We had ridden together up at Hanna's cabin on her neighbor's horses, Hanna rode a spirited chestnut named Chico and I rode a gentle grey named Sal, and once at one of my birthday parties.
It was arranged that Hanna would ride Elfie the western buckskin, since Elfie was nearly bullet proof and also the only horse available who was a true western pleasure horse, since Hanna preferred western to English, and I would ride the unpredictable Twilight.
We arrived at Bishops fairly early in the morning, and in a rush, for what ever reason I cannot remember. We went out to the large mountain pasture and collected our respective horses and took them into the stalls to groom them. Something was off, but neither of us could place it. Gretchen was there and was hovering nervously about, wanting to make sure nothing bad happened to Hanna, and Twilight was fidgety.
I brushed Twilight quickly, without really paying attention to what I was doing, happily chatting with Hanna about all the places and trails to explore on our ride. She and Elfie were getting along wonderfully, and Hanna and I were giggling and tingling with excitement.
Suddenly Gretchen voice, unusually sharp and stern cut through our revelry. "Gabbi, look at Twilight's leg! You can't ride her."
Silence dispersed through the barn like dust. I looked down at Twilight's legs, and noticed her knee on the left leg was horribly swollen, and when I bent down and lightly ran my fingers over her skin, it was tender and hot with infection.
The ride wasn't happening, there were no other horses in the barn that were trail savvy that I could ride. I apologized to Hanna and she was taken home.
Now I had to deal with Twilight. "We need to soak her leg, with high pressure water." Gretchen said. But neither of us did anything right away, we were just staring at that leg, Twilight kept tossing her head and dancing slightly on her toes.
"How did this happen?" I croaked
"She probably impaled herself somehow on the barbwire," Gretchen replied bitterly. Barbwire was snarled into the fence along several portions of the mountain pasture, there was no way to get rid of it.
"So how are we going to do this?" I asked, I had tried giving Twilight a bath before, and she had trembled and finally snapped her tie when she could not stand being under the stream of water. Her bath had lasted only about three minutes.
"Start by spraying the water near her hooves, then work your way up her leg," Gretchen instructed, her warm brown mouth trapped in a frown. "You are going to have to come up and soak it at least twice a day, we need to flush the infection out, and reduce the inflammation."
I agreed without question, I felt guilty, I should have noticed the wound as soon as we brought Twilight in from the pasture. Gretchen held her lead rope, while went and turned on the water pump and walked back over to Twilight with the hose, she tossed her head up, and looked at me with one eye, the white rims around the edges bulging.
"Easy girl." I coaxed.
She danced in place a bit, but she let me spray her hot leg with the cold water, we soaked it for about ten minutes before turning her out again. Gretchen did not want her out in the large pasture with this injury, so we kept her in the paddock next to the pasture with Penelope. Mateo was outraged of course, but it was high time he and Twilight were given a little space from each other, plus we all knew that watchful wise Adam would keep and eye on the fiery colt.
When I got home, I immediately started researching barbwire wounds on the Internet, I discovered that Twilight's particular wound was called a puncture wound, and that in order to reduce the swelling and prevent the wound from abscessing it had to be kept open with peroxide and soap and warm water. I also discovered the wound should be rubbed down to try and help with drainage. I added my treatment to the one Gretchen had already suggested.
The more I researched, the more worried I became, some horses are made lame by puncture wounds, they have a hard time transitioning from their gaits, and are constantly bother by their legs.
This was Twilight's first major injury since being in my care, and I was worried sick. I remembered when Sarah first bought Penelope, how protective she'd been for her horse. The first accident Sarah had with Penelope was walking her out of the barn from her stall. It had happened so quickly, they turned out of the stall and onto the cement floor of the barn and Penelope's hooves lost their purchase, she fell down, back legs first followed by her massive half Shire body. Her back legs slid under the hay trailer and banged against the axle. And then she scrambled for her feet, large hooves clanging in frightened desperation, before she hauled her body back up.
Sarah was trembling as she checked her horse over cursing softly to herself, her face was pale and her eyes flickered constantly over Penelope, for a week she walked around Penelope as if she were on fragile ground, afraid of breaking the over one ton wonder.
What would Sarah of done if Penelope was hurt beyond repair? What would I do with Twilight if she was beyond healing. Could I live with my first horse being an un-ridable lame one? That was probably the biggest shock of the day, for the first time ever I was actually considering Twilight as possibly being my own.
Nice pictures! ;P
ReplyDeleteI'm glad that you're going back and writing these stories. They give me some insight.