Tuesday, June 23, 2009

Another "Only Child"

The other day we took hay to the river ranch and stopped to admire little miss Beretta...

Wow...She is chunking up!

My favorite view...

But such a sweet face...


I would think that by now the other sorrel mare, Cowgirl would be getting close. It's been a month since she started to make a bag. Last week when I was out there, even the red dun mare, Honky Tonk was starting to make a bag.

Sadly, both mare's bags have gone totally flat. Honky Tonk has obviously pulled up in the belly and no longer even looks bred. Cowgirl is still huge in the belly, but her bag has dried up. Soooo....I'm guessing there will be no more babies this year.

I don't know. This is going to take some investigating. No sign of aborting. No exposure to outside horses that could have transmitted a disease. They have all been in the same pasture, on the same feed and drank the same water.

Pretty sad when you wait anxiously for a year for that foal to come and then...nothing. And you don't even know why. I'll continue to keep an eye on them, but I'm not holding my breath that I misjudged the signs.

15 comments:

Carroll Farm said...

Bummer, I was looking forward to some more cute baby pictures!

Wyoming Girl said...

Westnile? it causes mares to abort... just throwing it out there

Paint Girl said...

Keep the Beretta pictures coming! I love that baby!
Sorry to hear about the other two. Will be interesting to know what happened. I have never bred a horse before, so I learn a lot by all of you.

City girl turned Country Girl said...

Beretta looks great,she's so adorable!! That really stinks about the other 2...Yes it sucks to wait this whole year for possibly nothing!! Keep us posted, very strange...

Leah Fry said...

Hopefully, they're just messing with ya and will give you the long-awaited babies.

Fantastyk Voyager said...

That's very curious about the two mares. Please keep us informed.

Beretta is darling. She was really posing for you. I love her little head.

Vaquerogirl said...

That has happened to me before too. Don't feel too bad, without an ultra sound sometimes you just can't tell! I love the filly though- what a cutie!

Shirley said...

Lovely filly! Odd about the mares, maybe they only started to make bag when the other filly was around, like a hormonal maternal response.

cdncowgirl said...

I'm sorry that must be really rough :(
I know nothing (or next to it) about breeding so this may seem a rather dumb question but...
if both mares were looking bred (full bellies, bags developing etc) and were this far along before they aborted would there not be something still there? And I guess if that would be the case wouldn't you need a vet?
OR would they have aborted much earlier but their bodies would have still carried on as if they were preggers?

Thanks for including the Beretta pics, I love that face :)
You can just see the muscle taking shape in those side view pics!

Callie said...

Oh Geeze, Hope the mares are ok!

C-ingspots said...

Beretta is a beauty for sure! Maybe the other mares were exhibiting signs of psedo-pregnancies because of being pastured with the other mares. Very unusual either way. Hopefully all will end well. I understand it would be very difficult to wait for so long and be disappointed.
Also, one of your commentors mentioned that west nile causes abortions. West nile would definitely not be a concern because the mares would be very sick and showing neurologic symptoms. And...the vaccine does not cause abortions. That is a myth.

BrownEyed Cowgirl said...

You know-over the years, we have had a few instances with breeding mares. Relatively small numbers considering the number of foals we have raised.

One mare got the belly, made a bag, was streaming milk and then absolutely nothing. She just dried up, sucked up and came back into heat.

We've had maiden mares not let the stallion breed them.

And the two worst cases was a bloody bag delivery a couple years ago. Resulting in the loss of a grullo stud colt and almost the loss of my mare. The other was a teenage mare that did abort and then died.

We did vaccinate all of our horses for WNile, about a decade ago, when it first hit this country. Since it was a new disease, nothing had immunity to it and people lost a lot of horses. That was the year the mare aborted and then died. And as much as I believe in the benefits of vaccines for new diseases C-ing. The first couple of years of the WNile vaccination-it did cause aborts, sickly foals and dummy foals. I was working for a vet at the time and we saw a huge rise in numbers of such cases. I'm sure that by now, they have fixed it so that it is no longer a problem, but back then, it was.

We have also vaccinated for Rhino over the years and haven't ever noticed that doing so resulted in more live foals than before. Actually, we have had more problems with mares producing a live foal in the last couple of years than we ever have in all the years before.

Is it because these are all maiden mares? Are they missing something in their diet, even though they all look healthy? Are they too fat? I don't know.

Cdn-My brother sees these mares several times a day and neither of them have "gone off", which is typical of a range mare when they foal. They'll stay away from the rest for several days-whether they foal a live foal, dead foal or abort. They stick pretty close to that spot. If either of them had done that I would have suspected an actual abort and definitely hauled them in to be checked out. But both are acting normal. The only change is the lack of milk.

I don't want to sound blais'-but if they are acting normal there isn't much sense in hauling them to the local vet to have them palpated and be told they are open. Besides, if I'm wrong, hauling them over 20 miles of gravel roads and then another 50 miles to the vet and then back, in this heat, would certainly not be good for them.

Melanie said...

Well at least you got one good looking foal, right? Were both of these mares non-maiden mares? Maybe they sort of hormonally linked up with Beretta's momma when she was getting ready to foal? You know, like a phantom pregnancy?

Or maybe there are some really quick coyotes out there in that field-they dropped 'em early, they died quickly, and the predators nabbed'em up? Kind of gross, but it is another possibility.....

Unknown said...

Well that sucks - I'm sorry. Sounds like maybe one absorbed?

Maybe it was just an off year - better luck next year hopefully.

That babe has such a sucker face. I call it that because I am a sucker for babies with cute faces and chrome. The baby could be as fugly as sin in every other way and I'd by it because of it's cute face with chrome.

I'd be like ok I need this and this and this in a baby - and then see that cute face and be like "Awww wa sucha kute face" - sold.

Anyway ya - it's cutie.

Andrea said...

Oh no, what sad news. Maybe, just maybe, fingers and toes crossed, they are just acting funny???

Your little filly is super stout and cute!! Love her muscly body!! Little Chunk!! She's one nice filly.