Poor Axel

I went out to see Axel last night, deliver gifts and see how he was doing. He's still swollen like A said. J had called to fill me in as well and said he wasn't doing any better and she thought he was maybe a little off on a leg. Turns out his back right (the non ringbone leg) is stocked up as well now. His belly lumps have pooled to a single huge lump and the muscle area over his sternum are swollen as well as his sheath. I couldn't find anything else notable. His left eye was a little puffy if you used your imagination. I remembered the thermometer this time so I took his temp but he did not have a fever at all. I groomed him and got all the knots out of his mane and then tried to walk him around the arena a bit. If he was just stocked up from not moving enough in the pasture, walking in the arena should have helped. Unfortunately the more I walked him the lamer he got. Not knowing exactly what is wrong with him I decided to stop before I made anything worse.

So the vet is due out tonight sometime. Hopefully he has some ideas. I took a look at my calendar and wrote down anything that changed in the past couple months.

10/27 Both he and Cody had rain rot for about 2 weeks
11/9 We stopped giving him the 4-in-1 HA supplement
11/20 He started excessively chewing on wood
11/30 We put him on the Quitt supplement for a month
12/7 He stopped chewing on wood for the most part
Some time in here they got their first round bale
12/15 Farrier trimmed hooves
Second round bale was put out
12/24 We first noticed the swelling and gave him some benedryl
12/28 We first noticed he was lame on the back right and still swollen

Interesting to note that the wood chewing started after stopping the 4-in-1 supplement. At the time I didn't even connect the two. The 4-in-1 has probiotics, biotin, joint supplements, and omega 3&6. I'm not sure if any of that would make him want to chew wood in it's absence. Maybe just the sudden change in itself? Anyway, I'm keeping my fingers crossed that the vet knows what this is and fixes it.