My garden is doing great. It is going gangbusters. I did plant a large variety of goodies. I am eating Lettuce from the garden have been for a couple of weeks. Sharing some with my neighbor Judy. Love ya Judy.
I should have taken pictures to post on here I will do that later and post a picture to go along with my story.
I ground drove Greyboy yesterday after work. Oh my gosh what a beautiful day. 72 degrees. I only went for a little walk, he was just fine. It was good for me that I took a walk, I need it, more than the skinny GB does. Of course I only walked him a little ways down the dirt road, did not leave the property line. I wanted it to be a good experience, (for me) LOL. I want to enjoy my time so that I will do it again and again, not make it miserable and then I decide to quit because it is no fun.
Soon we will be having hot weather and I do not do well in the heat, let’s put it this way, I don’t go out in the heat.
All in all it was good to be out with GB and his reward; staying out in the front yard eating grass. Mostly weeds really, but he likes it.
Went out to Flying R Ranch last weekend. Helped work the ranch. We had the best of America by Horseback event and it went really well. Had a lot of fun. Trail riding horse People are the best. They are great guest and very thankful for everything. I really enjoyed everyone. Thanks to everyone who made it a success. We look forward to the next visit in October.
I want to try my hand at having some chickens. I have been off and on again about it. I just need a few chickens for their eggs. I have read several books from the library and from my kind neighbor Judy.
I have my horses I have my garden, now I want my chickens. I don’t know, the way the food supply is today the only way to know what you are eating is to raise it yourself. We should all be a little more self sufficient and practice organic methods as much as possible. That is my reasoning behind getting the chickens. Then I think, well I am old the damage has been done, it aint gonna hurt to keep eating the poison food supply. 
I think I will start this adventure. I need to get me some chicks maybe 10, I would like to get the “Rhode Island Reds”
So GB healed up nicely. He finished up with his meds a few weeks ago. His eye wasn’t too bad to start with but it could have gotten bad.
So now I just have to get on him and ride. He is still a little brat. Buddy sour and barn sour. We have had some pretty good riding weather, I seem to be too tired after work to ride. It is probably a combination of being intimidate by the horse and not having anyone to go riding with.
GB is 19. You would think that he would just plug along. But NO! he does his old tricks of backing up to initimidate and scare the rider (Me). He is an Arab and he acts like an Arab when he is asked to do something he does not want to do. His bad behavior happens when I am too nice to him. I try the over the top be super nice to my horse, make my idea his idea etc, and then all I get is a bratty horse.
Last week on January 1, Greyboy injured his right eye. We had the vet out Dr. Root. He saw that Greyboy had scratched the cornea of his eye. Not too serious. Gave us “QuarterMaster cream for his eye. I have been putting that into his eye twice a day since then. He is doing better since then. He has his eye open all the time now so that is good. I will continue until the medicine is gone. It is a penicillin. On the bottom lid of GB’s eye it is a little swollen, not bad just a little and the inside of it is quite red.
Well end of story. Short and sweet. Vet was out today to take a look at Greyboy. Greyboy had issured his left eye. Scratch on the cornea. Not bad just needs some ointment.
So hubby asked Vet about the feed, Senior feed and molasses content. Vet said there is nothing wrong with it. He said a change in sugar content is the issue, but when a horse is use to the sugar content and that content does not change then there is no issue. He said he would hesitate to change anything in regards to feeding Captain because we are lucky that the horse is alive and walking around and not having any issues with his digestive system. We talked about Oats and he said they are good but he would not change a thing on Captain since it is a miracle that he doing as well as he is.
End of my story.
We have not started the oats as of yet. Don’t know why. He is still getting his Bute once in the morning and once in the evening. Feeding time is very late in the afternoon, 1:00pm and then again around 1:00am.
Captain is getting 10 – 12 cups of Senior feed a day. He gets 6 in the morning and 4 at night. He is also getting a hoof enhancement oil. I don’t have the name of it right now but will get that tomorrow and list it on here. His hoof growth lines are still not normal but they are tighter than the previous growth. I may try to post a video of him walking don’t know if the compatibility will be right. May have to post on youtube and then post it here.
I have been reading about whole Oats as a possibility for helping Captain out. As long as we get him off any sugars.
He gets enough Alfalfa to supply the Calcium that is needed to balance out the Phosphorous in the Oats.
Whole oats are ideal because:
• high proportion of mucilaginous substances
• high proportion of husks
• high prececal starch digestibility even before breakdown
• high fat content
• ideal to chew taking into account the horse’s dentition
• very high palatability
Information provided by http://www.thehorseshoof.com/oats1.html This is a very good read. I would recommend looking at the part 1 and part 2 of this article.
I hope you can see how awful the hoofs are. Believe or not they are better than they were last year. On one of the photos you can see where we mended a severe crack that went all the way up to the coronary band. He gets farrier work every 6 weeks. Yes his hoofs are long, Hubby is convinced that he is more comfortable with long heels and long hoofs.
We are trying to get those hoofs shorter as the Laminae become more attached. He has dealt with several abscesses during the last couple of years.
We will be buying some oats and slowly switch him over from the Senior feed. We do not want any sugars in his supplement feed.
I decided that I am going to do a daily report on Captain. He is an 18-year-old Arabian Gelding. He foundered in September 2009. My husband has been caring for him ever since.
Captain is fed twice a day grass hay. A mixture of Orchard grass and 30% Alfalfa. He also gets Senior Feed made by Nutrina. It has a lot of Molasses in it. Which is bad for a foundered horse. I think I have my husband convinced that we need to switch his feed to something with no sugars in it.
I am going to post pictures, I will try to get a daily photo on here. Plus an update daily. I don’t think some days will be much of a change but we will see. I just checked out some sites talking about Oats as a good source for feed supplement. From what I read it sounds like just the ticket. We did buy some different feed today only because the feed store was out of Senior Feed. Of course we will be switching him over slowly to the new feed. This will be a two-week process as recommended.
Captain has been on Bute for two years now and he is still alive amazingly so. I will get photos of his feet. They are a God-Awful mess. You will see them tomorrow when I post his first photo.
Currently he has a good attitude, looks forward to his food and company. He is a very loving horse. With all the pain he is going through, you would think he would have a sorry attitude.
He was severely losing weight a couple of months ago and so my husband increased the amount of Senior feed and his weight did come back on. But, he is now getting three times the amount of sugar.
So you all will take a journey with me from the beginning of his new feed program. It will be a few weeks before he is on the oats. We will share his journey.
Wish us luck, and may God bless Captain.
