70%!
Gogo spent part of winter break at my fiancee Alex's house, which ended up being a HUUUUUUUUUGE disaster. I wanted to give her a few weeks of breaktime, and some time with her girlfriend Polly (another dark bay mare who Gogo LOVES). Alex's barn is a three-stall barn, and our herd of three started off well together, but Gogo started to get bored while out of work. REALLY bored. First, she sliced off a HUUUUGE chunk of her foot while kicking the wall at Polly. So we moved her across the way so she could be in the stall where she couldn't touch anybody. But she COULD reach the huge tack trunk... and over the course of a few days, she repeatedly took her halter off the hook, placed it on TOP of an overturned bucket (more than once), kicked the wall and pushed the enormous tack truck away from the wall, pulled the tupperware bins full of blankets into her stall, broke the latch to her stall gate, squeezed her way around the narrow people-only corridor to the LATCHED grain bins, unlatched them, ate her fill, dragged one of the bins STILL upright into the middle of the barn aisle, and peed on the stepstool. And wasn't sick. We fixed the latch, but she wasn't satisfied. The next day she lifted the gate OFF the hinges, got back into the grain AGAIN, then let herself out into the field and refused to be caught.



Hmmmmmm. We actually dubbed her barn "The Looney Bin" because of all this nonsense. So after a very Merry Christmas, I moved her to a different barn again, and put her back into work. Which leads me to 2008... but that is for another time. As for now, I should probably go comfort the kitten who just had her ovaries ripped out today. Ouch....