Mystery Detective

I got a call from my BM on Thursday that Tesla hadn't touched her lunch (not even her favourite alfalfa flake, what?!) If this girl stops eating something is definitely wrong.

I found her standing head down in her box - she wasn't even swishing her tail to scare the flies and was just miserable and wanted cuddles. There was an itty bitty fresh poop (so I wasn't thinking colic just yet)

Dr K met me up at the barn. She took Tess' temp: 105, and gave her injections of banamine to bring down the fever and relieve pain. Tess didn't have any nasal discharge...so she also thought it might be a lower tooth problem - perhaps she had something foreign caught/abscessed in her mouth/back of her throat.

Tess was still tender on the right throat latch - no touchy! but there wasn't dramatic swelling.

So out came the speculum - and Tess was SO good - Dr K put it on without any sedation (I told Tess it was just a big western bit, hehe). The vet said there were very few horses she would do that with (awwwhhhhhh, proud Momma moment - but also someone was feeling so rotten)

Google "Speculum".....yup.

Dr K dug her arm up to her elbow in Tesla's mouth - but didn't find anything obvious by feel/looking.  She drew some blood for testing, waited for her temp to come back into the normal range, and then scheduled to come back in the morning with the portable x-ray machine to rule out that she hadn't swallowed something if she still looked poorly/had swelling and/or tenderness.

I knew Tess was feeling better when she kept shuffling over to the hay. Banamine, man that stuff works :) and planned to head out first thing in the morning and see how she was...