progress

Gypsy seems to be getting better, she's moving around her small area more. I had to cut her pasture into a small padock so she can't move around much. I feel bad that she was used to having so much room to roam and now she's stuck in a small dirt lot.

Giving her the meds has been easier thanks to apple cider and orange juice! She seems to really like the mix i make and sometimes even looks for more! On friday she will be done all of her meds so that will make life easier for me.

I've been sick with a nasty cold so i haven't done much other then feed her and give meds. i need to give her a good grooming, she's covered in mud, but luckily a little mud on her coat for a few days won't hurt her. She looks like a furry mud ball!

I'll post some pics with my next entry, for now I've felt like such poo that i haven't wanted to do much but sleep.

Gyspy has been doing better, though last night i thought she was going to kill herself in her stall. It was raining badly and the thunder and heavy rain on the roof of the barn was freaking her out a bit. i found apple cider mixed with apple sauce makes it easy to give her her meds.

i cut the pasture in half so she can't move around much, she's not happy with me but this is all for her own good so she'll just have to learn.

bad news from the vet today

The vet came out today and didn't have good news for me. Gypsy is in fact in pain, she has laminitis which is a problem with her hooves. http://www.laminitis.org/laminitis.html

i've been told to not ride her for at least a month or untill spring. She needs to be kept in her stall at night, which she hates and she can't be moving around much.

So this is where Gypsy will be spending a lot of her time.

The vet gave me a ton of meds to give her too. i think she is going to hate me by the end of this. i feel bad but i have to cram all sorts of yucky tasting meds into her. She gets 8 pills of one thing twice a day, 9 pills of something else twice a day and 2 little scoops of powder twice a day.

This is all the meds i got today. i'm a bit overwhelmed by it all. i never realized how hard it is to get a horse to take a pill. Since tonight was the first time i've ever given a horse meds like this i think i did ok. i crushed up all the pills and mixed them with apple sauce and used a syringe to get it all into her. She didn't like it. Then for the powder or Bute (which is a horsey pain med), i mixed that into what little feed she can eat. She didn't like that either. i now have to soak her hay for an hour, which is a huge pain in the ass. Tonight i soaked it in a rubber maid tub loose. i learned my lesson about that, it's very hard to get soaking wet hay moved to where i need it to get it. Next time, aka tomorrow morning, i'll be using a hay net to hold the hay in place and THEN soak it.

This is my new hay soaking bin. The round thing holding the hay under water is a press from an apple cider press that we never use and since i kept tripping over it today and found out how heavy it was, i knew it would be perfect for this. The hay needs to be soaked in order to get some of the sugars out of it since sugars can make her condition worse.

So i have a lot of work ahead of me for a while and Gypsy and i will not be happy with each other for a while.

new blog

So i decided to be a dork and blog about my horse Gypsy and her training. i figure i can use it as a way to keep track of our progress (or lack there of) and know what i need to work on more.

Seeing as i worked all day today and didn't get out to work with Gypsy today this won't be much of a post. Tomorrow the vet comes out to do a check up and give her the shots she needs.

That is all for today.