I thought I would do a diary for Dan, mostly so I can track his progress
Picked up Sat 10th March, double dosed with pyrantel. Dan is very quiet, a bit like the kid at the back of the class that has been picked on He's got patches of coat rubbed out, especially under his mane, matts behind his ears and filthy dirty clumps in his coat around his bits. His coat feels dirty and heavy with grease. Fussed him while he ate and no nastiness but he was a bit wary. He's been super with the electric fence, even with just 1 strand he doesn't push his luck with it
Sunday 11th, I gave him a really good brush off (boy does he enjoy that his little lip was going and he's trying to mutual groom me), I hacked the end of his tail out of the mud, trimmed his beard so its not dunking in the water bucket every time he drinks, and trimmed around his bits, then teased the matts out by his ears, all with him loose in the field. We got in a bit of a muddle with feet picking I was saying 'up' and he kept turning to me and trying to rear (he's trained to put his feet on your shoulders apparently) so we spent a few minutes trying to figure out his command to just hold 1 foot up, we kind of got it, he's good with the back feet but did nip at me when I tried the front right, I am sure it was just miscommunication between us, we will get there Found lots of red worm in his poop, will need to re-worm to include encysted in a couple of weeks.
I've not done anything specific since, every evening he gets a little brush/scratch, gets his bucket with a handful of chaff and nuts and a hay net (he's on a bare patch with just nibbles of grass along the fence line) and I potter about with him. Last night he was much brighter than he has been since arrival, alert, interested in everything and following me round like a dog He really does need a good bath once the weather warms up a bit.
I will take him to hand graze (I have a big patch I haven't grazed that the other two aren't on) later and want to go for a little walk about, but I really ought wait for his quarantine to be over for that bit, I just hate that he's stood in the pen without much to entertain him.
Picked up Sat 10th March, double dosed with pyrantel. Dan is very quiet, a bit like the kid at the back of the class that has been picked on He's got patches of coat rubbed out, especially under his mane, matts behind his ears and filthy dirty clumps in his coat around his bits. His coat feels dirty and heavy with grease. Fussed him while he ate and no nastiness but he was a bit wary. He's been super with the electric fence, even with just 1 strand he doesn't push his luck with it
Sunday 11th, I gave him a really good brush off (boy does he enjoy that his little lip was going and he's trying to mutual groom me), I hacked the end of his tail out of the mud, trimmed his beard so its not dunking in the water bucket every time he drinks, and trimmed around his bits, then teased the matts out by his ears, all with him loose in the field. We got in a bit of a muddle with feet picking I was saying 'up' and he kept turning to me and trying to rear (he's trained to put his feet on your shoulders apparently) so we spent a few minutes trying to figure out his command to just hold 1 foot up, we kind of got it, he's good with the back feet but did nip at me when I tried the front right, I am sure it was just miscommunication between us, we will get there Found lots of red worm in his poop, will need to re-worm to include encysted in a couple of weeks.
I've not done anything specific since, every evening he gets a little brush/scratch, gets his bucket with a handful of chaff and nuts and a hay net (he's on a bare patch with just nibbles of grass along the fence line) and I potter about with him. Last night he was much brighter than he has been since arrival, alert, interested in everything and following me round like a dog He really does need a good bath once the weather warms up a bit.
I will take him to hand graze (I have a big patch I haven't grazed that the other two aren't on) later and want to go for a little walk about, but I really ought wait for his quarantine to be over for that bit, I just hate that he's stood in the pen without much to entertain him.