March 24
Nope…no foal…! But man, that is one big mare and she can make one HUGE mess! Have I mentioned how much I hate cleaning a stall bedded with straw? UGH! And she is drinking about 6 full 5‑gallon buckets of water every day and then peeing it all back out about every 20 minutes. I have pelleted bedding underneath the straw to help absorb all the urine but its ridiculous how wet and disgusting her stall is by morning, and I clean it several times a day, including right before I go to bed. Today she is the same, relaxed, but looking uncomfortable. Lots of crusties on her teats today but no active dripping that I can see.
March 25, 10 am
Still no baby! We had some restless activity last night…a little bit of kicking at the belly, pacing…but nothing. She has huge globs of crusted milk on her teats…its gotta be soon, right? I wish she was a mare that would allow her udder to be touched, and I had one of those milk test kits…but unfortunately she’s not and I don’t, which means, we just have to keep waiting and watching. She’s got all the signs…squishyness around the tail head, limited tail-clamping ability.…hopefully soon!
March 25, 10 pm
Ok I will probably regret saying this but I really, really think she will go tonight. She’s dripping milk when she walks, her udder is huge, she’s periodically kicking at her belly, turning around and looking at/biting her belly, and tonight she had some cow patty manure instead of the nice firm manure she had before. I’ve got her stall all cleaned (once again), waters full, fresh straw down, a big pile of hay, and now the plan is to leave her alone and monitor from the house. She’s quiet now and eating her dinner. But I really, really think she can’t go much longer.
March 26, 12:39 am
I am convinced she’s in labor now. VERY restless, lots of kicking her belly and staring at her sides going on now. I’m dying to go clean the poop out of her stall that I can see on the camera, but holding off because I want to give her as much peace and quiet as possible so she’ll DO THIS THING!
March 26, 9:30 am
Well I knew I would jinx myself if I said that! After all that pacing, pawing, kicking.…she settled down and was mostly quiet the rest of the night. Still no baby. My newest prediction is.…August. She’ll have the baby in August. *sigh*
March 26, 11:30 am
They do not induce horses, but yes I would assume she is having some early contractions. I took a couple of photos this morning of her udder and the splashed milk down her legs. We now need to worry about the loss of colostrum because she’s been losing so much milk, which may mean the baby will need plasma to get the antibodies she should have gotten from the colostrum. We’ll need to make sure we do the IgG test on the baby right away after he/she is born.
March 26, 2:42 pm
We had a quiet morning but she is back showing signs of active labor again…butt pressing, kicking, and acting like she wants to lay down. Timing isn’t great since I am trying to balance work and watch her at the same time, but at least I am done with meetings for the day, finally.
March 26, 6:20 pm
OK, any time now…she’s been in heavy labor for a couple hours now…no more resting. Been pacing and pacing and trying to go down. Very soon.
