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Audra J. Mullineux (Audra)
| | Posted on Monday, Feb 26, 2001 - 6:50 pm: |   |
Dr. O and All:
Tonight I lead my 4 month orphaned foal (see posts in Lounge:Loss of World's Greatest Horse, Aren't They All?) up the road for some leading/halter work. Since Splash's mother died, my other two mares have really taken her under their wing. They seem such a great support system, and both call after Splash whenever I take her out to work for 15-20 minutes. I joke that Splash lost one mother and gained two! :-)
Tonight after I returned to the barn, Rikka and Jazz were both at the fence, calling and waiting for babys return. When I turned Splash out with them, Splash went up to Rikka (her half sister) and tried to nurse. Now Splash has done this before, but Rikka would flick her tail and push her away. Tonight Rikka just stood there and allowed Splash to try to nurse, laid her head over Splash and seemed to push her toward herself! A very comforting and nurturing attitude from my perspective. It brought tears to my eyes, so fresh in losing my mare, Arabesque. It was almost funny too, hearing the sounds Splash made trying to get milk from an udder that has yet to hold milk, so the teats are still really small!
:-) My question/concern is: Is this normal orphan foal behavior? Will this hurt Rikka? Will I have to "wean" Splash from Rikka sometime, apart from being a member of our "herd"? Splash is getting 2 cups Foal-Lac type pellets,5 cups 12% protein grain mix, and free choice alfalfa/timothy hay, if that should matter. The work we did tonight was not anything more than we have done, simple halter/leading work, and Splash did not act stressed at any time. Thanks for any thoughts you may have on this! Audra |
Robert N. Oglesby DVM (Dro)
| | Posted on Wednesday, Feb 28, 2001 - 7:31 am: | |
Hello Audra,
What a beautiful picture. On we could conjecture all kinds of problems but I tend to think the risk small. You might find Rikka starts to develop milk. If this persists yes it looks like weaning will be neccassary.
DrO |
Christine C. Mills (Chrism)
| | Posted on Wednesday, Feb 28, 2001 - 10:24 am: | |
Hi Audra,
When I weaned my foal last year, she was turned out with another weanling, a colt.
They both tried to nurse each other ... I think it is common - perhaps the are looking for a sense of security?
An earlier foal I had was turned out with an aged gelding baby sitter when she was weaned. You can only imagine the dirty looks he gave her when she went looking for the "milk bar."
I, too, enjoyed the mental picture of Splash and her "aunties."
Cheers. |
Christopher Dalton
Member
Username: Claustra
Post Number: 2
Registered: 9-2002
| | Posted on Saturday, Jan 11, 2003 - 6:38 am: | |
I have a feel-good story related to the above.We recently purchased a new filly and had to move out a mare and her 15 month foal as we needed the room.We gave the Arabian mare and foal away to an endurance stud as they were hard to sell and the stud weaned the foal.Three weeks later this stud had another foal whose mother died 1 week later.Our mare came back into milk and adopted this foal-needless to say the new owners were very happy they had taken our horses! |
