Tuesday, March 16, 2010

The Annual Check-up


When I left the barn a few minutes ago, Tesoro was hanging his head over the stall door - a little bleary-eyed, as if he'd stayed out too late last night and had a little too much to drink. The vet had sedated him so she could float his teeth. (Wonder why filing a horse's teeth is called "floating?") Our horses usually need this procedure every other year. Rocky and Fay had their teeth floated last year, so they skipped out this time. I feel sure they enjoyed hearing the file scraping back and forth on the boss hoss' teeth.

The vet - from LSU Veterinary Clinic - usually comes with a crew of four or five veterinary students. Today she just had one student with her, but they didn't have any trouble handling the herd of three.

The horses on this quixotic little hobby farm are not too different from the people who live here. They are under-worked and over-fed. After the vet took girth measurements - the horses' measurements, not ours - it was determined that our equine friends could do to lose a few pounds. They need to munch less and exercise more. Where have I heard that before?




1 comment:

SBL said...

Yes, indeed. That's exactly what I need to do: munch less and exercise more. :-(