Light at the End of the Tunnel ... end of QT!

And promptly got sick. First a respiratory illness of some sort, cough, snot, lethargy. On vet advise treated with antibiotics and they seemed to get better. After 30 days of quarantine, the chestnut with the blaze (Vixen) grew a strange abscess under her ear. Fearing strangles, we had a local vet look at it but given it's weird placement and no other symptoms didn't think it was strangles and released them from QT. Thank goodness they are unhandled and not halter broke or they would have all been put out to pasture. Instead, on day 42 of their QT, we got hit with full blown strangles, an aggressive and hot strain, called bastard by our normal vets due to the weird placement all over their heads. Unfortunately there was nothing to do but wait it out and keep them fed and hydrated since they are barely touchable.

Finally, though, four out of five of the girls abscessed, burst and drained. The buckskin, Nikki, never did ... or she had it originally and just didn't have it that bad. Either way, on vet consult they are now finishing up their final 21 day post-drainage and illness QT and will be able to move to a clean pen this weekend. There is some stress with moving them, but it needs to be done. We have no other pen that doesn't border another paddock with horses in it, but we have to do it at sometime. We are choosing not to fully integrate with our big herd but will be sharing a fenceline with them. At this point, what will be will be. We've done our best to maintain QT and keep it from spreading but after nearly 3 months in the QT pen we need to move forward and get their training started, and we need to get that pen cleaned out and waiting for a few warm sunny days to kill off the strep that causes strangles.

Through it all, the girls have grown, gained weight (lost it while sick, gained it back), and are learning to trust. Two of them, Nikki and Vixen, are nearly ready to halter. Noelle (the bay) allowed touch while sick but hangs back now and the two palominos, Dasher and Dancer, are by and far the most cautious. We are really looking forward to actually being able to work with them.

These five 2 year old girls are available for adoption but obviously will need to be halter broke first. They could use monthly virtual adopters to help cover their cost - $100/month each provides food and farrier work - or individual $50 sponsors for each of them to cover their DNA testing to determine if they are Morgans from this herd. http://www.gentlespirithorses....