KaraKum Stud Blog | Why do horses get sick on Saturday nights?

Sunday 18th, September 2005

Why do horses get sick on Saturday nights?09/18/2005 05:08 PM

Last night we had good friends over for dinner and winetasting.
We compared Italian wines with Napa Valley wines. I must confess I'm still a little bit conservative about wine and still prefer the old world wines from those of the new world.
After a nice evening together we waved good bye to our friends at 1 am, and... heard a banging noice from the stables. We of course went straight out and found Merdjen rolling in her stall. She had a little bit of Tifton hay for lunch and obviously she can no longer even taste the Tifton without colicing. We gave her Banamine and waited for an hour, at 2 am she still looked miserable so we called the vet.

Therefore I spent part two of the Saturday night walking my horse under an almost full Florida moon, while Todd was on the phone with the vet, and actually had quite a good time, the night was warm and Merdjen and I were all by ourselves, eventhough I was thinking for a while that if we hadn't had all this horses I could have slept in my nice and warm bed by now and why do horses manage to get ill at such inconvenient times. I recalled the number of times that we have had to postpone dinners or more or less serve dinner in the stables due to ill horses, even on our wedding night we had to tend for an ill horse.
In spite of all this though, I consider myself priviledged to have had the opportunity to spend so much time with horses. They really affect my life more than I mostly admit to myself. The symbiotic life between humans and horses is so special and so strong, it is difficult to explain in words.
Interestinlgy enough research in this area is becoming popular and it will be interesting to see how science explains this symbiosis. I was disappointed to see that I missed lectures within this interesting new research area that will be held at Uppsala University this fall. Hopefully I can lay my hands on some of the written material though.

The vet arrived out of the darkness with his big truck and the magic was broken. Merdjen was treated and recovered completely. She will never touch Tifton hay again, it feels like she had almost an allergic reaction to the hay as she got such a small amount and reacted so strongly. I would really appreciate if anyone else that have had similar experiences with the Tifton contacted me.

Comments :

1. maria09/20/2005 18:16:40

Jessica, what's Tifton hay???

I can testify the inconvenience of horses getting sick when they shouldn't: four years ago I sent Altai to full livery 75 miles away from home when I was going through a lot of upheaval, moving house and getting married. I sent him away with a heavy heart but I wasn't coping with commuting between four places: work, my house, Nigel's house, stable.

I went to visit him a few days later and found him rather unsettled and not quite himself. It was hard to pin down and people told me I was fussing for no good reason and the livery owner hinted that they didn't really want me to keep coming and checking on him, which, I guess, is fair enough.

After 5 weeks - the day before our wedding!!!!!! - I had a message on the answer-phone saying "Altai had colicked". I tried to ring back but was unable to reach the livery owner. Needless to say, I was sick with guilt and worry and ready to call off the wedding (and, probably, the rest of my life).

The wedding went ahead but then we were due to leave for Europe for a week the same evening and I had to trust that I will still have a horse when I got back.

Well, I did and he got moved as soon as we were back and took 10 minutes to settle in the new place. I learned a valuable lesson: TRUST YOURSELF. Try to recognise in yourself when you are exaggerating and worrying in vain but, at the end of the day, if you think the horse you know well looks distressed, it probably IS distressed. It can be for all sorts of reasons and hotbloods are notorious for being picky about their surroundings. Colick is usually food induced but I am convinced other factors can sometimes play a part too.

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