Chief is just NOT having a good week

My poor horse, he has had a pretty traumatic week, all things considered.  For as long as I’ve owned Chief he hasn’t had this much excitement combined and now….all at once in one week he’s been getting bombarded!  Earlier this week Chief was just getting a bath when the ties he was attached to broke off at the base where they had rotted through.  Scared him half to death, but he didn’t panic and came through that incident without a scratch.

Today Chief wasn’t so lucky.  Since he did 5 days at Schellbourne earlier this month I wanted to let him have a break so didn’t take him to any rides this weekend – I was tempted, and now it seems like I probably should have.  But, you never know – everything happens for a reason and it’s possible that had I gone to a ride this weekend that something else might have happened.  One thing for sure – Thank God for veterinarians who work on weekends and are available in a hurry!!

Eye injury - waiting for the vet (may as well take a photo, right?)

I was in the field next door working with Bo while Rocky and Chief were on the other side of the fence watching.  I walked past them going out, and coming back and didn’t notice anything amiss.

When I was done working with Bo, I walked him back to the barn and put him back in the paddock.  About a minute later Rocky and Chief each come into their own stalls in the barn.  Immediately I saw that something was wrong with Chief!  OMG – his eye was injured!  There was a little blood but not bad–since it had just happened it also wasn’t that swollen yet.  It looked like Chief had caught his eyelid on something and ripped it.  OH @#$%!!!!!

First thing I did was to put a halter on Chief and get him out and take a closer look.  I felt all around his head and face to see if there were any other wounds or punctures and slowly made my way to the area that was of obvious concern – the left eye.

Chief was being really good about the whole thing as I think he knew he was hurt and that I was taking care of him.  I gently and carefully pulled up his eyelid above his left eye and I could see that it was torn pretty good.  I left him tied up and ran in the house to call the vet.  I called Great Basin and got the answering service.  Their only vet on call was on another emergency and would call me back.  I asked if I could haul the horse over to their clinic and they said I would have to wait for a callback from the vet.  So, onto plan B and I called another vet – Tyler Brady — I really liked him having seen him work on friends horses.  I was so glad that I had his number because he could come out right away!  Yay!

By this time I was out in the barn talking on the cell phone and checking on Chief.  There was now more blood and swelling.  I mixed up some complete feed with 2 grams of bute for him figuring that it would help the swelling and pain in case the vet took very long to get there.  Turns out he was there within a half an hour and by about forty minutes of the accident happening, Chief was getting stitched up!

Vet has arrived - working on the eyelid

The eyelid was torn pretty good.  We figured out that Chief had stuck his head sideways through the fence to try and reach some grass on the other side.  He got zapped by the hotwire and yanked his head out, catching the eyelid on a screw that was on an old wooden gate. Needless to says that gate is now GONE.

Part of why this happened is that Chief is always on a diet and therefore always in search of whatever he can get his mouth on.  It is totally not like him to get injured – this is his first real injury of any type since I’ve owned him and first emergency vet call of this type for him.  He is always the horse that doesn’t get into stuff….till now!

Stitching up the eyelid

Fortunately during the stitch up process, Chief was a pretty good patient and stayed quiet and still for the cleaning, debriding and stitches.  There was a lot of blood, which is normal for these kinds of injuries.  I’m not bothered too much by this stuff – it’s always good to stay calm and quiet and supportive of the injured patient.

I was mostly worried and concerned that there was damage to Chief’s eye.  Tyler said that there wasn’t!!  What a relief.  I didn’t think that there was but until things got cleaned up and the vet got a good look I wasn’t breathing a sign of relief.  That was good news.  Great news, rather!

Eye injury all stitched up!

Chief is going to be on antibiotics for a few days plus some bute.  He also got a tetanus shot and I have some salve to put on his eyelid wound each day.  I also held an icepack on the swelling earlier and will keep doing that until it subsides – maybe every few hours for a couple of days.

I tried putting a flymask on but the swelling is too great and I think it’s better to leave that off for now so he doesn’t feel compelled to rub (which he did).  Maybe in another day or two?  I put some Swat fly repellent ointment underneath the eye to help with the flies.  Fortunately they aren’t bad right now and I haven’t seen any on his eye.

I’m posting the photos as thumbnails so that I don’t gross anybody out that might not appreciate a good (or is it “bad”?) horse wound.  If you want to see them larger, just click on them and they’ll enlarge.  I think that the vet did a really great job with the stitches.

Never a dull moment!