Arroyo’s weaning, and a call for help for his eyes

posted in Blog, FSHR Horses, Rescue Tales | Tuesday, August 10th, 2010

Arroyo’s weaning from Raven was difficult, but the reward was worth it for him, and for all of us people.

Arroyo gives a ride to Erin

This happy scene would never have been possible a month ago. Arroyo could not be separated from Raven. He could not keep his mind on anything else, including food, if she was more than 10 feet away from him outside the corral, or if he was in the corral without her, or if he was tied outside the corral while she was being worked inside.

They have always been together. That is, as long as I have known them. They starved together, were rescued together, went to the vet together, recovered together, and got spoiled rotten together.

Joined at the hip.

Arroyo and Raven in Spring, 2010

However, as they got to feeling like themselves again, Raven began to be more and more dominant over Arroyo. You can see it here. This summer she became downright aggressive toward him, biting, chasing, and causing him to injure himself on the legs, eyes and face because he could not see where he was going as he sought to escape her teeth. But every time we tried to separate them, Raven would sulk and go off her feed (quietly, so Arroyo wouldn’t know); and Arroyo would go stark raving crazy to the point of being dangerous.

We began the weaning by leaving Arroyo in the big corral, where he would have room to exercise his need to move, move, move, and put Raven in the small square pen directly adjacent. They stood together occasionally, separated only by a green corral panel. Most of the time though, Arroyo would frantically pace and call for her, even though she was right there. He wore a trench through that end of the corral, and I had to clean the mud twice a day during the rains to keep the flies down in his morass. We felt awful. After all they had been through together, and we had to remind ourselves that those wounds and scrapes all over him were Raven’s doing and that this was for everyone’s good. He was dangerous to handle during this time. I had to use a stud chain to keep myself safe, which made me feel even more awful even though he respected it. I also feared he would colic from the stress. He didn’t.

In a week we moved Raven into the next pen down, and put a different horse in the square pen. In her new pen, Raven could wander a few steps away from the corral, but then would go back, giving Arroyo the approach and retreat, only in reverse I guess. In a few days we moved her into the next pen, which is huge, and she was much happier. The feed trough was at the far end of it, but another feed trough served as the barrier between the huge pen and the corral, so the two horses could eat together, or Raven could take off and leave Arroyo for hours at a time. We gave this adjustment a little longer. Raven went off her feed for a couple of days but then went right back to being the same old Raven.

At each transfer, Arroyo became agitated, but eventually calmer than from the transition before. I found manure piles farther and farther out into the corral (which were much easier to pick up). He made friends with the other horses placed in the pens where Raven had been. He made friends with Angel, our other blind horse, when she was turned into the corral with him. We couldn’t leave them together, because she, like Raven, would chase him from his food though. She’d been born blind and was fine with it. Arroyo still had much confidence to gain. But he was doing it by leaps and bounds.

Calm and cool at the hitching post

At last he was able to stand calmly at the hitching post (you can see the dings and dents from Raven still on him) while THIS was going on in the corral:

Erin among others, riding a happy Raven

…which leads us to now, in which Raven is in a pen that is near the corral but in no way touches it; it is entirely separated by another pen…and we have:

Happy Arroyo!

But Arroyo is still suffering from uveitis, and is still a head-tosser; and though he knows the boundaries of the corral and has radar to detect other horses in the corral with him, he still occasionally whaps his poor eye into something, making it worse. A fly mask isn’t adequate protection for him at all. He needs something stiff, like race horse blinders, or something.

There is this thing called a Guardianmask but I don’t know if the eye pieces are sturdy enough to protect him if he whacks his head on something. I do like the sun protection built into them.

I also found online these race horse blinders with plexiglass bubbles that cover the whole eye…they come in clear, green and amber. I don’t know if plexiglass will hold up to smashing into trees, and I don’t think the eye bubbles have any protective value from the sunlight. They would sure keep the flies out though.

Any ideas/advice on eye protection for this lovable guy would be greatly appreciated. Thanks for reading!