While Duke is in rehab, Mr F goes to work

 Feisty is a 4 year old OTTB, who was "too lazy" to race. He's been with us three weeks so far, and what we've done is:

- Learn to stand tied (not cross-tied) in the aisle.

- Stand quietly for feet picking, grooming, and tacking.

- Load and unload in the trailer quietly.

- Go on rides in the trailer (haven't accomplished quietly).

- Lunge both directions at walk, trot, and canter.

- Graduate from little turn out to medium turn out, to middle pasture.

- Wear shipping boots and a fly mask.

- Have the fly spray squirted NEAR him (not ON him, my mistake the first day).

What's coming next is standing quietly next to the mounting block, and then after that is being ridden at the walk. I figure that will take a month, and then we'll start trot and canter in August (hopefully!).

It's a little slower going than I thought, but every day we do some work together (not the same thing two days in a row) and make it a little bit harder each day than it was the day before. Sometimes he struggles to figure out what I want, but he's a good boy and works through it.

The goal is to get him into regular lessons with John by the fall, so that next year he can go to derbies, and hopefully progress BN to N.

Rehab

 In January, Duke felt a little off. It got progressively worse. Six months later, he's had an MRI, two ultrasounds, platelet therapy, a few shockwaves, a couple months of lasering, ligament supplements, and stall rest. He was in his stall plus a 12x12 paddock most of the time, and I'd take him out to graze and "walk" 15-20 minutes per day.

At first, he didn't want to put weight on his right hind, but a couple months ago, he started standing on it and perked up a lot.

He has ligament damage in both hind legs, and he had coffin bone damage in his right hind, where the ligaments pulled the bone and made it jagged.

His follow up exam, the ligaments had not filled in, but had not gotten worse, but the coffin bone had smoothed out.

His rehab is going to be a month of walking (building up to 30 minutes, we just finished the first week of 10 minutes by hand, and two 10 minute rides under saddle), then start 2 minutes of trot and over two more months building up to 12 minutes of trot.

So that's July, August, and September.

Then in October and November, we'll add in canter. And in December, jump again.

It was really great to get back on him yesterday, after five months off.

John said:

- If he recovers, he's going to need more icing and care.

- He probably won't be able to go above prelim, because the speed is too hard on the ligaments.

- He needs a job, mentally, to be a happy horse.

- Walk him on the hard pavement a little, to help "toughen" the ligament.