Wednesday, February 14, 2018

the game's afoot

Get it?? See what I did there??? A foot?!?! Lolololol I crack myself up with the puns....

handsome boy. also, incidentally, currently not good for much else either.
The inevitable has become reality. Charlie's woe-befallen RH, of recent nail impalement fame, has indeed begun showing signs of abscessing. Sigh.

I had begun to hope we could avoid this entirely.... I mean, the spurting blood from the puncture seemed so promising! And he had become so comfortable!! I had even begun to tell myself that it really truly would be ok to school him purposefully again!

Alas, tho. Twas not to be. In fact, it all went down somewhat comically anyway.... In true Charlie fashion, naturally.

RIP horseware liner, you were gone too soon!
(for those curious tho, yes i absolutely went right on back and ordered another one....)
The foreshadowing: Charlie's normal sheet was still soaked from all our rain, so I had asked the woman who helps with blanketing to use my new Horseware liner and Mio sheet. Except.... dun dun dunnnn, I neglected to tell her about the clips on the liner for attaching it to the sheet's rear surcingle straps to prevent slipping.

Womp womp, you can probably see where this is going. Actually I know you can, bc the representative photo is literally directly above this text.

Suffice to say, Charlie shredded the liner beyond repair. I didn't even know if he took it off himself or if he needed to be rescued. All I knew was... that liner was DEAD. And whatever the case, I legit half expected Charlie to have maimed himself in some important way in the ordeal.

hm well golly gee wilikers, nobody could have seen this coming!
So the first thing I did after pulling him out of his stall that evening was methodically check each of his mud-encrusted limbs for blood, swelling or heat. And, Bingo!, I found two out of three where I least wanted to: his RH.

And it was hot. Dammit.

I guess it's possible that he somehow hurt that same hoof in some liner-related debacle. More than likely tho, we're still looking at fallout from last week's nail puncture.

fortune favors the prepared, eh??
So now we're back on full abscess protocol. Honestly I have no reason to believe this will be anything other than a normal, run of the mill abscess. Except that whole pesky "nail" business.... And the fact that it's Charlie and Charlie does things his own way.

But. The gist is: soak and wrap. Soak and wrap. Etc etc etc.

seriously tho. he's a good boy.
As far as I can tell, the nail hole is all sealed up. But I still cleaned up the hoof as much as possible before soaking it - rinsing in cold water and scrubbing with a stiff brush and hoof pick.

Then soaked in hot water with epsom salt generously poured in, plus some betadine too just for shits and giggles.

terrible angle. clean hoof tho...
After soaking for what felt like forever, I then poked around a little more with the hoof pick (finding nothing) then packed with poultice and more epsom salt and wrapped up for the farrier to evaluate.

and if you only saw this post from when i accidentally published it yesterday, you would have missed this sweet post-farrier barefoot pic..... still no sign of drainage tho...
The next day, farrier was able to pull his shoe and look around a little more. But while there's definitely something brewing in there, there's no sign of drainage yet. So Charlie's back on the farrier list for next week, and in the meantime I continue to soak and wrap, soak and wrap.

"hm this isn't so bad!" - charlie, probably
So. Ya know. Whatever, right? It's not like we didn't see this coming...

Frankly I was already pretty convinced that Charlie would wait until Saturday morning, after I'd already packed the trailer and loaded everything up for Loch Moy, to announce his intention to abscess.

"oh wait, shit, i immediately regret that choice"
Silver linings I guess are that the organizers allowed me to apply my entry to a future event instead of forfeiting it entirely (which would have made it the 3rd lost entry out of the last 4 mailed out, including the end of last season... those ain't great odds, Charles!).

now that's what i call thinking
So.... That's basically where things stand right now.

Still no reason to believe there's anything more nefarious going on inside the hoof.... He's been too comfortable for too long to suggest any injury to any of the important structures. Theoretically.

And an abscess certainly isn't the worst thing in the world. Honestly it's abscess season right now anyway, with all the wet/dry/wet/dry cycles we've been having with rain and freezing conditions. It's still reeeeeally freakin annoying tho.

C'est la vie, tho, right?

58 comments:

  1. POOP! Swift healing to Charlie!

    This weather is certainly not helping. We have had rain / misting weather for a week now with more to come and I swear the horses' hooves are already falling apart

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    1. Yea this is definitely a hard set of conditions for hooves, and it'll only get worse as the fresh spring grass comes up and the mornings get dewy....

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  2. Oh Charles.

    At least it isn't worse?? Gah.

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  3. Well damn it all to hell. Silver lining of course that you were already prepared, and that you didn't totally lose your event money. Womp womp. Hopefully he recovers quickly so you can get back to your regularly scheduled programming!

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    1. Silver linings abound fortunately. I'm just very tired of the clouds in the first place! I'm sure he'll be fine in short order tho.... It'll just take long enough to wreck these plans. Sigh.

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  4. Charlie! And the liner...may it rest in peace LOL. Remus hasnt torn his yet and i am amazed the thing is flimsy. In fact that reminds me NOT to take it to Emily's for him. The other horses there will probably help tear it ;)

    This weather and mud and ice and everything else along with the nail...jeez you had a loaded deck as it was!! I hope he bounces back quickly....figures the next few days are supposed to be warmer...

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    1. Yep he's sure got impeccable timing! And the liner really suffered an unfair fate. Since I forgot to tell the person who helps me with blanketing about the clips on the liner, I imagine it just slipped right on down his side - only attached around his neck (no belly straps). So he would have been stepping and tripping all over it with his hind legs. I'm not too worried about other horses yanking on it since I don't use it as an outer layer. Honestly I like it a lot and reordered another on (buh bye money).

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  5. Sorry about the cancelled plans. This weather hasn’t been helping anyone out and that damn nail. He looks comfortable though and is still ridiculously handsome so there’s that :)

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    1. Lol ridiculously handsome *does* help, as does his charming personality haha. Considering I spend a LOT of time *not* riding him, that counts for a lot lol.....

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  6. Oh Charlie! I'm sorry, hopefully it will be a quick abscess and you guys will be back at it in no time. Nice of Loch Moy to switch your entry too!

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    1. the loch moy folks are seriously the nicest! i love that venue just for its own merits anyway (and think i always will, esp since they offer all the way up to modified PT at starter trials lolol) but the people there really just make it that much more wonderful

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  7. That final picture is 100% me. Hopefully it is a quick, easy recovery and you guys are back to kicking butt very soon!

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    1. lol yea that picture is how i justify my ongoing mania lol....

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  8. i hate horses. a lot.

    charlie, stop giving your mother a heart attack. you and indy are both going to be at the starter trial in march.

    AND YOURE BOTH GOING TO LIKE IT.

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    1. i'm gonna print that out and blow it up to poster size and put it on charlie's stall wall. MARCH STARTER TRIAL OR BUST!!!!

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  9. Argh, how disappointing!

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    1. he's certainly making it difficult to plan as obsessively as i want to!!!!!

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  10. CHARLES! Stop with the ouchies please!

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  11. Charrleee!! Here's the thing- if I ever have a horse with an abcess, I'm calling you. Or reading your blogs again cause you're clearly the most knowledgeable...

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    1. ugh the thing is, i really have like.... no real experience with abscesses prior to charlie. and i'm basically shit at the hoof wraps. and all types of wraps, lets be honest. but... if anything, charlie seems intent on making me hone my skills on all these things. whether i want to or not....

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  12. Nooooo Charlie!!!! Well, at least it only IS an abscess. Oi. And at least they let you put your entry towards one in the future! I mean, really, Charles. Get it together! lol

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  13. ugh. Charlie is on the Carlos train for abscesses - seriously like having flashbacks (and both their names start with C which stands for cookie)

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    1. i mean, the abscess was basically a given considering he just had a deep puncture in his hoof that sealed over on the surface level. still tho, crappy (another C word!)

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    2. Yeah I don't mean it in the "he's like Carlos" in the navicular-way. When I first got Carlos we had 1 year where he was constantly blowing abscesses left and right (or at least it felt that way) from various things (in the very hot summer the main culprit was he'd knock his entire garbage can of water over, even though it was secured in various different ways, and then literally wallow like a pig in the soupy poopy mess he made.) Both front feet hated me, it was almost never the same thing twice in a row (sharp rock, poop soup, shoeing, poop soup, tore a shoe off, poop soup, stepped on a nail, poop soup) Neverending!!!! And like you I had to cancel more than 1 horse show and it was frustrating, eventually I just started showing my friend's brother's horse to not keep eating the entries.

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  14. Ahhhhhhh! Hope that sucker resolves soon! Abscesses are super frustrating!

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    1. i'm gonna lay this blame right at the foot of the nail charlie stepped on...

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  15. Sadly, I am great at wrapping hooves. Have you used a disposable diaper? They work quite nicely under the Vetrap and duct tape. I didn't see one in your pic.

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  16. Tis the season? (eyeroll) My instructor who's on vacation this week told me she went all of 4 hours before someone called and told her she had a crippled horse (not literally, but ya know). the weather has sucked too - single digits a few days ago with iced over roads, and tomorrow it's going to be 60 and raining.

    The weather needs to calm down, Charlie needs to calm down, and whatever other variable that wants to tempt fate needs to also calm down so you guys can move along!

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    1. er'ry body calm down plz!!!!!! bc.... yea basically that's what's up...

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  17. Ugh Charlie, noooo!!! Well, um, at least his weight looks good???

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    1. lol i was thinking that too... except with every day he loses more tone and nudges back into dad bod territory instead of looking like a svelte sports machine. sigh. it's better than a few alternatives tho!

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  18. Replies
    1. SO FUN THERE'S NOTHING I WOULD RATHER DO.... or something like that?

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  19. Damnit, this one was supposed to be a 'win'. But not surprising really.

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    1. yea i mean, that's kinda how charlie rolls, right? a constant parade of "well hey it could have been worse!" lol

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  20. Bummer, I hope his abscess clears soon.

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    1. i'm sure he'll be sound as a dollar on the morning of our show... just, ya know, having already moved the entry and minus one shoe. bc that's how it works, right?

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  21. Horses just wanna stay injured. That is my conclusion. There is no other obvious logic to explain.

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    1. charlie just wants to make sure we're all paying him the appropriate amount of attention.

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  22. Just.... Blah. Charlie - don't you want to go to fun events and do fun things? -.-

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    1. that's what i keep trying to tell him, that there's so much fun stuff out there to do if he would just hang in there a little while longer!!!!

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  23. Aw. Charlie is addicted to Netflix and stall?

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  24. I guess he is consistent? Fingers crossed it goes away nice and quick!

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  25. You are handling this amazingly well!



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  26. Nail punctures scare the crap out of me. I had the first one at my barn in nine years this past fall. I was sure the nail had hit the bone. The horse was lame for weeks... Thankfully, the radiographs showed it did NOT hit the bone, and with wrapping, soaking, and antibiotics he's back out roping again! I hope it's much much easier for you!

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  27. Wow, you poor thing! I honestly think you and Charlie mighttttt have worse luck then Rio and I, and that is saying something, LOL. Fingers crossed for you that it IS only an abscess, and that it runs it's course quickly!!

    <3 Kelly @ HunkyHanoverian

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  28. Oh, man. Gotta love ill-timed abcesses. Sorry this is happening!

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  29. Well damn. Let's hope Charlie is getting all this injury baloney out of his system NOW so he can be injury free all season! Hang in there! <3

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  30. Again! Ugh Charlie.... Why is it each one of our horses has something... I get dirty butt caused by ulcer healing flare ups..

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