It's a Filly!

I had a plan, was looking forward to working the plan but Jetta didn't want to cooperate. I stayed up with her all night on Tuesday night. I had the new Mary Higgins Clark book, so I sat in my lounge chair out in the barn with my headlamp on, reading. She was anxious and nervous all night. This is just not her character, so I thought that she might be in early labor. We had tasted her milk, it had turned white and was just slightly sweet, so it was possible.

She had calmed down by morning and by around 10:00 a.m., she had waxed.When my DH got home from work he put her back out in the dry lot, so he could clean out her stall. I decided to take a nap to prepare myself for a long night. Before I laid down I took her picture eating some hay.While I was napping, my DH came in to get something to eat and the next thing that I know he is waking me up saying that it is a filly and she is already dry. I jumped up feeling cheated and mad. I wait all year for this and then miss it because I take a little nap!

If this had been twins we would not have been there to get the second one out quickly and since we knew this one was going to be really big, she probably could have used a little help. It helps to get the baby out as quickly as possible because they just get up faster and learn to nurse easier. With slow, hard labors the foals can have dumb foal syndrome and just have a little more of a struggle in the beginning.

This is what I found when I arrived on the scene...I named this filly "Sky" on the spot because of her unusual eyes that were the first things that I noticed about her. She is very large and didn't want to nurse as quickly as we would have liked but with my Husband's great skill at getting a newborn foal to nurse, she was nursing within a couple of hours.

She is a dark brown or bay with roan mare and tail, blanket with black spots and she has partial blue eyes. This is the first blue eyes that we have ever had here at Pintura Springs other than Grandkids.The above photo was taken as she first found her feet.



There will be no running under Mommy's belly to hide from danger with this big filly.
And last but not least a Family Picture that includes Sky's sire who came to look her over and pass out cigars.
It is dark and rainy here today, so Sky and her Mother are still in the stall and it is too dark to get any new pictures unless the weather changes.

Foaling Anxiety

I am going to try to answer your questions here, Rae. I don't know what is up with all of the problems trying to leave comments, but I wish they would try to get it fixed.

One thing that you said in your comment was: "So who knows???" and that is a great summery. We have been foaling mares for many, many years and I still get nervous and anxious with each one. I lose many hours of sleep and when I do sleep it is so light that the lest noise startles me. Our foaling stall is right outside our living room door, so that makes it very convenient.

My DH just goes to bed and says, "Wake me up when you see feet." He figures I worry enough for both of us. But if he doesn't have to work the next day he does occasionally set his alarm and checks the mare throughout the night to let me get some rest.

We have had mares foal at all hours, day and night. All mares are totally different but I do take notes on each mare and they usually follow the same pattern year after year. We have one mare who stands and eats hay, stops, yawns, then yawns again, then lies down and pops the baby out. She shows no signs of foaling other than yawning.

We have had mares who just turn and look at their bellies on one side, then turn and look at their bellies on the other side, then lay down and foal. We had one mare who would try to destroy the stall. One of our mares was an embryo transplant mare for many years for a popular show stallion and she thinks that it takes a whole crew of people for her to foal. She will definitely let you know when her time has come, she wants you to hold her hoof and tell her to breathe.

People do not understand why we watch our horses so closely and won't leave home if we have one close to foaling but we have had so many times that if we hadn't been there we would have lost both the mare and the foal, we take it seriously because they are our responsibility.

Another sign that you can look for but probably not with Georgia is by opening the vulva. Mares will normally be pink inside but will become very red during or right before labor. Their udder can look tight without being tight also, the only way that you can tell that the udder is strutted to the max is by touching it, again this is probably not possible with your mare.

I would just about bet you that your mare has the same bloodlines as mine. Our mare is a registered TW and she is beautiful but totally nuts, we took her in on trade from someone who rescued her, they thought that she had been mistreated and would come around but she never did and she ended up kicking the lady. From what I have been told about the bloodline they are the smoothest of the smooth but are crazy and very high strung. The good news is that we have had two foals by her and she has not passed this trait down to her foals when bred to a level headed stallion.

We have thirty something horses at the moment and we have had tons of abscesses, we have even had two get abscesses in two feet at once. They are very painful and disturbing to see but they eventually blow out the top of the hoof and all the pain is relieved. You can have a Vet or Farrier open them up but we only did that once because it really didn't help that much.

As for the bute, we don't use it. We do use banamine and it has it's problems too. I have even been told by a Vet that she doesn't recommend the injectable because it can cause a rotting hole at the injection site. We have given a lot of shots and have never had a problem with it but I guess the paste is safer.

Late Night

I set my alarm to wake me at 2:00 am and went to bed. I woke up at 1:00 am and went out to check on Calico. She was just doing what she is always doing when I go out there, lying there chewing her cud, breathing rapidly, grunting occasionally. The only thing new this time was that she maa'd softly three times. They sometimes do that when they are in labor, they talk to their babies, her udder is tight now and strutted. Everything is ready for those babies to come and boy do I ever wish that they would hurry up.

I would love to get this one behind me because this doe is worrying me so much, she is going to have multiples, she looks like she could have a rectal prolapse, so someone will have to assist her in delivery. The worst part of it all is that we have a busy week scheduled with some things that can't be canceled. I may have to find a goat sitter, someone who isn't afraid to help deliver kids and perhaps fix a prolapse.

I have the coffee pot ready to brew, just in case she goes tonight. The first law of kidding or foaling is to have a fresh pot of coffee prepared. Calico is a first freshener, which means that I don't know what to expect from her because she has never had kids before. Cinder always gives very clear signs of labor, her udder is strutted, she talks to her babies, paws in the straw to make a nest and has a large amount of discharge right at the beginning and throughout labor.

Cinder

Cinder my Nubian goat started the first stages of labor at around 12:30 PM. She delivered a set of twins at 3:00 this afternoon, this is her third set in the three times that she has been bred, each time they have been a buckling and a doeling. This is our second set of twins in one day, a first for us!

News Flash

At 11:30 this morning, "Morning" our TW mare waxed heavily and she is now in labor, my DH came home for lunch and cleaned out her stall and restrawed it. More later...

Happy Easter!

Easter is as early this year as you will ever see it again in your lifetime. Everything seems early this year, we were looking forward to Spring but it came up in such a whirlwind that the temperatures haven't had time to catch up yet.

Giselle is still not doing well, she is off her feed and not getting up at all, she did go outside and stand for just a few minutes today but then went back inside to lie down and she hasn't moved since. She hasn't eaten any hay or grain, she wouldn't even eat treats. I took some warm molasses water to her at about 11:30 tonight and she drank quite a bit, but that is all she has had.

Her tail end had some goo hanging from it this morning which is a good sign that labor is close but I have been checking on her every 30 minutes all through the night and she isn't doing anything. She is just lying very still and has a glazed look in her eyes.

It is now 3:03 in the morning and after checking on her the last time I have decided that she has all of the symptoms of Pregnancy Toxemia and I have mixed up a drench for her again, karo syrup, molasses, nutri-drench, B-complex vitamins and crunched-up tums. I am giving her the drench syringe full (50 ml) every two hours, then following that up with 50 ml of yogurt. She isn't happy about it, she just wants to be left alone. No sleep for me tonight...

More Waiting

Still no babies, they just love torturing me. I usually check on everyone at about 2:00 a.m., if everyone is settled down and sleeping quietly then I go to bed for good unless I just happen to wake up, which I do occasionally. I wake up in a total panic thinking that I have missed something.

I am confident in the mares not being quite ready to foal yet because I have a lot of horse experience but the goats have me tied in knots. They are so big and seem so miserable and I hear tales of does kidding without their udders being strutted and with no signs of labor whatsoever, so since I don't know their exact due dates, I am a little edgy.

We rewrapped Morning's leg this evening and it looked very good, when we changed the dressing two days ago it didn't look so good, so I was concerned about it. My DH got to hose it thoroughly the last time, so I think that really helped.

Morning doesn't do much for my ego. I went out with my hair down today, she nearly tore the side of the barn down and almost jumped the gate. She hates me with my hair down, she thinks that I am an alien from a horse devouring planet or perhaps an unidentified blood sucking earth creature.

Spring Ahead

As I write this it is nearly 8:00 am but it is really nearly 7:00 am. Which means that I lost an hour of sleep and I can tell it. I guess that I can gain it back in November but that is an awful long time to wait.

I really like Daylight Savings Time and think that it is a wonderful idea. I don't know why it is a good idea. It does seem to make the days longer but that is probably an optical illusion.

Morning gave us fits last night, she was restless and pawing in her stall. I got up and watched her for awhile to make sure that she wasn't going into labor but she was just shaking her head, pawing and generally making lots of noise.

I woke my husband up to ask if he had checked her utter and was she strutted? He got up and went out, then came back to bed and said that she is filling up but not strutted. She continued to raise cane, so he got up and watched her for awhile. I guess she is just feeling better and tired of being cooped up.

This is one disadvantage of living in the barn, mares in labor usually try not to wake you up but devious horses like Morning, sleep all day and keep you awake at night. I know that she needs some exercise and some sunshine but we really don't have a place to turn her out that isn't muddy and/or uneven ground, we are hoping that it dries out some this week.

We are so amazed at how quickly and well this injury is healing, every time we unwrap it we are so pleased, I just wish that I had taken pictures. The extensor tendon is still not healed, so she can't always control her foot and it knuckles under, so that she steps on the front of her ankle, then she totally panics but she panics over everything anyway.

This mare acts like there is danger all around her at all times, to the point of injuring herself over non-existent threats. She has never been mistreated while we have had her and the lady that had her before us bought her at auction and thought that she had been abused but I just think that it the way she is wired. I have been told that this is common in her bloodlines.

She has absolutely no redeeming quality other than she is black, beautiful, has an extremely smooth gait, is very pleasant to watch in the pasture, has good bloodlines and doesn't seem to pass her spirit on to her offspring but then we have only had one foal out of her. Handling this mare is a nightmare. I will try to get some pictures of her and her well healing injury when I can and post them on here.