Norman's Road to Recovery (Tuesday)

Our farrier, Matt Lewis, working on one of Norman's foundered front feet. Note the opened abscess on the toe.

It is past 11:00PM, and we are finally hopeful for Norman again. Our farrier, Matt Lewis, came by tonight and, along with 1.4cc tranquilizer from the vet, pulled his front shoes, dug out the abscesses, and put backward shoes and pads on his feet to relieve the pressure in the toe. It was quite an ordeal for poor Norman. Hardly able to stand on his own, we had to put him in stocks. He shook and shook and sweated from it all (although 1.4cc is a lot, it hardly seemed to affect him), but after it was done, he was standing at his hay bag, eating with a good apatite. One concern we have is his temperature: tonight, before we started working on him, it was up to 103.2F. The vet recommended we not continue with the penicillin because, she says, it doesn't affect infection in the feet that well.

Both Matt and the vet think the sole has dropped too far to ever correct itself, but with hope he will get better enough to make someone a nice pleasure horse. That is our hope for Norman - to make someone happy, and to be happy. We will remain vigilant and see what tomorrow brings.

On another happy note, our farrier worked on the rescue pony Cosmo today as well, cutting back his feet all the way and giving the pony, likely for the first time in years, good feet to walk on again. Matt says the pony had foundered years ago as well, but will be just fine. He looks like a new pony!