Sadly, I had to have my horses eye removed this week.
For those that have dealt with this, What did you do to help your horse adjust and adapt to life with one eye?
Honestly, my guy never looked back. He had gotten a fungal infection in his eye (although the vets didn’t know that until after the eye was dissected post-removal) and had been in pain for three weeks while the hospital tried to treat it. By the time we removed it, he was so happy to be comfortable again, he never seemed to care.
The thing we did and still do is to always talk to him when we approach him from his blind side. Be sure to touch him lightly on his blind side before doing anything else(brushing, washing, etc.) so that he knows you are there. The big adjustments for my guy were that he had trouble with his depth perception when he was first recovering and dealing with the dark. He couldn’t judge how much space he needed to clear a doorway or turn a corner. He still isn’t perfect with it. So when you are leading your horse always watch out that you lead him such that he will easily be able to clear obstacles on his blind side. The other issue for my guy was that he is no longer comfortable going outside in the dark alone. If he can go out with is long-time pasturemate, he would go. If you try to take him out alone at night in a regular pasture he refuses to go. His pasture pal sometimes has duties raising one of our young horses. When he has to be alone and it’s summer, we put him out in small paddock right outside the barn door where he can still see from the barn night light and hear the horses in the barn.
My boy lost his eye eight years ago–he’s 22 now and it hasn’t compromised his quality of life one bit. Good luck.
Clarion, that is the same reason I had to have the eye removed, damn fungal infection. What a nightmare!!
Interesting point about being out at night. Didn’t think of that one, good to know.
Just enucleated my old AA horse. Same reason! He is fine, I even rode him in the orchard yesterday! I just touch him when I am on his blind side, turn out w a mask on and mainly at night.
They adjust amazingly!! I hope yours is as successful as mine!
Awful, insidious fungus! Martini was in the hospital, but they couldn’t help him. They kept culturing him for fungus and he came up negative. But he wasn’t responding to anti-bacterial treatments either. The eye ended up perforating and we had to have emergency surgery to remove it. When they dissected it, they found the fungus burrowed deep in the eye, but wasn’t on the surface.
One more thing I thought of, I don’t know if you have yokes on your stalls or not, but we do. When he first lost his eye, he couldn’t judge where the yoke was on his blind side when he wanted to hang his head out of his stall, so he kept banging his head on the yoke. We ended up putting foam tubing around the yoke opening to cushion his head/eye if he bumped it. After a while, he could tell how to avoid doing it, but at first he really needed the foam to keep him from hurting his eye socket .
I hope she recovers well too! I know horses adapt well to being one eyed, still figure if there is anything I can do to make it easier for her I will.
What a nightmare the past couple of weeks have been. This whole thing started out as an eye rub that caused a tiny corneal ulcer…eh no big deal right? Well it was until she decided one night to rub the crap out out of it. Came up in the morning to find the eye swollen shut, hot to the touch and the eye looking cloudy.
Vet switched her to two different stronger antibiotic eye drops from the ointment. Unfortunately when this happened we were blessed with a heat wave here in ct and super high humidity. So yup, perfect recipe for fungal infections.
Started treating for that and for a couple days she was great about letting me put the meds in. Suddenly she stopped co-operating with treatment and we made the appointment to go up to Tufts. When we got there the infection had spread to far. Rather put her through a long painfull treatment process that wasn’t even guaranteed to save her sight or her eye, I opted to have her eye removed. My girl is 25 and we just hack around the farm so figured this was the best way to go. Not an easy decision to make but I think it was the best for her.
Two of mine had the same infection as yours. One was a pasture injury as a baby.
None of the three took a bad step, so to speak, after their surgery. My one mare, Rose, has had 9 foals without a hitch. She keeps her newborns on her good eye side. We just always remember to let her know when we walk up on her “non” eye side.
I think this surgery is harder on us than on them. They do just fine.
My boy has a stall guard I installed for him. He loves to hang his head out. I did not post when it happened. It broke my heart. I could not justify the surgery expense at this time… I’m a single mom and he is in his late twenties. It was a heart wrenching decision but I decided to euthanize my boy.
I was hit by a drunk driver 15 years ago and among many injuries ( including brain damage, and broken C2) was a fractured jaw and horrific facial injuries. The only thing that made me feel normal was being around my horse. I remember it like yesterday. I always thought when I was around him " animals see past the outside to what’s inside", because at 26, you thinks looks are everything…
Then 13 years ago he broke his leg. My parent stepped in and paid fir surgery at New Bolton. And he has been living at the farm I bought to retire him on since.
Tears, heart break, trying to be strong. I wanted to bury him on his farm, what are the laws, I asked my dad? I have had many horses removed from the farm over the years but could not bear to see him winched up on the truck.
The clinic calls-" oh- your father called, expenses are covered . Please bring him up…"
3 weeks later, I look at my beautiful one eyed boy and, yup, it’s in the eye of the beholder.
Thankfully the stall fronts at my barn are all open so she can hang her head out. She loves to stand there and watch everything going on which is why I always end up with a huge pile of hay on the aisle floor after feeding time. She grabs a bite and then has to pop her head out to see what is happening.
Pennywell, I hadn’t posted anything either up until now either because it is so hard to deal with but wanting to do the right things for her overrode that.
Cheers to our one eyed wonders!!
Oh all you will appreciate this. Was joking with my friends on Facebook asking for suggestions for a nickname for a one eyed horse. One friend came up with this one, I couldn’t stop laughing after I read it…
Unicornea!!! So I now have Lizzy the Unicornea :D:D:D
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Unless the eye had to be removed due to an acute emergency, ie he could see fine when he went under anesthesia then woke up missing the eye, he will do fine.
I have treated many horses with painful infections (esp fungal) that eventually had to have the eye removed. They were actually BETTER after removal since the eye didn’t hurt and there weren’t any fuzzy shadows any more.
My mare lost hers when she was 3 months so she doesn’t know any different. And we have not treated her any differently on one side vs the other. However a previously visual horse will need some “re-training” but it prob won’t take much or very long.
On your part, increase your vigilance. He won’t immediately know you are on his blind side if he spokes TO that side. So be carefull to not get run over. Soft touches and noises seem to be more of an issue for them too. If riding next to someone, try to keep the blind side “open”. That way he can see the other horse. But keep enough distance from it that if he spooks from his blind side he doesn’t run into/over the other horse.
But he will figure it out. Critters are smarter than we are in that way.
My Haflinger had the same surgery at 3 years old…she’s 11 now and has never taken a mis-step since the surgery…I do just let her know when Im on her blind side but she doesnt act any different…
The vet school that did the surgery did have me keep her on stall rest for 4 weeks when she came home…they said that would allow not only healing, but her some adjustment time…
worked fine… she’s a pretty happy little girl…
Actually, I think we people have a harder time with this then our horses do! As far as they know every horse goes blind/looses an eye and it’s just an ordinary part of living. Just be sure the feed bucket shows up on time and in it’s proper place every day and all is just peachy!
Since the eye removed is on her left side which is the traditional side to lead on, would it be better to lead her on the right so that she can me when leading her. yeah/nay???
I had to remove one of my lesson ponies eyes at the beginning of summer. He had punctured the orb and even though the injury was treated, when all was said and done, the eye had shrunk and the eyelashes were then turned inside out, irritating the eye and providing a crazy feeding ground for the flies. So we had it removed.
He has been absolutely fine with it. I make sure I leave his whiskers around his eye so he knows where it is. Otherwise, we talk to him as we walk up, and I have the kids lead him on his blind side, even though it’s the “off” side so I can make sure the kids don’t acidentally run him into a wall or something. He is fine to ride in lessons and around with other horses. He still jumps 18" crossrails with no problems.
[QUOTE=LoriO;5775825]
This whole thing started out as an eye rub that caused a tiny corneal ulcer…eh no big deal right? [/QUOTE]
Actually, ANY corneal ulcer IS a big deal! If not dealt with immediately and aggressively they can result in a full rupture. Any eye injury should be considered a medical emergency and never treated lightly or with a wait and see approach. Never.
My youngest mare also lost her left eye to a fungal infection. Like Lori O’s horse, it started small, and then one night she rubbed her face in dirty beding, then it because huge and cloudy. Started on anti-fungals and serum, which held it steady for a while, then it worsened, and we took her in to the vet school. Tried to save the eye with a conjunctival graft, but the fungus was so agreesive that it ate entirely through the graft in a little more than a day :eek:. And at that point, I opted to enucleate.
My mare is actually quieter on the blind side, better about having shots give on that side, and so on. Nothing to visually stimulate her, I guess.
I still lead her from the left, even though she can’t see me there. The biggest problem I had was that when I was leading her to make a left hand turn I’d stop, and she’d turn towards me immediately, and plow into the wall rather than waiting to find the door. So we worked on stopping straight, and we seem to have that problem sorted out. When I’m going through a gate or door on her blind side, though, I often have to lead her with a hand on her halter and sort of guide her through step by step. She trusts me a LOT, probably more than she should. I’m not as good of a seeing-eye person as I’d like to be, but I’m getting better at it.
And as MeghanDACVA said, by the time her eye was out, she seemed so relieved to not be in pain anymore that she was more like herself once it was out than while it was in and being treated.
The only time she’s at all skittish on her blind side is if you’re on that side, and so is my other mare, who is dominant. Then if you touch her without talking she’ll scoot off thinking Mama mare is bossing her around.
Though she’s really adjusted very well, as sanctuary mentioned, I think we’ll keep the Euro whiskered look, just in case :winkgrin:
Believe me it was treated immediately! Noticed her eye looked slightly swollen at night check, vet looked at it the next day and we started her on banamine and an antibiotic ointment immediately. What a meant by not a big deal, was it was small and caught fast and treatment started right away.
For some reason after a couple days of treatment something happened wether it was itching or who knows what, she spent the night rubbing the hell out of it and everything went down hill from there.
Thank you everyone for sharing your experiences. It is really helping me and it will help me answer the questions of the other boarders at my barn. We are a rough board barn and we all share doing the work. Now I have a better idea of what to tell them. I may just print this out and put it on the board for them to read. It was one of the other boarders that asked about leading on the off side which is why I asked about it here.
I still lead from the left, though his left eye is removed . That iscwhat Nevis used to and I think he takes some comfort that I am on his blind side, that I “have his back”. His one pasture pal is usually on that side as well.
My retired horse is blind in his left eye (we talked about enucleation at one point, but it never became necessary) and I still lead him from the left.
I think it might confuse him if I suddenly started from the other side. (Plus it would feel like I was trying to write lefthanded or something. :))
