Grand Adventures Ranch

So far So good

Well, it has been 9 days and so far Peanut is holding her own.  It is amazing to me how she can remain calm, sweet and upbeat with such an extensive injury.  She is even using the leg and walking out to the treatment area.  My biggest worry is keeping the bone alive with it so exposed as the tissue begins to regrow. 

It is exciting that we have no smell when changing the bandages and that the damaged tissue remains pink and has good blood supply.  We have been making disposable oxygen tents and suffusing the leg with ozone every other day. 

We are treating the wound with an ozonated olive oil mix that contains Recovazon, Sange de Drago, Tea Tree Oil and rubarb root.  Sort of feels like covering here with salad dressing or marinating.  But it is doing an amazing job. 

A Heartfelt Thanks

A Heartfelt Thank You for the blessings of great neighbors.

Nothing displays the true character of your friends and neighbors as well as a crisis.  Last Friday, I was blessed with the opportunity to learn just how incredible is this community of Sonoita.  Just about six I was showing off our property to new students that had arrived for weekend classes.  As we were passing the pastures I realized that a horse was missing.  Now “Peanut” is short and the weeds are high, but she should have been visible.  After hunting for too long a time, I found her.  Brave girl was laying in the weeds with a hole in her left rear leg larger than my hand.

Pigeon Fever Ordeal

This is an email I received today from a long time canine health customer of mine.  I didn't even know she had horses!

Hello Kay,
We had Rainbow come down with pigeon fever after a new boarder went on a trail ride across town where all the horses on that ride came down with it. She tried to hide it but when her horse got so sick that she needed a vet and other horses were showing symptoms, the truth came out. We had the vet out and put Rainbow on antibiotics and isolated him. He seemed to have recovered or so we thought. Rainbow started to go downhill and had lost a lot of weight. I called out the vet and told him to take blood becasue I needed to know what was happening to Rainbow. Rainbow's drawn blood came out brown! He was urinating whole blood! He was within a couple of hours of needing a transfusion! We spent thousands of dollars and a whole lot of praying to keep him alive! It took over a year for Rainbow to recover! He was so emaciated! He was twenty-one at the time and had been a hard keeper all his life. We adopted him when he was nine years old. He was on holistic herbs, specail supplements, red-cell, and Mezotrace. We gave him his hay, Omolene 2000, Senior food, hay and grain pellets,psylium and carrots. We had his teeth floated twice a year and he had to wormed every thee weeks.

Pigeon Fever Study

Beginning in June of 2006, Grand Adventures Ranch and Mountain View Animal Clinic are co-sponsoring an investigational study of the efficacy of Octazone on horses diagnosed with Pigeon Fever.  Treatment will consist of seven consecutive days of rectal Octazone.  Horses will also be evaluated for diet and immune system strength.  There is no charge for this treatment.  14 days after treatment conclusion horses will be tested for presence of active pathenogen.

As we start this process I am actively looking for input from those who have experienced Pigeon Fever first hand.  My next post is an email I received from a long time customer for dog products and I will be answering her directly and here on the blog.  So if you have advise and experience to share please bring it to the discussion.  Tonight's phone call is also on Pigeon Fever - It will undoubtedly be an active topic of discussion in the coming months.

Kay

Holistic Horse Boarding - cont.

Sweet Feed - Yuck!

One of the biggest culprits in dis-ease in horses is manufactured feeds.  Not to put too fine a point on it but the great majority of horse grains and pet foods are made up of agri-waste.  Most of the "grain" (and I use this term loosely) in your standard sweet feed is what was left over after making other products for humans.

What is Holistic Medicine - As per the AHVMA

AHVMA - American Holistic Veterinary Medical Association.

What is Holistic Veterinary Medicine?  

    Holistic medicine, by its very nature, is humane to the core. The wholeness of its scope will set up a lifestyle for the animal that is most appropriate. The techniques used in holistic medicine are gentle, minimally invasive, and incorporate patient well-being and stress reduction. Holistic thinking is centered on love, empathy and respect.

    This mixture of healing arts and skills is as natural as life itself. At the core of this issue lies the very essence of the word "(w)holistic". It means taking in the whole picture of the patient—the environment, the disease pattern, the relationship of pet with owner—and developing a treatment protocol using a wide range of therapies for healing the patient.

    The holistic practitioner is interested in genetics, nutrition, family relationships, hygiene, and stress factors. Many patients present in a state of "dis-ease." At this point the holistic challenge lies in the question "why?" By a series of analytic observations and appropriate testing the goal becomes finding the true root source of the pathology. A simple-appearing symptom may have several layers of causation. Only when the true cause of the ailment has been found is there the possibility for a lasting recovery.

    It is at this point that the most efficacious, least invasive, least expensive, and least harmful path to cure is selected.

    In many acute situations, treatment may involve aspects of surgery and drug therapy from conventional western technology, along with alternative techniques to provide a complementary whole. This form of treatment has great value for severe trauma and certain infections. It often outperforms other methodologies. It is also at this time that other treatment plans such as those listed below are brought into use. Once the symptoms have been treated, the task is not complete until the underlying disease patterns have been redirected. The patient, as well as the client, will be guided to a new level of health.

Holistic Boarding - cont.

The primary focus for the health of our animal guests is NUTRITION!  In my opinion, a holistic approach to animal nutrition means looking at what Mother Nature, in her infinite wisdom, fed an animal.  Then looking at how stress and caloric need changes affect their overall health and using foods naturally found in their diet to keep the body in balance.

First - horses GRAZE.  They are not designed to eat concentrated calories in short bursts.  In fact, concentrated feeds such as hay pellets & cubes and pelleted grains can lead to sand colic, teeth problems and overall poor nutrient assimilation.  Here in Arizona grass pasture is rare and expensive.  And it is less expensive to grow a low-water legume like Alfalfa than it is grass.  But feeding alfalfa is to save money is short sighted and can get very expensive in future veterinary bills.  Click here for a more complete article on Why Not to Feed Alfalfa. 

Natural Fly Control

The most common questions that I am being asked about our plans involve a more complete picture of what we mean by "holistic" boarding.  One large consideration is flys...  How do you keep the fly population down without poision?  First - we use (and resell) fly biological fly elimiators: