(Horse Health)
This should be the most important topic for any marelover, we want our mares to be healthy and stay with us for as long as we can. Sadly mares do get sick and it can be very expensive if not impossible to cure certain ailments and injuries.
Do all you can to educate yourself in this topic, what plants she can not eat that might grow in the pasture,
look out for rusty nails, rundown stable, holes in the fields etc etc
I will mainly cover the two most important types of mare related diseases that are both fatal but can easily be avoided with just having foresight and knowing what to look out for.
>Laminitis
Is a inflammation that attacks the foot of the hoof, it's a crippling condition that causes a lot of pain for the mare and even death. Very hard to cure and if they have gotten it once it increases the chance of getting it again and again.
>Causes
"Over-feeding fat ponies is a very common cause, particularly during the spring months after recent rain. The soluble carbohydrate content increases in grasses and clovers after rain. When ingested, this causes metabolic changes that result in altered blood flow to the laminae of the foot.
>Over-feeding grain or grain engorgement when a horse gets into a feed shed/bin
>Retained placenta in post-foaling mares
>Septicaemic conditions
>Obesity (a common predisposing factor in laminitic ponies)
>Lameness which prevents weight bearing in one leg leading to laminitis in another supporting limb
>Trauma resulting from excess work in unshod horses on hard ground, or from over-enthusiastic hoof trimming"
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Edited last time by MareMoe on 03/19/2025 (Wed) 10:04:47.