tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1540523800194214282.post-71740962981545971912008-03-19T20:55:00.002-04:002008-03-24T14:45:52.133-04:00<a href="http://bp0.blogger.com/_Vt2Mu44hjMs/R-f2ycqCyYI/AAAAAAAAAFo/BaKiBEZOl0Y/s1600-h/Little+One+014.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5181381242859473282" style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="http://bp0.blogger.com/_Vt2Mu44hjMs/R-f2ycqCyYI/AAAAAAAAAFo/BaKiBEZOl0Y/s200/Little+One+014.jpg" border="0" /></a><br /><div></div><div>I know I’ve mentioned this before - I do foster/lay up care for off the track Thoroughbreds through CANTER New England - my heart’s work. And, I’m sure I’ve also mentioned that I fall in love with every new horse that comes on the yard. Like take my latest arrival, Black Rainbow who I dubbed, My Little One. He got to the farm in really bad shape. He was so thin you could play the harp on his ribs, and not surprisingly he was lethargic, his coat was dull, he had chronic diarrhea, and the most disturbing thing of all in my book, he had a worried, distrustful look in his eye when he’d even bother to look, that is; I was really afraid he’d given up.<br /><br />Since it’s a known fact that a daunting 90% of racehorses and another 60% of show horses have ulcers, with untold numbers that are mostly confined to stalls probably in the mix as well, and because gastroscopy was not a financial option, I decided I’d better treat My Little One accordingly just the same. So, I slowly transitioned him to a high fiber, high fat pelleted feed to which I added probiotics and freshly ground flax seeds before turning him out from dawn ‘til dusk with enough hay to feed an elephant (when I tried to add soaked beet pulp to his diet, he’d relapsed back to having diarrhea, so I bailed on that idea).<br /><br />Over time, I’m relieved to say, he started to rally and even learned to relax a bit – touching his ears and eyes took some time, though. Then, all of a sudden one day he re-connected, and with a vengeance. I practically had to peel him off the ceiling – if he wasn’t up on his hind legs, he was jumping, kicking and tossing his head, especially at meal time. It was wild. Over time and with a lot of work, however, we came to terms and he eventually became a total lovey. And, on the physical side – he gained enough weight to achieve an optimum ‘5’ on the Henneke Body Scoring Scale. Yet, with such a dramatic change in his temperament, I couldn’t help but wonder that maybe some of the behavioral challenges people face, from apathy to off the charts, are as a result of their horses having been plagued by Equine Gastric Ulcer Syndrome (EGUS), leading me to ask: how can you tell what’s a reaction to pain and what’s just plain rude?<br /><br />That’s what I posed to Frank Andrews, DVM, MS, Dipl. ACVIM and professor at the <em>University of Tennessee College of Veterinary Medicine</em>. Here’re the Cliff Notes of what he said. “It’s not the behavior as it is the change in behavior that alerts us to the possibility of a physical problem.” He cited two examples: the horse that normally has a good attitude, who for no apparent reason becomes mean spirited – ears pinned back or nipping, and the horse whose performance has declined, again for no obvious reason. So, how does EGUS happen? “You could make a case for stress being a prime contributor, that and poor nutrition management,” he said. He went on to explain that a horse’s saliva is bicarbonate rich in addition to having special coating agents to buffer and ultimately neutralize stomach acids - why the chewing process is vital to proper digestion. Consequently, if a horse is too fidgety to eat, or only gets fed twice a day with a token serving of hay (ideally he should be offered as much as he’ll eat), he’ll likely not be able to counteract the effect of the acids churning around. “And, because the esophagus extends into the stomach,” Dr. Andrews pointed out that a horse is, “as subject to acid reflux as we are.”<br /><br />And, so it goes to show, once My Little One was back up to speed, he picked up where he left off – only better. Armed with good looks and good manners, the story has a happy ending; he’s now happily ensconced in the lap of horse luxury. Not only does he have a pasture mate with whom he shares hay and whose withers he often nibbles, I’m told, but he also has the ideal adoptive parents as well – a devoted equine and small animal veterinarian couple. Wow! It doesn’t get better than that. </div>Life with Beanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07814203191234047011noreply@blogger.com