Twins

We put Dandee in the stall last night, we knew that she would foal soon. My DH had checked on her at around 3:00 AM and had come back to bed, he said that she wasn't doing anything. At around 3:20 I heard her lay down, so I got up and looked out and could tell she was in labor. I woke my husband up and we both got dressed. Under normal circumstances, we usually have plenty of time to dress and gather needed supplies but not tonight. By the time we got out there she had already delivered a normal sized black filly.

Dandee always gets very heavy in foal, she always looks like a blimp but she had been blimpier than usual this year. But we never once suspected twins, I was just afraid that she would have a very large foal.

When she kicked that normal sized (but smaller than she usually has) filly out on the ground and didn't even look like she had foaled, I said that maybe she was going to have twins, to which my husband replied, "Well, I didn't want to say it." Anyone who breeds horses knows that twins are a very dangerous and rare thing in horses.

Mares will normally abort twins or one will be still born prematurely and the other will be carried full term and deliver as a normal single but usually both foals will die and sometimes you will lose the mother as well.

Dandee was due yesterday, so many things just didn't add up here, she was full term and had a normal healthy foal but she was obviously still in labor and soon a bubble of placenta presented itself and I ran for a kitchen knife. My DH cut through the placenta and another bubble appeared immediately with two more feet in it. The second baby was born normally and quickly with no problems but is smaller than the first.

Both of our new foals are fillies, the first born is coal black with a blaze, two hind socks and two partial front socks. The second is solid bay with no markings whatsoever. The bad news is that they are Appaloosas with not one spot between them. But the good news is that our Appaloosa Stallion is a 100% color producer, so they will both roan out into colorful, spotted ApHC horses.

The second filly is small and a little on the weak side, she did stand and walk quickly with some assistance from my DH. But we did have to milk the mare and give her a bottle because she still has not nursed on her own.

Of course, Dandee has not been a problem in the least, she is a great mother that nurses other mares babies, so having two of her own is no big deal. She has tandem nursed before with a foal on each side and one of them was just a thief.

Dandee is a Quarter horse mare, a few years ago we had bred her to a paint stallion. she had a loud dun paint filly. One of our Appy mares had a Leopard colt, so here was Dandee, a solid bay mare with a loud paint foal on one side and a leopard foal on the other, that was quite a sight.

Here are the first pictures of our twin foals born at Pintura Springs.