Severe Diarrhea

[Amy & the Boys]

I give the Nourish and Immune herbs during the summer and nothing during the winter months.  He REALLY likes the cold weather.  He also has cellulitus that reoccurs during the summer months.  I wish she would have told me that before my first episode with the cellulitus and the continuing diarrhea.  Never had these problems before, talk about a learning curve.  I haven't had an episode of the cellulitus or the diarrhea for over a year (keep your fingers crossed).  He had been laid off due to family issues and was given to me because I knew how to shoe him.  I'm grateful, he has now regained enough of his fitness to enter a dressage show at 4th level.

Thank you Dr. T.

Amy

[horsegirl218]

Good news everyone,

I got the gelding out of the pasture and into a dry paddock.  These horses are all treated for sand on a regular basis and there were no parasites detected.  From there, we fed him oat pellets after consulting his allergy test results and going over his feed logs, we found that his best days were when he was fed oat hay.  After just 2 days, most of his squirts subsided and after one week, he was passing cowpie poop which was a real improvement.  The owner then wanted to put him back in pasture so that he didn't feel like he was being punished.  I warned against it, but she did it anyway.  By that afternoon, he was back to the squirts.  I watched him eat the other horse's poop and they are being fed Alfalfa and forage hay which has all sorts of ingredients in it that he cannot tolerate.  He was also eating oak acorns which I have found does deliver a small dose of toxin.  Some horses don't react, but I feel that this one does.

Back to the paddock and onto the oat pellets exclusively. 

Once we felt that he was stabilized and his poop was consistent again, I researched some other pellet products for one that has a more complete vitamin content with the most simple ingredient list available.  What we found was LMF in the pink bag contained the most complete diet that this horse might be able to tolerate.  I then urged the owner to start him with a 1/2 pound dose added to his oat pellets.

What I find is that people want to see the change instantly and in this case, the owner wanted to feed 3 lbs. on the first day.  It has been my experience that it takes less time for a low dose to leave the system if the horse proves that he cannot tolerate the change.  It took some convincing but she listened and he was brought on to the LMF slowly. 

It took weeks, but the gelding now has a healthy coat, good weight, a healthy pink tongue, a clean tail and all that.  It is unfortunate though that even after my urging (and I'm very insistent) the owner resisted the herbs.  I had them there for her but her vet unfortunately didn't recommend them.  I believe that this particular gelding would have and could still benefit from the herbs.  The good thing is, he is doing well now.

Marla

[beachridr]

definitely tell them the acorns are bad news... and can trigger laminitic episodes with the uncontrolled release of MMP's that Dr.Thomas explains in his article  the relationship between natural hoof wall growth and laminitis
http://www.forloveofthehorse.com/hoof_wall_growth.php

If anyone lives in an area that has a lot of them and its possible for the horses to get to them, I sure would want MMPstop around should one of them have a laminitic episode. A lot would depend on how much the animal eats and likely why some appear to tolerate them - they just didn't pig out.

from Dr.Thomas regarding another case where this happened

Oak acorns contain "tannin" which is very toxic to equids. Tannin kills the surface cells of an animal's digestive tract and enters directly into the blood stream from the gasrointestinal system

[eileen1814]

my pony had diarrhea for about 1 and a half years. we had him to ohio state for a week and they gave him mytronitazol { probably not spelled right} for giardea { again not spelled right} he kept having it. our vet gave him several medications but nothing worked. then in about a year and a half it just left on its own. sometimes it was like cow manure and sometimes it was like water. you should have him checked for giardea though. we had to just make sure he had a lot of water and food.

[beachridr]

good point...
spelling
Giardia

its an intestinal parasite... its common in the mountain lakes in my county...
here's a quickie explanation of giardiasis... what they call an infection in the intestines that is caused by giardia
http://www.dhpe.org/infect/giardiasis.html