This message is from: "Reena Giola" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Thanks Gail
the vet is very optimistic that he will pull through and be fine, just my mare had the 'colitis' and sadly passed away..........this is years before getting Gus. Anyhow, she was 10 times worse then he is. Thankfully it was caught early and early measures were taken for hydration, but he is still dehydrated, not severely but it's there. There was no impaction and this whole thing came on suddenly........I've had him 5 1/2 years and have never had a problem with him.....no signs or symptoms even relating to this. .....only a mild depression after vaccines and that is it. but as he was acting so NOT himself the barn owners caught it right away and called the vet......we did what we could locally but he just has something else going on in there. Ultrasound looked really good with lots of motility, but white blood cell count is up.........so they are treating him and I know he is in the best of care, better then he'd get if he was home/barn............ Colitis is really just a term they use when they aren't sure what it is (nothing specific/caused by who knows what) and it involves the colon/gi tract.....of course the resident vet on the list can correct me if I am wrong........ Reena -------Original Message------- From: fjordhorse@angus.mystery.com Date: 5/22/2004 7:06:45 PM To: fjordhorse@angus.mystery.com Subject: RE: thoughts and prayers This message is from: "Gail Russell" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Reena, I have experience with colitis. Had my mare end up in the vet school at UC Davis with it (California). I gather it is not all that common. The vets were not hopeful for my mare, but she did fine. Here is what happened. Maybe this will help. They took her in and put her on an IV to try to get the impacted gut contents moving. I gathered that an impaction can result from the chronic gut irritation that can come with colitis. They also started feeding her only a handful of hay at a time, and switched her over to pellets. The key was nice fine hay....nothing stemmy or hard to digest. She spent a few days there and looked pretty good when I got her home, but was still not feeling great. (She had been having nasty cramps, that caused her to try to sit down on her haunches (like a dog....known in the vet world as "dogsitting"). I believe that she had had it (colitis) for quite a while....after a stressful transport experience....and that it finally manifested itself in a serious way in an impaction after her gut was further irritated by treatment with bute for laminitis. My vet said the extra hydration of her feed was not necessary, but this is what I did. I slowly converted her to pellet feed. They were having me give her psyillium as well, so it was mixed into her ration. I wet her feed to EXCESSIVE EXTENTS. My vet said this was not necessary, but it seemed to me that any moisture I could get into her gut might help. I fed her six to eight times a day at first.....some hay at first as I slowly converted her to pellet feed. I put so much water into her food that she had to almost go snorkeling for her feed. By the time a meal was finished, she was covered in gooey alfalfa pellet/water paste. She hated it, but was hungry enough to dive into the soup I gave her. Eventually I bought two Happy Trails Feeders automatic feeders that I used to feed her pellets (and later hay....dry at this point) on a six to eight times a day schedule. That went on for a couple of months. By the time I was done, (and able to return her to a hay diet) her coat was fantastic and she was in fantastic condition. I also gave her ulcer meds.....Gastrogard, at $700 a month, with no real reason to belief that it would affect her hind gut. I am not certain it was all that helpful. When I picked her up from Davis they thought that she had a chronic form of colitis, and that she would never be able to tolerate hay. They suggested putting her out on soft, green pasture grass when she was stabilized. I do not have access to pasture.....but was able to bring her back to grass hay consumption with careful care. The Happy Trails Feeders are expensive. Another route is something called "Quick Feed" feeders. They are still around $200 (you can order them online) but they will put out a small amount of pellets at a time, without you having to get up at all hours to feed. Anyway, I am sending good thoughts and prayers too.....but just wanted to let you know that I had a horse that was colicking SEVERELY with colitis (my local vet recently told me she did not have much hope for the mare when she sent her to Davis)....and pulled through just fine, even though the vets were not optimistic. Gail -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Reena Giola Sent: Saturday, May 22, 2004 2:21 PM To: fjordhorse@angus.mystery.com Subject: thoughts and prayers This message is from: "Reena Giola" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Hey all, we need some here for Gustav........he has been colicky the last two days.......and after treatment perks up, etc., well this morning the local vet is at whits end and tell me he needs to go to MSU vet school (clinic) cause she has really done everything possible and he is NOT getting better...... so there he is poor guy, an hour and half away from me.........nothing was determined for a fact about what is going on, other then it is colitis (sp?) ......so please put some prayers out that the treatments work and he gets better........he is my baby......... crying here in MI Reena [demime 1.01d removed an attachment of type image/gif which had a name of IMSTP.gif]
