Pony Problems

We had been planning to go for a little drive today but when I fed this morning Flora was foaming and drooling at the mouth. My immediate thought was that she ate something noxious. She dug into her breakfast so I wasn't too concerned.

A couple hours later we were getting ready to leave and I went up to check on her. She was still drooling (but not foamy) and now her neck was slightly extended and she was holding her mouth open and her tongue was kind of hanging out. Now I was concerned!

I checked on-line and it sounded like she had something stuck in her throat, or she was choking. It sounds worse than it is. Apparently in horses it's not as serious as it would be in humans or cattle.

So I put a call in to the vet. An hour later no one had called back so I called again. The office person got the vet on the phone and he was unable to respond. So they contacted the other vet who was in the field and he called me back after a while.

He listened to me describe the symptoms and assured me it would not be life threatening and in fact often resolves itself. He wouldn't be able to come out until about 3pm (which was 2 hours from then). He said if it didn't resolve itself, then he would come out.

Sure enough, she was still drooling and seemed uncomfortable. The vet showed up and started an examination. Flora was being uncooperative so she got a little relaxing shot. Upon initial examination the vet determined that she probably just needed her teeth floated, which he did. Then he had me hold her tongue out to the side while he looked a little closer.

And it's a good thing he did. He found a large ulceration on the bottom of her tongue. Then he found a small twig or thick weed or something wedged in-between some back teeth. It was sticking out in such a way that it was the likely culprit of the ulceration. He actually had to get some pliers to pull the thing out.

I am happy to report at this time that at feeding time Flora seemed much better already, and she was not drooling at all.

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Side note:

I haven't done any more wallpapering yet, but the two rows are still up and don't have any lumps or bubbles!