Summer Vacay

 Cinder got two easy weeks after Split Rock. The first week saw temps up to 108*, so even if she hadn't shown the week before, she would have gotten the time off anyways. At the end of that week the vet was out and Cinder got some acupuncture. She was tight in her back and slightly stocked up behind, probably due to the show and not moving around during the heat wave. She's a horse that when the temps are above 85 she's sure she can't possibly move, and the barn was only doing half day turnout so she was in under her fan more than normal. Vet recommended a few days of bute and easy work, so Trainer A took her on a couple trail rides and the legs bounced right back. The tightness in her back is also partly due to my saddle, but I have the fix for that on order and it should be here in the next few weeks.

Barn cat likes to judge you while you mix up supplement containers

Last week I was swamped with work and then my mom and I had a weekend away in Central Oregon. I didn't make it out to the barn for over a week and I felt like a bad pony mom. Cinder got some more trail ride and a stretchy flat ride while I was gone. She did manage to find trouble while I was away. The horse in the paddock next to her sat on the fence, and then freaked out when the hot tape wound around her hind legs. That set Cinder off, and she managed to scrape up one of her hind legs as well. It's all superficial, but she's one that swells easily, so when I came out for my lesson on Monday it was still pretty stocked up. She was 100% sound, so that's good. 

Now that the pasture is dead, Peebs is enjoying getting turned out on it for half a day, instead of being 24/7 in his dry lot. 

We decided to go on a trail ride for my lesson, as it was very humid (for Oregon. I know it's nothing compared to the east coast). The bugs were out in full force and Cinder was not happy about it. She kept having mini tantrums during the ride and would stop to try and get at the bugs on her. There's one section of the trail that Cin hates; you have to cross over a culvert with a little pond on one side, and a stream on the other. Jazzy, the mare Trainer A was riding, is usually pretty solid, but she spooked hard at that crossing so Cinder said no thank you. I dug my heels into and pushed her forward, and she ended up bolting across it and tried to run up the hill on the other side. A wanted me to stop her and come back down and let her stand for minute to see that the culver wasn't scary, but when I went to circle back, she reared twice. They were tiny rears, but as we were still going up hill I didn't trust her to keep her balance and gave up. A was fine with me giving up, and we'll revisit that crossing later. By the time we got back to the barn both Cinder and I were covered in sweat and so happy to be done. Hopefully my lesson on Friday isn't as exciting!

NQR but NQW

 So Cinder had her vet exam last week, and while she's still NQR, she's also NQW aka not quite wrong. She was feeling a lot better after her bodywork and let the vet palpate her back pretty hard without trying to kill her, so yay! We did do a quick lameness exam and she was 0.5 lame on her left hind, high up. Flexing both the hock and stifle didn't really show much, so since the ultrasound was set up for another horse the vet popped it on her stifle for a quick view. 

Shes standing slightly downhill, but I'm happy with her body condition right now

Stifle looked great so vet thinks her reluctance to get groomed could be a couple things. She either did something in the pasture or got cast in her stall and tweaked her back and it's just slow to resolve, it's her ovaries, or possibly hind gut ulcers. When the vet was palpating her, she hit an ulcer point and Cinder reacted hard, but the point can also indicate front leg lameness and Cinder had conveniently pulled a front shoe the day before. 

We got a lot of yawing during the session

We're going to do a round of treatment for the ulcers, and also did an electro-acupunture session that day. This was Cin's second time getting acupuncture, but her first electro session. She was pretty skeptical at first, but settled into and kept yawing and yawing. She almost fell asleep in the crossties, which is unheard of for her, especially as the barn was pretty busy. The vet did say Cin's left side wasn't pulsing quite as rhythmically as the right, indicating something was going on there and made her lean more towards the "did something in the pasture" hypothesis. I'm going to try and schedule more acupuncture sessions whenever the vet's out again as Cinder seemed to really like it.

The weather has been super shitty this past week, either pouring down rain and windy, or freezing cold (and we even got snow at my house) so Cinder has gotten some light rides. She was still pretty pissy about her SI being touched on Monday, but it was 38* and I had a lesson right before dinner time. I had put her in my BOT quarter sheet for the first time but she was highly offended by it so we pulled it off and A wore it during the lesson. We just did w/t in my lesson but Cinder was really good.

Peebs Rehab Update

 Ugh, I'm so behind in posting about Peebs. But there's really not a lot to say. His suspensory is healing, but slowly. We did get cleared for walking under saddle, and are currently up to 23 minutes loose rein walk and 7 minutes of a forward, on contact walk. We go back in two weeks to reultrasound and hopefully will get cleared to start trotting. 

When your pony and outfit match the leaves you have to take a pic

Our walking "under saddle" is a bit of a misnomer, as I actually haven't put a saddle on him since he re-injured himself. He's almost 6 months into this rehab, but it still level headed enough that I can ride him bareback with no issues or drugs. I figured this can be my no stirrup November as I'm not ready to drop my stirrups with Cinder yet. 

Peebs got his first acupuncture session two weeks ago. The new vet at our clinic, who has handled most of Peebs' rehab does it and while I was a bit skeptical, I think it's helped. Peebs took a nice nap during the session, which was great considering he lost his damn mind when we got to the clinic because there were sheep in the field next door. If nothing else, the acupuncture sure relaxed him and helped overcome his sheep induced neurosis.  We're going to do another session in a few weeks, after his next ultrasound.