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runamuk

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This isn't mini related has to do with a yearling appy/arab foal that has had sudden weight loss (we aren't talking a little) If you feel more comfortable chatting offline pm or email me thanks......

We are checking teeth and doing extra worming no signs of illness (ie cold flu etc) but has gone from a chubby tubby to emaciated in less than a month...none of the other pasture mates have lost any weight if anything everyone else is getting plumper.....any ideas??
 
I wasn't trying to exclude any one if there are any ideas please let me know........this is very very odd and really sudden.......the vet will be seeing this horse but ideas as to what we might be looking for could speed things up.......he is eating and drinking quite normally but if he keeps losing weight at this rate he will quite literally disappear
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yes he is that thin that fast.......

ideas
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Rori,

I am so sorry to hear this. Keeping the yearling in my thoughts.

You are right in thinking that something is going on as this isn't normal especially is every one else is doing great. The only time I have seen a horse drop weight that quickly with all the food it could eat sitting in front of it and good deworming and dental programs was with my 18 year old full Arab mare back in 1995. This is a mare that would remain fat on just the thought of giving her grain. We had upped her grain slowly to 3 pounds per day and she was still loosing weight like I have never seen before. She was on pasture 24x7 and we were feeding her alfalfa in July even though the pasture was really all she should have needed. We had bloodwork done and her sugar levels were super elevated. And she did get ringworm as well. After all things were looked at, we had to euthanize her as she was still loosing 50 pounds per weekend, at least it looked that way. (I miss my old vet!!!! I wish she was still in practice here!) Anyway, What it turned out to be is a patuitary (ps) tumor and well, at the time that wasn't cureable, and I am not sure about it now.

Just a thought that came to my mind just now... I recall another time I saw severe weight loss with a young horse. I had a just barely 3 year old mare that had her teeth done and everything was fine, then within 3 months she went from being fat to ribs showing. Humm... not sure what was wrong with her, so had the vet out and found that the way she was shedding her baby teeth was somewhat strange. Normally they loose the top tooth and the bottom one about the same time (or so I was told by the vet) and what happened in my mare's case was that the top tooth came out much much later than the bottom one. This allowed the bottom one to grow in much too quick and it was causing issues by hitting the upper gums. We had to have her teeth floated a second time within a 3 month period and that fixed the issue. I wonder if this could be the case with the yearling???

Please let us know what you find out as I am really curious on this one.
 

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