A good day for a little foal

The morning started with an odd status report from the vet. She felt the foal had taken some steps back and the frustration was evident in her voice. “He is not responding to his mother at all. He has resorted to running from her again. He is not feeding well from the bottle.” The whole thing was pessimistic and not helpful. I started looking for answers myself. What would I do if Tech kicked him out because he’s perfectly healthy, but still needs “physical therapy”? How could I take care of a foal with a nasal tube for feeding? I worried all morning.
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Va Tech – the first 24 hours

On Saturday June 16 at 12:30 in the afternoon, dad and I were met by a team of 5, waiting to take Cori and her newborn into emergency care. One of the 5 took me to the front office to leave my credit card number (ah, modern medicine). The other 4 immediately began taking the baby’s vital signs and getting a history. He was already so much improved since the morning that he was walking very steadily – even bucking a little.

Dr. Tan was assigned to our case. As it turns out, she was also the primary vet for our foal Tsjemme, who came to Tech last year. “Dr. Tan”, I said as I shook her hand, “we gotta stop meeting like this”. She smiled and immediately went to work on the foal.

When Cori came out of the trailer, one of the tech’s said “my goodness, that is a beautiful mare!”. Of course, I swelled with pride. Cori became a little agitated if she could not see her foal, but otherwise she was, as usual, an angel. While Dr. Tan and two assistants did an evaluation on the baby, one tech held Cori, who quietly munched her hay, while the other started milking her. After these two saw what a sweetheart Cori is, they relaxed. The tech milking Cori just got down on her knees and milked, milked, milked. She stopped after getting more than a liter (think of the size of a liter bottle of soda pop), and this was because she simply got tired of milking. That’s my mare!

The baby already has a distinctive personality. He is strong and athletic and smart. Two techs could hardly hold the 12 hour foal, and when they tried to do things he did not like, he cleverly evaded them. I bred him to be a competitor, and I think he is going to be just that.

There were some very good signs that day – the foal was moving very well – an amazing improvement from 12 hours before. All his tests were perfect – IgG (thank you Dr Cassell, the emergency vet. You really saved him), blood gas, fluids, temp, tests for septicemia, pulse, ultrasounds, etc. Physically he is doing extremely well. No problems whatsoever. The vet put in an IV and NG tube (as seen in the picture above). The NG tube is to feed him until he can nurse. The IV tube was initially for fluids, and later for some antibiotics (he does not need it, but the vet wanted to make sure he did not get something from the germs in the hospital).

Dr. Tan feels her job is mostly done. He needs to be monitored, but his health is quite good. It is up to the vet techs now to feed him and help him learn how to suckle from his mom.

Today, Sunday, I visited Cori and baby at 9am. Cori is bored, but being so good. She is a hospital favorite I think. The baby was sleeping. Looking at his chart I saw that his pulse at 8am was much higher than normal. A note was beside the measurement, stating “this is because he is running around”. Ha! My little athlete.

I gowned up and went in to see him. I made him get up so I could monitor his interaction with Cori. He still did not see her as his momma, but at least he was no longer in a panic and avoiding her. He would even touch her with his nose every now and then. She was streaming milk, so I ushered him over and moved him closer to the teat., The streaming milk came into my hand and I rubbed some on his gums. At first he moved away, then smacked his lips as if to say “hmm – that is good!”. I then put a finger in his mouth and he ever so slightly sucked on it. I cheered with joy! If we can get him to suck, we can get him on a bottle. And if we can get him on a bottle, we can lure him to a teat. And once he understands that momma is where food comes from, he’ll be back on track.

Tomorrow is Monday and the hospital will be fully staffed with experienced, long term vet techs. I am hoping the lady who worked with Tsjemme will be there. One day at a time.

I’ll write more tomorrow.

Cori’s new son

Well, after waiting 338 days, Cori has given birth to her new son at 11:15 pm Friday night. He is a very pretty boy and very squirmy and vocal. He is a big foal, but fine – not huge like Hiltje’s boy Tsjemme was. This one is more like Cori’s first baby, Samson. He was able to stand within 2 hours.

The delivery went without a hitch, except that the umbilical cord did not break on its own. This was because the placenta was birthed totally with the foal. We found this to be odd, and later found out that it was an indicator of premature separation of the placenta from the mare – a bad thing. Meconium seemed to pass just fine. He stood in about 1.5 hours and things looked ok. I waited for him to nurse before feeling overly confident.

At 3 hours he still had not nursed, and was not showing interest in his mother (although she was doing everything she could to help him). It was 2am and I went to the foaling shed to try to encourage him. He did not seem to be “connecting the dots” – wandering into the stall corners and not exhibiting a sucking reflex. I knew this baby needed to eat as soon as possible, so I called the emergency vet to get advice. The vet heard my story and said “I am leaving now”.

The trip for the vet is nearly an hour, over Fancy Gap mountain. He showed up at 4am, with the foal 5 hours old. I had milk waiting for him (I milked using my new Udderly EZ milker – to be described in a future post). Dr. Cassell inserted a tube while I tried to hold the foal stationary. It took a few tries – this little guy is very strong and very active. Dr. Cassell and I once again tried to encourage him to nurse, but he did not seem to understand that his momma was the source of food. Dr. Cassell concluded that this was a case of neonatal maladjustment syndrome – known by the unfortunate lay person’s name of “dummy foal” (this is a terrible name because the foal is not “dumb”; he seems quite intelligent. But he does have some neurological problems with balance and suckling). Dr. Cassell said the fact that the entire placenta has been birthed so quickly indicated that the placenta had detached too quickly from the mare, thus depriving the foal of oxygen. Luckily, our foal’s symptoms were minor. Some foals with this can have seizures, infection, or be born dead. Our little guy’s inability to nurse is a small problem by comparison. We agreed that Dr. Cassell would return at 9am and we’d figure out what to do then.

By 9am Saturday, the foal was much stronger and moving much better. He was trying hard to nurse – but not nursing his mom. Rather, he seemed fixated on the hay rack in the corner, licking at it and bumping it in the same way a baby will bump the udder when trying to nurse. He still did not suck, but Dad tried some Karo syrup on his finger and the foal did lick at it – an improvement. Dr Cassell got there at 9am and tubed the foal again. He also checked vitals and did some blood work. Things looked pretty good.

“Well”, he said, “the baby needs to be taught to suck and get reorientated to his mom. This will take a little time and no one knows how long. You can leave him here and tube feed him every two hours, or take him to Va Tech hospital and let them work with him. They are equipped to do this.” Dad and I agreed – take him to Tech and see how he is after a few days. So for the second time in 36 hours, we hooked up the trailer and headed north over the mountain. This time with Cori and her 10 hour old foal in the back.

Our story will continue in the next post…