Making Enemies

Cody really hates me now. I stopped by Fleet Farm on Wednesday before going to the barn and picked up some Zimectrin Gold. I decided to just de-worm Cody in the pasture so I brought out his bridle to trick him. He was not impressed. He didn't spit out any of the de-wormer but he stood there with his mouth open for the longest time afterward, expressing his distaste. Poor pony, he wouldn't even take a fruit ring I brought as a treat after.

Axel was all over me while I tried to de-worm Cody, he thought I had something good to eat. Unfortunately for him he found out what that was when I brought him into the barn and de-wormed him there. He's a lot easier to dose but he still ended up with a big smear of medicine on his face. He wouldn't eat the fruit rings after being de-wormed either but he accepted a handful of hay as a peace offering.

So then my next experiment started. I put on his boots and took him into the arena armed with multiples of rubber gloves and some DMSO. Sadly (luckily) he wasn't feeling too bad and moving pretty good though he is more lame in the arena footing than out on the hard ground. He wandered around a bit and then I put some DMSO on his knees. I couldn't smell it (despite reports of it's horrid scent) but he could either smell it or feel it as he put his head down immediately to look at what I was doing to him. The boots and administering it in the arena was a precaution as some horses don't tolerate the feeling of DMSO. I figured if he was going to freak out he might as well do it where he can't hurt himself or me. But once he looked at his knee for a few seconds that was the end of the reaction. After that he went about his business wandering around. I asked him to move out a bit to see if he felt any better. Still lame at the walk and trot but pretty darn sound at the canter (tell me how that even works). So the next step is to use the DMSO every time I go out to work him and see if that starts reducing the swelling and soreness in his knee. Next time I buy the roll-on version because gloving up and trying to get the gel on is a pain in the rear.