Scarlet Update

I’ve been so focused on Ezio and improving our partnership that I’ve neglected to write about Scarlet much. Our routine hasn’t changed all that much. We’re still walking 10-20 minutes a day depending on the day. He’s still doing well in that fashion.

But near the end of June, he started to leave behind a lot of his bermuda. He seemed to be eating his alfalfa fine as well as his grain. I assumed that it was just due to how warm it had suddenly gotten. We’d had a good summer so far of mostly temperate weather. Low 80s for the most part. Then we had a week of high 80s-90s heat with a serious amount of humidity. We had a cool spell coming in at the end of the month so I figured I’d wait to see if that helped his eating.

Unfortunately, it did not. In fact, he seemed to just not be eating his bermuda entirely. He also, to my eyes, lost quite a bit of weight. I obviously panicked when I realized this was a serious problem. But he was still eating his alfalfa and grain. I debated for a while but then decided to call my vet. He got his teeth done in Nov and he is 25. So it might be time for him to be looked at every 6 months. She’s been quite busy lately and I believe her assistant left so we haven’t decided if that’s what we will do.

In the meantime, I got a couple of bags of bermuda pellets. I figured it wasn’t fully a problem of physically eating. Maybe its the form factor of hay versus pellets. I’ve been feeding him about three pounds or so a day of pellets and he seems to be eating those well. I also spoke to the BO and changed his feed to be a flake of alfalfa morning and night and only one flake of Bermuda the whole day. He’s still leaving parts of that flake behind but he’s usually eating 50-75%. He hasn’t lost any more weight but I’m not sure if he’s gained it back or not. Weight gain can be hard for an older horse so I’m trying to not worry in that aspect.

His behavior is still quite normal. He walks fine. He rolls when I turn him out. He even decided to be a snorty Arab when we walked by one of my barnmates getting into the trailer. He curved his neck and snort pranced the whole length of the barn, about five minutes worth. I turned him out after and it took him a whole five minutes of prancing around and snorting before he chilled. And then he rolled and cantered back across the arena to me. So despite his eating changing, he is still in good spirits. For now, I’m just supplementing his feeding and I’ll keep an eye on him with the help of my vet.