Cob Jockey

We caught up on Disco, how about Uncle Connor?

"This is dumb." Connor, probably.

Connor and I had two remote lessons in January before things got sidetracked. And while my husband was in the hospital, Connor developed a cough, for the FIRST TIME EVER. Go figure. And my vet, God love him, consulted with me over text message and insisted on driving some dex down and dropping it off at the barn so I didn't have to leave the hospital. And then didn't charge me for a farm call!

Pre-cough, Mary riding and me drinking wine. Naturally.

With no movement into or out of the barn since he came home, I figured it must have been environmental, and had two suspects in mind: the alfalfa I had just added to his diet (which I do every winter) or his dusty stall.

See, I have this problem with both ponies' stalls, in that they're both SO tidy, bedding (which is bulk sawdust) tends to stay in the stall for longer than it does for the other horses, which means it slowly gets broken down into dust over time. No one's stalls are dustier than mine, and it's especially bad in the winter when the humidity is low. 

 I've tried to solve this in many different ways, and the only thing that seems to work is just letting them get low and stripping them more often than I want to.

This coating of dust on the water is from 5 minutes of working on Connor's stall

So I decided to strip it and bed the entire thing with pellets to eliminate the dust factor.

Which I did wet down best I could in 15F weather after this photo was taken

And I also added a flake of alfalfa back in that night. Aaaaand the cough came back with a vengeance.

So, at this point, it seems pretty clear that it's triggered by the alfalfa. He's always been more sensitive than most to white clover in both hay and grass, and I know there's some clover in that batch of alfalfa, so I'm chalking it up to that, since no other horses have any problems.

So Connor is getting a bit of a break while that clears up, which is just fine with me as we head into the worst month of the year.

Would you believe my outdoor clothing is so effective I was perfectly comfortable in 1F, but almost died when I popped into Kroger for a few things on the way home from the barn? I had to drive with my window down, people probably thought I was nuts, lol

Now you're caught up on both boys!