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Thrush

Thrush

Jan 15, 2018 | Thrush

Tuesdays with Tony

I found a hoof pick in the Clinic the other day. Upon inquiry to my humans, I learned what this odd thing was for. Apparently not only do horses not groom themselves, they also require you humans to clean their feet. Seriously, clean their feet!?!? I don’t understand why you humans put up with these crazy critters who can’t even clean their own feet. I clean my own feet several times daily, and do my own nails! This discussion about cleaning horse feet led to a discussion about thrush. I love thrush! They’re such tasty little birds. Ah, scratch that. I’ve just been informed we aren’t talking about birds. We are talking about an infection in horse’s feet. I learned a lot about thrush in horses today. Read on for my take on the situation.

Thrush: Well, that’s a funny name

Thrush is caused by a bacteria called fusobacterium necrophorum. Sometimes other bacteria come along for the ride too, but fusobacterium is the main culprit. Fusobacterium likes warm, moist places with little air movement, and some organic material to feed on. What does the bottom of your horse’s foot look like? A warm, moist place with some nice organic poop to feast on. The bacteria move on to the hoof itself after they eat the organic material, and that’s when the problems start.

Deep Canyons

Most people think of gooey feet when they think thrush. This is the most common presentation of thrush in the sulci down the sides of the frog. However, thrush can also get into the central sulcus and here is where it likes to make horses sore. Thrush can present here without all the goo. Typically it just appears as a very deep central sulcus. The problem with that really deep central sulcus is it feels like walking on a hangnail. You humans usually want your horses to perform in some way, and walking on a hangnail is not conducive to performance. At the bottom of that deep sulcus, the thrush can eat into the delicate soft tissues there creating a wound.

Make the thrush go away

Finally, the answers you’ve been seeking. There are several great, easy ways to treat thrush. Generally, my Docs first step is cleaning the foot daily and applying Durasole to any areas that appear a little deep. If the thrush is out of control, or there is a very deep central sulcus, they go to the cattle mastitis ointments called Today or Tomorrow. Either one seems to work great, and they come with a convenient applicator tip that goes right into those deep crevices. A little bit applied three to four times per week will clear up the thrush in no time. Every once in a while my Docs get a really bad case of thrush that requires treatment with antibiotics under bandages, but those are pretty rare.

Make the thrush stay away

What do wild horses do? This is a common question about all things horse. The answer for wild horses in this case: They don’t live in a stall. Standing around helps stuff pack into the crevices, giving fusobacterium a lovely place to live. Lots of turnout time and exercise help hooves flex and move which works to keep them clean and healthy. Equally important to turnout time is a good farrier. A good quality trim will keep the frog open and flexible. A good trim will also keep the heel height appropriate which is the key to a healthy frog.

I hear there’s an old saying that goes something like, without a foot, you don’t have a horse. Got questions about your horse’s hoof health? My Docs have answers! Now I’m off to clean my own feet.

Until next week,

— Tony

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Tuesdays with Tony is the official blog of Tony the Office Cat at Springhill Equine Veterinary Clinic in Newberry, Florida. For more information, please call us at (352) 472-1620, visit our website at SpringhillEquine.com, or follow us on Facebook!

New Years Resolutions and Horses

New Years Resolutions and Horses

Jan 8, 2018 | Lameness, Wellness Program

Tuesdays with Tony

 Ahh a new year, another chance to make your dreams come true! 2018 offers us each the opportunity to start fresh, to turn over a new leaf. I know you horse-crazy cats pretty well by now, and I bet I can guess some of your New Years resolutions. For some of you, it might be to make it to Pony Finals. For others, it might be to get in the money in the 2D. Some of you might even have the goal of riding your horse for the first time in several years. Whatever your competition goals this year, Springhill Equine can help you achieve them. My docs are well versed in getting your horse to where he needs to be to make your wildest dreams a reality. I need to find someone to help me with that… cats have dreams too, you know!

Resolution #1: Get my horse on a Wellness Plan

   First, let’s start with the basics. In order for your horse to get back in the game and stay there, you will need to make sure his healthcare needs are taken care of. The easiest way to do that is with one of my all-inclusive Wellness Plans. Not only do they cover all of your horse’s routine medical care like vaccines, dentals, and Coggins, but they also offer peace of mind in the form of No Emergency Fees should your horse meet with an unexpected illness or injury this year.

    Whether your goal is trail riding or racing, or somewhere in between, your horse can’t be expected to do his best if he isn’t feeling well. Each Wellness Plan comes with 2 complete physical exams each year to catch the little problems before they become a big deal. These visits are also a great opportunity to check in with one of our vets, and discuss any concerns you may have with your horse’s performance. If there is an underlying medical problem, you will certainly need to get that taken care of before you can move up to the next level in your sport. I realize that this advice would have more clout coming from someone who actually participated in sports, which I decidedly do not.

Resolution #2: Have that nagging, super-minor, only-sometimes, usually-works-out-of-it lameness checked out

  Just because a judge wouldn’t necessarily notice it in the show ring doesn’t mean it’s not there. If you feel your horse is off, even if it’s only a little hitch when he comes around that 3rd barrel and it only happens when he’s tired, you should really have one of my amazing vets look into it.
    There are a few reasons you should have a mild lameness worked up sooner rather than later. First, even a minor lameness could be a sign of a serious injury, and continuing to work your horse could make the injury worse. Second, the lameness could be an early sign of a disease that can be prevented. For example, if your horse is diagnosed with early arthritis, there are medications you could start him on now that are proven to protect his joints from further damage. Third, and most importantly, that nagging, barely-there lameness could be affecting your horse’s performance, and getting it properly treated could make the difference between first and last place at your next competition. Wouldn’t you love to know if something as simple as a shoeing change could make him feel—and thus perform—10 times better?

Resolution #3: Achieve my competition goals

   Once you have your horse’s health in order, this third step will be easy! With the help of my splendid team of vets, techs, and staff, your horse will be looking and feeling his best. I like to offer our clients the total package – from nutrition to dentistry, from farriers to trainers, rest assured someone at Springhill can point you in the right direction. Remember, a healthy horse is a happy horse, and happy horses win prizes!
    I’m afraid the only competition I have to look forward to this year is the occasional cat fight between myself and Teanie over someone’s tuna sandwich. So, I must live vicariously through all of you and your horses. Your New Years resolutions are truly important to me, and I want to see you stick to all of them!
     WishIng you and your horse the best of luck and a Happy New Year!!!!
      -Tony

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Tuesdays with Tony is the official blog of Tony the Office Cat at Springhill Equine Veterinary Clinic in Newberry, Florida. For more information, please call us at (352) 472-1620, visit our website at SpringhillEquine.com, or follow us on Facebook!

The Curse Of Knowledge

The Curse Of Knowledge

Jan 1, 2018 | Colic, Dentals, Eyes, Injuries, Lacerations

Tuesdays with Tony

My humans have been worrying about the future a lot this week. The weather people say it’s going to get cold (no one seems to remember how often they’re wrong), and with cold weather comes colicky horses. That got me thinking, so this week I asked Kayla, Nancy, Beth, and MJ what they worry about more now that they’ve worked here and seen all the things horses really can do to themselves. After all, they see hundreds of horse problems every year, so they have plenty to worry about with their own horses. We call that the Curse of Knowledge. Here’s their Top 5 list.

#1 Eye ulcers

Maybe you’ve had the Docs come out and put some of that fluorescent green dye in the eye. Then they tell you to use a few ointments 4 times per day, give some Bute or Banamine, and they come back out to check it again in a few days. Lots of eyes heal perfectly well this way. The ones that don’t, however, are the ones my team worries about. My minions have all had the joy of treating ulcers in eyes. They say what makes this one Number 1 on their list is that everything can be done absolutely perfectly, and things can still go bad. These ulcers are also very expensive and extremely time consuming. Treatment very quickly goes into the thousands of dollars, and is a minimum of 4 weeks. My minions also agree eye problems are a great reason to have major medical insurance on your horse!

#2 Very specific lacerations

Last year we had a weanling come in with a very small cut over her hock. She was an extremely well-bred barrel horse. Turns out that small cut went into the hock joint. It looked like no big deal, but because of the location, it was life-threatening. That’s right: life-threatening. Wounds in joints can very easily lead to infections in joints, and infections in joints are extremely difficult to clear in horses. Luckily, with about $5,000 in treatments, my Docs were able to get this one cleared up. MJ was horrified at how small the wound was, how easy it was to overlook, and how bad it all could have ended up. She says she’ll never take a wound for granted again! We all know horses are incredibly fragile, but MJ was amazed to see it action. Also, yet another reason to have major medical insurance on these crazy horses.

#3 Colic

This one had to be on the list. However, my minions said they view colic very differently than they did before working here. All colics used to scare them. Now it’s the colics that don’t respond quickly to drugs. Then they go into full on panic. You see, most colics get some sedation and a little pain relief, a whole lot of water and electrolytes, and off they go. It’s the ones that get painful again very quickly that scare my minions. Too often those are surgical colics. Even if they aren’t surgical, they do require lots of fluids, pain meds, and care. These colics are always touch and go for a bit. And yet another reason to insure horses!

PS on this one: coastal hay is the number one cause of colics. You can feed coastal to your horse, but please, please, please also feed some alfalfa or peanut hay!!

#4 Tendon Injuries

You pick up the trot one day and something doesn’t feel quite right. You wait a day or two and try again: still not right. My Docs come out and do a lameness evaluation, put some novocaine in different parts of the leg until the lameness goes away, and then do an ultrasound. You know you should be worried when the Doc gets “that look” on her face. She tells you it’s a proximal suspensory tear. Why do my minions fear this diagnosis so much? They know it’s a minimum of 6 months of rehab work before we even know if things are going to be back to normal. They know with some of these small tendons and ligaments (like the oblique sesamoidean) that it is nearly impossible to get the horses back to normal. They also know that the best shot for healing comes with extremely diligent physical therapy work, and most people don’t do so well at that part.

#5 Lay Tooth Floaters

I saved this one for last, but it should probably be higher on the list. There are lots of people out there who will “do your horse’s teeth” for not a lot of money. You get what you pay for. Unfortunately you also often get much, much less than you pay for. My minions have seen broken teeth, missed tumors, infections caused or made worse, and, simply put, really bad floats done. Even worse, many lay floaters sedate horses which is AGAINST THE LAW. My Docs went to school for a really long time to know all the things that can go wrong when they sedate a horse. They drive around with a truck full of stuff to manage problems if things do go wrong. My Docs have the knowledge to understand how that little thing they see can be an indicator of BIG problems. I can’t be any clearer: Lay floaters are not a good answer for your horse’s health. Dentistry should be done with bright lights, sedation, a speculum, and a doctor.

Want to know how to keep your horse safe in a scary world? Communicate! My Docs and minions are here to help you. Send pictures, call, email in questions. From abscesses to zoonoses, they’ve got you covered. Now I’m headed for a long winter’s nap.

Tuesdays with Tony is the official blog of Tony the Clinic Cat at Springhill Equine Veterinary Clinic in Newberry, Florida. If you liked this blog, please subscribe below, and share it with your friends on social media! For more information, please call us at (352) 472-1620, visit our website at SpringhillEquine.com, or follow us on Facebook!

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Horse Tech

Horse Tech

Dec 25, 2017 | Exercise

Tuesdays with Tony

Let me begin by saying I hope you all had a very Merry Christmas. It’s my favorite holiday. What more could a cat ask for than shiny things on a tree followed by empty boxes and wadded up paper? I realize you humans have lots of holidays, for lots of different things, but this one gets my vote as best.

Moving on to an actual topic: Horse Tech. Dr. Lacher has an obsession with technology. She may not have all of it she wants, but she sure researches the heck out of it. So without further idle chit-chat, I bring you a few of her favorite things.

FitBit for Horse

There are four or five companies working on slightly different versions of the fitbit for horses. Equisense, SeeHorse, Orscana, and Trackener are just a few. The main drawback they all have at the moment is they work on one part of your horse’s life. They either are designed for use during work, or while they are hanging out, but not really both. We all love our fitness trackers because they tell us about our entire day. It would be great to know you rode your horse for 3 miles, and he did another 7 in the pasture last night. For the record, there will never be a fitness tracker for cats for obvious reasons.

These trackers do have some pretty cool things that they track. They can tell you how “even” your horse moves from right to left, they can tell you how much time you spent at the walk, trot, and canter, how you did on take-off distances for jumpers, and even how your horse compares today to his “normal.” Using some of these features, they found that you humans are really bad at knowing how much work you’ve actually done on your horse. Humans underestimated the time they had spent on walk breaks by 50%. And you think cats lay around all the time!

Equilume

If you breed mares and want early babies, you know the struggle of mares under lights. You need them in the stall until 9:30 – 10pm every night, they think that’s stupid, and you wonder if the light is bright enough.

Enter Equilume. They did the work to prove that a blue light shining in one eye at a certain brightness for a certain amount of hours worked as well as being in a stall. Then they took that light and put it on a racehorse hood. Voila! Your mare can hang out in a field with her friends, with a light shining in one eye. Because that light is blue, and only on one eye, she can still see all she needs to see.

Bonus feature: just this year they found that mares wearing the hood who were due to foal early in the season had bigger, stronger, healthier babies than mares on the same farm not wearing the hood. Biggest downside of Equilume is the cost (around $500) for something that can only be used for one season. I imagine that like all tech it will improve and get cheaper as time goes on. I also know that some of you would pay a lot more than $500 to not have your mare in a stall.

Horsepal

Can’t decide how many clothes your horse wants to wear tonight? I’m going to tell you, it’s fewer than you think. I find you humans are always cold compared to those of us with a fur coat. I digress. Turns out there’s an App (and a sensor) for that. Horseware Ireland, being a manufacturer of some of the best blankets on the planet, found out that lots of people have that same question, so they made Horsepal.

This is a small sensor that fits inside your horse’s blanket and checks temperature and humidity. Using that information, the Horsepal app tells you if your horse is likely too hot, too cold, or just right. The App links weather from your area and compiles past data for your horse so over time you can figure out which clothes will be best for what weather. Downside: it can’t send that data to you from the field, but it does store three days worth of data for you to download and review. I’m also not sure how useful this is in Florida, but I do think it gets cool points for helping you humans know how your horses are feeling in the field at 2 am.

KurtSystems

I’m including this one simply because it’s just so dang amazing! Seriously, when you humans put your mind to something, it’s unbelievable what you can do. The inventors of this system were trying to come up with a way to pre-train baby thoroughbreds. They looked at the research out there and found that if you could put babies through a build-up fitness program before you put a rider on them, you had fewer career (and even life) -ending injuries. But how do you do that?

Their solution certainly isn’t cheap, but it is pretty spectacular. The KurtSystem is basically a big monorail system for horses. They use this to start training horses on a track-size area (so way bigger than a roundpen) with no weight. The horses start with slow speeds and short distances and work up over 6 months to faster speeds (still not racing fast), longer distances, and even a bit of weight (around 70 pounds). The goal is to create horses who have some level of fitness, and an understanding of how to do their job before adding a floppy human to the whole system. It seems balancing you humans is really hard work! While I’m certain this won’t be a feature in every barn, it’s cool to geek out on it and to see someone trying so hard to prevent injuries in young thoroughbreds.

What’s your horse tech dream for 2018? My tech dream is a button I push to open the door. Although, I’ll admit, it is fun to watch my staff open and close and open and close it for me. Now scroll a little further down the page, enter your email, and subscribe to my blog. It will make you a better human.

Tuesdays with Tony is the official blog of Tony the Clinic Cat at Springhill Equine Veterinary Clinic in Newberry, Florida. If you liked this blog, please subscribe below, and share it with your friends on social media! For more information, please call us at (352) 472-1620, visit our website at SpringhillEquine.com, or follow us on Facebook!

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Eye Injuries

Eye Injuries

Dec 18, 2017 | Eyes

Tuesdays with Tony

As we get into the Christmas spirit, it seems horses can sense the strain on your wallet from all that shopping. As a cat I’m a little more conscientious about such things, of course, but horses get some sort of evil pleasure from making their owners squirm.

 Every Eye Injury is an Emergency

If you are a horse, one easy way to rack up a big vet bill in a short amount of time is by poking something in your eye. Remember that eye injuries are always an emergency, and the more time that passes before the right medication is initiated, the more expensive they can be to treat.

Corneal Ulcer

This is the most common eye injury in horses, but it can be just the tip of the iceberg. The cornea is the clear outermost layer of the eye that you see through. Puncture wounds, abrasions, and other forms of trauma can cause a break in this layer. Usually these “simple” ulcers will heal just with a few days of triple antibiotic ointment. However, any break in this protective outer layer creates the opportunity for infection. Uh-oh.

Stromal Abscess

When a corneal ulcer gets infected by any of the bacteria or fungus that exists in our lovely Florida soil, it becomes a ‘complicated’ ulcer. What often happens at this stage is the outer layer of cornea heals over, trapping the infection beneath. This is called a stromal abscess, which takes on average 8 weeks of medicating the eye 4 times a day to heal! No fun. A Stromal abscess can often be prevented by early treatment of a Corneal Ulcer. That’s why all eye injuries are an emergency! That, and….

 Iris Prolapse

Certain types of fungus that can infect corneal ulcers actually cause the cornea to ‘melt.’ The fancy medical term for this is keratomalacia, which would be great to use in a game of Scrabble! Melting corneal ulcers are the worst of the worst. If left untreated, they can cause iris prolapse, or rupture of the eye. It is every bit as gross as it sounds. Basically, the ooey gooey insides of the eye leak out through the hole in the cornea, until the iris (the part that gives the eye it’s color) blocks the hole. This requires emergency conjunctival graft surgery or enucleation (removal of the eye) to treat. This is definitely not something you want to make your horse endure due to your inaction.

An Ounce of Prevention

You can’t really protect your horse 100% from everything, because they’re a lot like cats in their ability to find a way to cause mischief. However, you can go a long way towards preventing eye injuries (injuries in general, really) by doing a few simple things. First, make sure they don’t have something sharp to scratch on. Check your stalls and fences regularly for nails and broken boards. Broken tree branches are another favorite scratching point. Also, don’t put your horses out with things like rusted-out car bodies, tractor implements, falling-down structures, and things like that. Just because your neighbor’s horse made it in that type of environment for 20 years is no guarantee that yours will.

A quality fly mask can also prevent many eye injuries. Gnats and flies are a major cause of itchy eyes, so keeping them away is a huge help. The mask itself will also keep most scratching sessions from becoming eye injuries. It’s a lot cheaper to buy a new fly mask every year than it is to treat an eye injury. Do your horse (and yourself) a favor, and cover it up!

The moral of the story

If your horse has a squinty, tearing, swollen, or otherwise weird-looking eye, don’t waste any time getting one of our amazing docs to check it out! Quick treatment can make a huge difference in whether or not your horse loses an eye, and it can also be the difference between hundreds of dollars and thousands of dollars. I’m a professional risk-taking cat, and I’m here to tell you: Don’t take risks with your horse’s eyes! There’s nothing to gain, and everything to lose.

Until next week,

-Tony

 

Tuesdays with Tony is the official blog of Tony the Clinic Cat at Springhill Equine Veterinary Clinic in Newberry, Florida. If you liked this blog, please subscribe below, and share it with your friends on social media! For more information, please call us at (352) 472-1620, visit our website at SpringhillEquine.com, or follow us on Facebook!

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