Epona's Journal: Winter means cold and injury

Winter is here. We got our first snow last week- a whopping 6 inches. They're calling for ice this weekend. Yuck.

Wednesday morning was scary. I went to feed a few horses who were in the field, only to find one of our young guys had a fist-size chunk taken out of his knee. His lower leg was soaked in blood and you could see all the way down to the bone.

I called the vet immediately, as well as the owner. Even though the horse was young and normally a pain to handle, he was surprisingly calm when I gave him 3 different shots and put medicine down his throat with a syringe

When the vet arrived she dressed the wound with about 12 layers of bandaging and informed me that the prognosis was 50/50. If he didn't get an infection in the next 72 hours, he will probably make a full recovery, if he does, he probably won't survive the week because of the severity of the wound. It's been 48 hours and he's doing okay. Going a little crazy being locked inside all day but that'll pass.

Now he gets an IV of antibiotics everyday, 2 antibiotic shots, 30 pills, 2 shots of a tranquillizer twice a day, and 2 different pain killers. That alone takes a good half hour daily, in addition to the hour it takes to clean and redress the wound everyday.

Thank god for Bawls- I never sleep anymore.