DIVA'S SECOND CHANCE
In March, I purchased/rescued a pony that was "at risk" to be sent to Plum Island to be used for USDA disease testing. She was very pregnant, and I just couldn't see her going to that facility with a baby. Her name is Taliesen, or "Tally".
Tally had an upper respiratory infection, which was treated and she continued
to do very well. Her feet were in horrible condition. My trimmer (Judy Ries) has worked wonders and her feet
look awesome now.
On
May 5, 2006 Tally delivered a filly. It was a "red bag delivery",
or placenta previa (premature placental separation). The filly was oxygen
deprived and too weak to stand and nurse on her own. So the vet came out and
we tube-fed
her via nasogastric tube with her mothers expressed colostrum. The filly
(now named "Diva") again crashed that night, and the vet came back
out and gave her IV plasma, fluids and we retubed her and left it in, in order
to continue to feed her mothers expressed milk. Diva crashed everytime she
had her mothers milk, so apparently she had an allergy to her own mothers milk.
So
we put her
on
Buckeye
foal milk replacer, and she blossomed. She had to be tube-fed every 2 hours,
and we had to remove her from her mother due to the IV's, as it was a management
issue and her mother, while extremely good considering all we were doing
to/with her baby, she could very easily have tangled in the IV and feeding
tube, and
pulled them out.
For 3 weeks we tube-fed Diva every 2 hours around the clock.
She has been on numerous antibiotics as she had an extremely low white
blood cell count (despite receiving her mothers colostrum via syringe and
tube, and receiving a unit of Plasma), she was on Pepto-Bismol and Probios
for the resulting chronic diarrhea, and Zantac for the possibility of ulcers
from
the antibiotics,
stress, and tubing. Diva pulled out her tube 6 times and it had to be reinserted.
She has clocked a lot of time in the backseat of the truck to the vet clinic,
and has become a favorite patient. She has fought and beat the diarrhea,
the ulcers, and a vet who mis-placed her tube 15 times into her lungs
rather than her stomach. She has gained over 20 pounds since her birth.
Diva napping in the sun at 5 days old
On Tuesday 5/23 we had to remove Diva's feeding tube because it was all gooked up with mucous and other nasty yucky stuff, and she couldn't breathe properly. She has gained over 20 pounds since birth with her tube feeding, and was showing a lot of interest in eating. She mouths everything, sucks her own tongue, your clothes, your shoes, the walls, anything she can get her mouth on. So she had available in her stall a bucket of milk, an Igloo Momma with warm milk, a bowl of mash (soaked milk replacer pellets and sweet feed mix), hay and Dengie. She did not show any interest in any of it. We did attempt every couple of hours to express milk in her mouth from a bottle, and place some mash back in her throat, which she did swallow most of, but this was not enough to sustain her. After 24 hours, we decided it was time to take her to Tufts and find out if there is something physiological making her physically unable to swallow. Tufts agreed to evaluate her and scope her.
On Thursday 5/24 we drove her up to Tufts for her noon appointment. Of course
as soon as she entered her stall at Tufts, she started drinking a ton of
water out of the bucket in her stall! So we tried milk replacer, and no
go, she wanted none of it. Then they scoped her, and didn't find any glaring
abnormality, but she did have an almost non-existent swallow reflex. (after
drinking that water though?) So, a little later they tried goats milk replacer,
and she drank about a cup of that!
On Friday, 5/25 Diva spiked a temp and started with diarrhea, and needed to be placed in isolation (at $132/day). A radiograph of her lungs showed pneumonia. Diva went back on antibiotics.
Over the Memorial Day weekend, Diva began eating on her own! Tufts was able to wean her from goats milk back to her foal milk replacer, and she is now eating 6.8 liters per day on her own from a bucket. We picked her up from Tufts on 5/31, and she is now home, though she still is dealing with diarrhea and has a couple of days left of antibiotics for the pneumonia.
As of June 2, Diva still is not eating well. She apparently does not like the taste of her milk replacer because she drinks plenty of water, so it is no longer a problem swallowing. We are trying different brands and mixing it with goats milk. We may have to buy her a lactating goat, considering goats milk costs about $7.99 per half gallon, which would come out to $40 per day!
June 6, Diva is not drinking her milk replacer at all, and is only picking at her mash. She has developed an umbilical hernia, her legs have stocked up and her fetlocks relaxed again. We're going to try fresh goats milk exclusively.
June 10, 2006 -- Diva LOVES her fresh goats milk. She is drinking it with gusto, gaining weight and looking good. We are DESPERATE to find goats milk, so if anyone has any resources in Connecticut, PLEASE email me at mives@adelphia.net. Goats milk from the health food store is $7.99 per half gallon, she's drinking a gallon a day, so that is $16 per day just for milk. We have found a few people that have some for $5 per gallon, and we are cleaning them out, but we only have enough for about a week at this point, we need 4 more weeks worth of goats milk. Even if you are in a neighboring state, perhaps we can ship frozen milk on ice packs.
June 20, 2006 - Stacey and I drove to Massachusettes to pick up a lactating goat that was donated for her. Thank you, Jane! The girls are doing wonderfully, and so are the boys. Of course we couldn't leave the two little boy goats behind, they were so cute! So now Stacey has FOUR goats, one of whom supplies Diva with her milk.
July 7, 2006 - Diva has been wearing our makeshift hernia belt for a few weeks, which consists of a string cinch, memory foam, and of course, baling twine. It seems to be working so far, and her hernia has reduced in size. Lets keep our fingers crossed that it wil heal on its own and she can avoid surgery. Here are some pics. of Diva from this weekend:
At the present time, her vet bills have exceeded $2500 (not including the visit to Tufts). The Tufts was $755 (a bargain, as they found grant money to help pay the other $1200). It also appears that she is going to need surgery for her umbilical hernia. Surgery of this sort tends to run around $1,500. **UPDATE** Diva's hernia belt worked! Her hernia is fully repaired, yippeee!!!!
September 20, 2006
As an update on Tally, she has a new home with a 2 year old little girl, an gets lots of love, and brushing, and gives pony rides.
Thank you to everyone that has donated for Diva! We could not have done this without all your help, and Diva thanks you too. She is such a personable little filly, and has so much spunk and try. She could not have gotten this far with Stacey, and her own little attitude, hence her name "Diva" :-)
February, 2008, Diva is a happy, healthy, mostly normal pony mare :-) She sure lives up to her name, and has a tendency to have little temper tantrums from time to time. Her she is, wearing a saddle for the first time.
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