anatomy of a wrap

Happy Friday, y'all! Bet ya thought that I couldn't possibly write about my horse's friggin hoof hullabaloo for nine straight posts in a row (over 5 full weeks)!! 

Bet you're wrong, tho ;) 

paddock + hay + dusk = happier times

Good news, tho. Charlie continues to hit important milestones along the way to recovery from his gruesome gravel-induced subsolar abscess.

still feeling hopeful about this thing

Today's update: we transitioned to a dry wrap (ie, no more animalintex poultice pads), tho still with the antibiotic slurry. This appears to coincide with the drainage drying up -- a key box my vet wanted checked off before we could consider reintroducing full turnout. 

d'aww look at that muddy pone pone tho!! <3 <3

We will do a couple more days with the topically applied antibiotics slurry (oxytet + crushed metro pills), then move onto more basic betadine and eventually a "strong iodine," primarily for its hardening properties. 

in the process of removing a wrap. this view shows my attempt at a heel bulb "pillow" after 24hrs --- let's see how it did!

Which basically all means.... I can actually think in real terms about what that reintroduction to turn out might look like. More specifically: I'm hoping to stick Charlie back out with his herd tomorrow for a few hours. 

The herd relocated during his abscess-induced absence, and is now ensconced in the much-more-accessible winter sacrifice field, complete with round bale. Downsides are that there is generally deep mud around the round bale... But, it's actually been pretty dry the last couple weeks so I'm thinking positively.

wrap after removal -- why yes, that imprint looks like the fluff did *exactly* what i hoped it would!

So.... Really, my biggest consideration right now is how to dress that foot for success. He's spent more than 48hrs so far in that Easyboot Zip already, and I'm inclined to still feel hopeful about it. 

view after first day in a dry wrap (no animalintex). vet encouraged me to be aggressive in scraping off old residue

I started putting some folded up super fluffy cotton bandaging material over his heel bulbs, and as far as I can tell, it's working. Wasn't compressed to paper-thinness, so it's clearly providing protection from being overly compressed or rubbed... And the heel bulbs themselves looked quite good -- also probably helped by switching to a dry wrap.

slowly downgrading the wrap --- still has the antibiotics tho

So I'll keep repeating this process for a little bit. Tho, realistically, the wrap itself is slowly being a bit downgraded and less .... extra haha. I'm still using some rolled cotton to sorta hold everything in place -- the gauze patch with the antibiotics slurry on it, for example. But that's mostly bc I have a friggin ton of these little rolls and kinda wanna just use them up.

really documenting the placement of the "pillow" so it can be reproducibly effective

Probably at some point in the next couple days, the rolled gauze will disappear altogether and it'll just be a roll of vet wrap holding the fluffy pillow in place and covering the sole, then the outer duct tape 'slipper.' 

add a few more strips of duct tape and voila! charlie's "slipper"

I don't really know what will happen if/when Charlie sloughs off the rest of his sole, so it feels like maybe a safe choice to maintain this sorta inner bandaged wrap inside whatever outer boot or shell Charlie might be wearing. 

tucked away inside his zip boot, ready for day 3 of constant wear

Actually, in an ideal world, I kinda like the idea of using that reusable / disposable shell while Charlie is stalled -- since it's a lot less binding on his hoof and generally more breathable, while still protecting the duct tape wrap. Then maybe he'd just wear the Zip boot for turn out... 

But... That requires twice-daily boot changes, which means trusting other folks to make good and deliberate choices. Which.... Ehhhhhh we'll see.

"i'm not a terrorist, you're the terrorist!" ---charles, being a slight pest lol

So. We're ready to give it all a shot, I suppose. The last box on my vet's checklist is kinda the biggie, tho. Charlie needs to stay reasonably comfortable on that hoof. Which... We'll see, I guess. 

He's still walking like he's got a hole in his foot bc, spoiler, he does. But it's not really slowing him down much. And he's definitely getting increasingly impatient with his confinement. 

So we will see! Wish us luck lol, and hope y'all have a great weekend too!