Blackie & Red Journal Day Five

posted in FSHR Horses, Horses, Rescue Horses | Wednesday, February 17th, 2010

Monday Feb. 15

It’s some holiday today…let’s see, oh, yes, it’s President’s Day. The kids are off school. Too many four-day weekends if you ask me.

This morning I noticed tiny red specks. Three or four of them, little drops of blood, in the iced-up snow at the gate where I drop one of the hay flakes. So I examine their faces, but I don’t notice any cuts. The goats accompanied me everywhere. They are cute and annoying. Again, it seemed Blackie was the dominant one.

Red's face. He's going to be hard to distinguish from Mooch when he fills out.

I am tempted to try to medicate Red’s clouded eye. The vet had told us that the cloud was moon blindness too long untreated and there was nothing we could do for it. But the area around the cloud looked red and inflamed. His eye must hurt, I thought.  Our farrier, an old cowboy, suggested blowing sugar in it. I had heard this suggestion once before, by another cowboy, concerning Angel. I suppose I should ask a vet about it.

Blackie was flinging and dropping her mush around, kind of like Tempo does. Red inhales his, keeping his nose in the bottom of the bucket without lifting it until the food is gone, at which point he lifts his head and flings the pail somewhere.

Mooch

At the noon feeding I checked again for blood drops but they were gone. I haltered Blackie first and then Red, which is becoming routine. I tied them out and fed them more mush along with 5 lbs of hay. Red scarfed all his hay, and Blackie ate only half. The thing about Blackie is that she will not eat if you’re brushing her, standing beside her, or even looking at her from the other side of Red. She will only eat and drink if no one is paying her any attention.

Erin takes Blackie. Here she is trying to get her to step backwards.

My daughter, Erin, came over to help with their walk. She took Blackie and I took Red and we headed south down the road (last time we went north). They did just fine, and took no notice of cars whizzing past.