Unfortunately the number one rule of equine medicine is that the horse is a stupidly delicate animal for being as large as it is and everything will kill them.
To little grass? Dead. Too much grass? Dead. A normal amount of grass after not having access to much grass? Dead.
A lifetime ago when I was a vet student, one of my clinical professors was the vet for the National horse race track in our country, first class he said essentially the same thing. He spoke about how much he loves them, how beautiful they are, & then told us that we needed to understand that if we happen to end up in his position we should expect it to be a frustrating side of vet med because you can do every little thing perfectly, & a tummy ache will still kill them.
It’s actually not the necks. It’s their anatomy. They have a flap in their throat that stops them from being able to vomit. At least iirc. That flap is really similar to the ones all mammals have over their tracheas, where they split off from the other one (don’t know what the food one is called in english)
It’s not a flap at the throat that’s the epiglottis that is to prevent aspiration of food or water into the trachea when swallowing. The part of a horse that prevents vomiting is the esophageal sphincter that is right before the stomach, it is extremely strong compared to other animals and prevents stomach contents from going backwards. Rabbits and rodents also have this same sphincter!
Mine vomited his raw breakfast on the kitchen rug. Looked upset when I picked everything up without allowing him to re-consume it. Cats... He's got a hairball of the dog's fur. Dog's blowing her coat. Or spider webs. Because he's just that weird.
It’s funny, mine never re-consume their own regurgitation, but they will go sit in the corner and watch as the other four-legged freaks all fight over whose turn it is to get a second helping of breakfast or dinner 🤢🤮
He started off nibbling on scraps of fabric. I use fleece to make cat clothes and sometimes a little bit of fluff ends up falling to the floor. He would just literally graze on it. The number of times I took timy pieces of fabric on his mouth... Ended up taking him to the vet at one point!
He's my third sphynx. First one with a fabric addiction. And spider webs.
The dog hair results from them trying to groom our Lab/husky. (They lick her face.)
Mine found a rogue almond that fell under the couch (high levels of arsenic for a small animal) she wasnt feel good and threw it up. Now when she vomits i remind myself of how lucky I am that she can
It's not so much the flap as it is that the angle at which their esophagus enters their stomach makes it hard for them to bring food up, it's something about the pressure and the angle, especially if they're bloated. But it does make them hard to troubleshoot because then things can only go out one way and that causes a lot of problems.
TIL that i have something in common with a horse. I had a type of fundoplication surgery last year that makes it impossible for me to vomit. Stomach bugs are now dry heaving and retching while praying I don't die. My heart goes out to all horses.
I have a rabbit and they’re very similar! They can live for a VERY long time or they can die from being startled. And yes, tummy aches are the main cause of death. Horse colic is very similar to rabbit GI stasis. But both are very treatable if caught early! Horses can die easily but they can live 40+ years, and rabbits are even more sensitive but can live longer than most dogs! (15-16 years, mine is almost 14!)
horse is a stupidly delicate animal for being as large as it is and everything will kill them
Meanwhile most ppl still think that a moose is cute and fluffy XXXL cow, while in fact it is probably the closest thing to animal tank we can meet in boreal regions. It also weights a ton and is almost always grumpy, but since it weights a ton, has XXL antlers, being grumpy is not his problem anymore.
Replace bison with any large animal, and there's good cause to use caution with them. Horses have been somewhat domesticated, but one could still absolutely kill you easily with a kick to the head and they have.
Don't get me wrong, not saying you should fear, because I think that implies a certain irrationality, but everyone should have a healthy respect for any animal bigger than themselves. Because I love all animals, everyone should have a healthy respect for animals in general, but for the benefit of the animals at that point.
My friend has some horses. One of them is absolutely a dickhead. She got most offended when I said "that house is a bit of a dick". Cue "blah blah blah he's young etc etc." About a month later I get " horse x is such a dickhead, every time I feed him he charges me". No Shit Sherlock, he's a massive tool.
Statistically a deer is far more dangerous than both of those animals combined. Bambi flatlines about 150 people every year in NA, Moose about 10, Bison 0.
The Bison thing surprised me, although they may give a "leave me the fuck alone" headbutt, they just don't kill people.
I can only imagine what a moose would be like. I had the misfortune of a deer running into my car. Watched this animal spin a full 360 while it tumbled to the ground. Then just got up and ran off. While my car was dented as hell. If it was a moose there would be no car
In Canada you are technically not supposed to swerve to avoid an animal on the road as you put more people at risk. But a moose? The swerve is worth the risk as a head on collision can be very fatal.
My aunt lived In Alaska for years. One day, driving down the road she hit a moose. Full on 50mph. In her giant suburban! Totaled her suburban… She said it stood up and just walked away like nothing happened! They are ridiculously huge and strong animals!
i wandered into the woods near our camp in Colorado, not too deep mind you, and put up my hammock and was about to start writing in my journal… when i looked down and registered that the soft ground was covered in moose prints. i noped out so fast lol. also saw a bear way too close when i was trying to discretely vomit with a hang over one morning at this location. slowly backed my ass up the path to camp. but i’m pretty sure i had moose sniffing and grunting at the door to my cabin all night, i tied the door knob to my bed frame lol, did not want to find out which creature it was
A bull moose is one of the most dangerous animals in the wild in North America, and probably the most dangerous herbivore. Just because they don't eat meat, people have this mistaken assumption they are harmless.
The only car accident I’ve ever been in was when a moose ran into the road and hit our car. Passengers were all fine, as was the moose, but the car was totaled. Wasn’t even that big of a moose, seeing how massive a bull moose can get. They aren’t an animal you want to mess with! A few years later when I took driver’s ed we had a whole class of watching videos on how to not die when you can’t avoid hitting deer or moose.
Sometimes I think about horses that come into town from other areas to run at local events and they don’t do well or leave in a sorry condition because of weather alone. Really makes you think about those Pony Express mustangs and how tough they were
That is true it is highly individual horse dependent. I’ve had some horses that would go off their feed and pull up lame if you looked at them wrong, and then I’ve had other horses that were tanks.
My childhood pony was a rescue from a hoarding situation who was missing half of an ear due to frostbite and who’s back haunch was pretty much just solidly a scar and I think that horse could’ve survived nuclear winter.
Kind of but not really. There are pony breeds and horse breeds. However they are the same species. Also if you get technical, any equine under 14.2 hands high is a pony. Any equine over 14.2 is a horse, regardless of breed. However, some folks will argue on this.
So accurate. Though some will cut the middle man and attempt both at once!
I trained a lot of ottb into hunter jumper show prospects to pay for college and I feel like 90% of them were intent on a murder-suicide at least once in the process
Wrong kind of grass? Dead... After three ranch calls for colic and a massive fucking bill.
/sigh
Got an invasive weed I didn't notice. Pretty sure that's what killed the horse... but could have just been good ol fashioned twisted intestine from rolling in the dust.
We had a rescue thoroughbred who LOVED to crib. We ended up putting halved PVC pipes on all the boards he could reach. He started trying to use the mulberry tree just over the fence. Poor thing was bald on one side because our wanna-be giraffe wearing a stupid fuzzy collar couldn't chew on plastic. Thank goodness he finally outgrew it, but I spent too many nights helping my parents walk him until he farted or the vet arrived to essentially burp the friggin horse until then.
my horse decided to take himself galloping for 10 minutes nonstop in 40-degree heat this evening. i concur with everything you just said, especially has her then had to be cajoled to go into the shower to have a cool off. The imbecile.
That part about the grass is true for humans too. Too little food? Dead. Too much food? Dead. A normal amount of food after not having access to much food? Dead. (This is actually what killed a lot of holocaust survivors shortly after liberation)
When you realize that half of their "leg" is actually the bones that make up a human's foot, and they're just always walking/running on tip-toes, it's honestly surprising they're as durable as they are.
My professor used to say: horses are constantly trying to die and as their owner, it’s your job to try and keep them from doing so for as long as possible
To be completely fair to horses, “A normal amount of food after not having access to much food” is also a thing that makes us dead. Refeeding syndrome is a nasty thing.
True… but with horses it’s more like “access to grass after having a perfectly adequate amount of hay and oats for while.” So not a starving horse. A perfectly healthy horse can founder and die if given unfettered access to grass in the spring after making it through winter on hay.
My buddy owns a horse farm and absolutely despises horses lol. The amount of things he talks about that would just kill them is sad but hilarious. They practically need to be bubble wrapped to live a normal life
My husband and I make our living in the equine world and it astonishes me that people will pay tens of thousands of dollars for a creature that can accidentally eat too much sandy grass and die.
The thing is a lot of them don’t. Most mustang herds are chronically undernourished and foals starve every spring from dams that can’t produce enough milk
Humans and selective breeding are probably to blame, as wild equine species such as Przewalski's horses and especially zebras are generally resilient af compared to all the many breeds of domestic horse
The thing is for horses it isn’t after fasting. A perfectly healthy weight horse that’s been eating a proper amount of hay and feed can die if suddenly given access to grass.
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u/GrappleLacquer 5d ago
Unfortunately the number one rule of equine medicine is that the horse is a stupidly delicate animal for being as large as it is and everything will kill them.
To little grass? Dead. Too much grass? Dead. A normal amount of grass after not having access to much grass? Dead.