Monday, August 8, 2011

Not-so-smrt-pony

Last Wednesday morning, I noticed that Reddums wasn't quite himself. He didn't come up for breakfast (gasp!) and was standing on the east side track looking... sort of distracted. I watched him while I took care of morning chores, and he didn't actually seem to be in any sort of distress - no lying down or looking at his sides or limping or anything. He just looked funny.

I went out and checked his feet (nothing) and listened to his gut sounds (disturbingly faint) and checked hydration levels (normal). I shooed him up to the barn where he got a drink and ran Saga off his alfalfa - in other words, he acted completely normal. I was a bit concerned to have to leave him but dutifully headed to work anyway, and when I got home he was completely fine.

Well, this morning I figured out what was causing the problem:

Why yes, that is in fact a half-digested plastic carrot bag.

About a month ago, I left Red unattended in the barn aisle for a few minutes. He took the opportunity to knock over several bins of brushes, throw the fly spray bottle across the aisle, and eat the remainder of a bag of carrots. At the time, I couldn't find the bag, so I figured it had blown away as it was rather windy. What I never thought might happen was that he had also consumed the bag itself. Jeez.

I always had him figured for such a smart pony, too.

8 comments:

  1. Whoa - I thought only dogs would do that. Glad he's okay :)

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  2. WOW! I bet you had a heartattack when you found that this morning!

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  3. PS I cannot believe that piece of plastic sat in his hindgut somewhere for a MONTH!

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  4. Dressager, CFS, I'm glad he's OK too. Talk about a near miss! I wonder how many lives horses have? I think Reddums used one on this!

    Andrea, yeah, I about keeled over when I saw that at 6:15 this morning! I had to look twice - it was one of those "No, it couldn't be..." moments. Then I was imagining the vet bill if it HADN'T made it through on its own... Yikes!

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  5. Well, at least we know how long it takes plastic to get through the cecum. Does blogging about it count as publication? Now no one else will have to repeat the experiment!

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  6. I will bring carrots only in environmentally friendly paper bags from now on. Or maybe I'll just unwrap them and give them to Red. Then everyone will be happy.

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  7. @ Calm, Forward, Straight (and Jen, of course):

    Our boxer, Fiona, has consumed a bag of tomatoes on the vine (leaving the vine); an entire bunch of bananas, leaving NO TRACE WHATSOEVER; taken a 5-lb. bag of potatoes, leaving nibbled-on taters throughout the house (including in my bed); her last larceny was to steal a bag of Riesen chocolate caramels and consume them all, including wrappers. (Yes, I know dogs aren't supposed to eat chocolate. I thought it was safely out of reach... haha)

    Plastic bags = evil.

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