Trying to catch up with the board!

[tricia]

I haven't been online much the past week. I had a killer cold that just about wiped me out, we were slammed at work, and DH's boss died!
And then to top it all off, Ladd coliced Thursday afternoon. Sheesh...... I'm just looking forward to a nice slow day here at work so I can finally relax and surf the boards and catch up.


I've missed you all!

Tricia

[qhaddict]

Oh my. I hope you are able to get some rest and relax now!

[Mary Ann]

Yeesh, what a week! Got any ideas why Ladd colicked?

Are there any implications for your DH due to his boss's death? I'm so sorry, especially if he was a nice guy.

Regardless, we're glad to have you back! Are you pretty much over your cold?

[Chrisnstar]

Oh gosh, is Ladd ok now

[tricia]

We are just waiting to see about the job situation. Mr J was in his 80's but was still involved in the day to day operations of the plant until about 4 months ago when he got really sick. He was a hard man to work for and expected a lot of his employees, but he was always fair. He always made sure that his employees were taken care of. DH said that even after he was sick, he would visit the plant once a week to tell the employees how much he appreciated their hard work.
They haven't read the will yet, but I am sure that the plant will go to his 2 sons. They have spoken in the past about selling it out to a competitor (basically shutting it down), but that was before they diversified into several other new products that they are building now. Another alternative would be for them just to turn the plant and business office over to my DH (who runs the plant) and to another man who oversees the orders/sales and sit back and draw a check. I guess we'll have to wait and see if they are satisfied with how much actual cash that he left to them (he was a multi-millionaire) before we see if they want to cash out on the business. In my opinion, they would be stupid to sell out now. DH developed and let them patent a brush hog and also a grappling claw that go on the front of a Bobcat. They are making a ton of money on them with the clean up effort from the hurricanes. I begged DH to patent the design on his own and sell the rights to them, but he's a company man to the bone.

I don't know why Ladd coliced, it wasn't a bad colic, but he did turn down food, was really "droopy" and wanted to lay down a lot, and was pawing a bit.
I was putting out round bales and noticed him laying down a lot, which is highly unusual because he is always very interested in the tractor. I kept watching him and decided to offer some feed to them and see his reaction. He turned it down and just stood there with his head hanging over the feeder. I knew then that he had a tummy ache. I listened to his gut, and it sounded active, his gums were pink, but his sides felt a little tight. I kept him up and moving, and for a while, everytime I turned him loose, he would drop to the ground. I prevented him from rolling until he finally pooped 3 times and decided to start grazing again. The poop was really dry and crumbly so I am thinking that maybe he wasn't drinking enough water that day. I wasn't terribly alarmed, because he wasn't acting like he was in a lot of pain or thrashing around, but I watched him really close to see if I needed the vet, it lasted about 4 hours total. If he hadn't pooped by then, I was planning to load him up and go to the vet. After he pooped that last time, he acted like nothing had ever happened. Really strange. We did have a pretty good drop in temp that day, so that may have possibly had something to do with it too. Who knows?

I am still pretty congested from the cold and coughing a good bit. The news guy said this morning that our lovely weather that we are having is to blame for so many folks being sick. We are just passing it around at home, Amanda brought it home, so I am blaming her!

[DorothyB]

The horse I used to lease would colic every time a cold front came in - even if all his care (feed, turnout, pasture pals, etc) had been totally consistent, he had fresh water, etc.