Rehabing my own neglect

[gibsongrrl]

I don't know if you remember but I posted about my mini, Sugar, a month or so ago. I let her get way too skinny over the winter and her crest collapsed.

She is looking better. Still not where I want her to be by a longshot, but I understand putting on weight takes time. One of my biggest obstacles is my mini donkey, Sparky. He's way too fat, and hates to be away from Sugar, so I have to find a nice balance.

Good news is they are now getting some turnout. The grass is fried, so I don't worry too much about the donkey. I know I'll have to be careful with them both if we start to get rain. More good news is that we are going to convert their run-in into a little barn with two separate stalls, so I can truly separate them at feeding time, which will help as well.

Anyway, I gave Sugar a bath yesterday and oiled her hooves, so I thought I'd share some photos. Again, she's not where I want her to be right now, but I do think she looks and feels better.

You can really see the fallen crest in this photo. Doesn't look so bad, but when she raises her head and neck, it really flops over. Hoping this will get better.

With her flysheet to help keep the flys off her neck since I roached her mane.

And with everybody's buddy, Hotdog.

Thanks for letting me share.

-Kristie

 

[_minihorses4ever_]

She looks like she is defintely on the right path. Don't beat yourself up over it! You realised your mistake, and now you are fixing it. Horse ownership is always about learning.

Keep up the good work!

 

[dgrminis]

She looks like she is coming along and as I am sure others have said dont beat yourself up because you are at least admitting your mistake and you are taking responsibility and fixing it

That is how we learn things

Keep up the good work!

 

[Charley]

Her weight is coming along so well. Keep up the good work. Her crest looks in the pictures to be coming along as well. Doesn't look like a broken crest so hopefully it will heal also. I think you may have done the right thing by roaching her mane so the weight is not pulling it to one side or the other. We had a gelding that had his mane trained to split and had half his mane on each side. It was cute. You may want to do that with hers when it grows back.

 

[Boinky]

i have personally never seen a truly broken crest from being thin. i have seen them flop over because of being thin and too much mane hair but it's not what i'd consider a truly broken crest. I've never seen one not pop back up once they have fat and neck muscle rebuilt there. Her's should go back up with no problem once she has the weight back on and keep the mane thinner.

I HAVE seen some broken crests due to being way too fat and those are very different and will never go back up.

 

[MyBarakah]

Hi! I think you are doing a great job and quite being so hard on yourself! Horses are VERY forgiving!

You are very good at being able to see that your horse was under weight and you were able to do something about it! Which is allot more than what I can say about other horse people! Just keep up the good work!

 

[HGFarm]

I think you are doing a great job as well, and being careful while managing their weight for both. Maybe if you feed her extra, put her in a pen where the donkey can see her but not eat her food too? So they are next to each other?

Just a general question.. have you had her teeth floated? If she is not chewing correctly, she will not be able to put on much weight. Her hair coat looks good.. she is coming along!

Maybe add some Sr food to her diet for a while til her weight comes back on? None for Mr. Donkey though, LOL