Frank Sinatra, aka Frankadoodle@homestead

Frank Sinatra, aka Frankadoodle, gave me quite the scare yesterday.
He has always been a BIG eater. He’s a 3 year old thoroughbred, so yeah. Big eater. He LOVES his hay. The only thing better than a bale of hay, he says, is a good neck scratch while you eat dampened (to prevent choking) pelleted hay. Don’t get me wrong, he enjoys his ration balancer too, but he eats all the hay pellets first, THEN the ration balancer.
Well, Frankadoodle was more than happy to eat his breakfast, but he was not as fast as normal. Hmm. Maybe he is growing up and slowing down. Maybe the pregnant mare being grumpy across the hall was distracting. God knows she is quite the distraction to me right now. Mares.
No temperature. Skin snaps back fast. His water trough is half empty, so he is definitely drinking. He’s bright and alert. So back out he goes. I throw more hay. He doesn’t go eat it. WHAT?! WHAT?!?!
My hay hog ignores his hay, and just wants me to love on him. Our ground is frozen so we can’t work on the line right now. I know he’s bored. We do some in hand stuff, he voraciously eats his treat rewards. He’s a happy boy.
I turn him out again and go put his halter and lead away. He’s just standing at the gate looking at me, ignoring his hay. He poops. He’s not colicking. He’s not lethargic.
Maybe I’m a distraction. So I will go away (and watch him from where he can’t see me, because that’s the kind of annoying mom I am). He waits for a little while but goes to the hay and starts eating it.
Okay. Weird. I’ll check him again at dinner. Take his temperature. Check his gums. Dear god, please don’t let this handsome young horse need an emergency vet call.
I wait a few hours, dinner time comes. He happily eats. Slower than his normal. I’m getting nervous. He hasn’t finished his hay in the field like he normally does. So it’s thermometer time. Thermometer reads 100.3 repeatedly, even in a heated water bucket....then breaks. LORD. Of course it does. I assure you the worst time for me to have a thermometer break is when I am trying to convince myself that a horse ISN’T sick. Where is the spare? Buried under 3 pounds of veterinary and foaling supplies. Of course. Where else would it be?
The correctly working thermometer says his temperature is 99.2, then 99.4, then 99.4, then the bucket of heated water is correctly at 50. Thermometer confirmed as working. Check him one more time (did he just roll his eyes at me?), 99.4.
Gums are very moist and pink, capillary refill is good... wait... what is that?!
LOOSE TOOTH! The baby is losing his bottom second incisor, on the right side of the picture.
Mind you, I already notified the vet this morning that she may be getting a call at dinner time, and that I would keep her updated. I was so hoping it was growing pains or a loose tooth. Hallelujah!
Praise the lord of silly geldings. No crisis. The whole barn sees the Equine Dentist and Veterinarian Team January 16th. So we are fine.
He gets some extra soaked pelleted hay to make up for the hay he doesn’t want to chew. He is really happy about it. It’s even made with hot water thanks to our awful polar plunge currently going on.
Spoiled rotten. All of them.