Otto

As I was saying in yesterday's blip (today's backblip - just to confuse things), a lot has been happening over the past few days.

Otto is home, having been paid for on Thursday, fretted over on Friday and Saturday, then finally collected on Sunday. I had planned to keep him in his stable overnight so that he could have time to chill out, but he turned into the equine version of a spinning top when the other horses in the barn were turned out for the night, and it would have been unsafe to just leave him on his own in that state. So he went out. I've decided to keep him with a friend's herd of mares, as he has been living with only ladies for the past year or so. He pranced around his field to show off to the ladies, gave them each a quick sniff over the fence, before turning his bum to them and settling down to graze.

Yesterday morning I popped up to check on him/ drop off some supplies, and he was lame. Yes, you read that right. Lame. Bloody typical isn't it!! He wasn't too bad coming in from the field, however he was still too high to leave in the stable on his own. After giving him a once over I turned him out in the field again in order to seek advice from friends and family. I nipped up a few hours later with my mum, and went to bring Otto in from the field to get a second opinion on his lameness. Unfortunately he had become worse, and was very reluctant to bear any weight on the injured leg.

A friend, the lovely lady who picked Otto up for me on Sunday, left her mare in the barn overnight to give Otto some company, and has diagnosed Otto's lameness as being "seedy toe". Following further research, this seems to fit the description pretty well. Seedy toe is caused when the hoof wall begins to separate from the sole, creating a groove in between the two. It usually surfaces on horses with overgrown hooves (which Otto has), and is exacerbated by the horse standing on wet ground for a prolonged period of time (which Otto had been doing all Sunday night). We unfortunately did not notice this before/ during/ after the vetting, as the place where we bought him has considerably less rainfall than soggy old Aberdeen and so the separation of the hoof wall from the sole was not severe enough to cause any pain on movement.

The good news now. Today (1st May) I popped up to the yard to swap Otto's companions and muck out. On leading Otto down the centre aisle in the barn, I noticed that he is no longer visibly lame and is only slightly cautious when walking. Obviously a night in on dry ground has done him good, and he will be kept in again tonight until he sees the farrier tomorrow afternoon.

Disaster averted!

In other news, yesterday I nearly exploded with frustration on trying to set up a flat-pack storage box for Otto's things... In the end I gave up and will try again in a few days when my temper has cooled. Oh, and the garlic powder I ordered to put into Otto's feed also arrived yesterday. Loose. The tub had split open in transit, and on opening the parcel I was encased in a rather potent cloud of garlic powder. Maybe buying a horse wasn't such a good idea after all!! :P