Mare with chronic colic

[grzywinskia]

Hi COTH. I’m coming here to tell about my
Recent experiences and see if anyone has faced the similar or if there are any ideas/ suggestions.

I purchased my mare from Ireland as a 4 yo and she came to the US in September of 21.

The spring of 22 she had 4 super mild colics exactly one month apart
March 22- nothing abnormal - treated on farm
April 22- stayed painful after treating on farm. Transported to hospital. Scoped and had mild ulcers. Treated.
May 22- the night before her rescope mild colic again. Rescope was clean.
June- mild and treated on farm. Did a repro exam. Nothing abnormal.

At that point we had nothing consistent to pinpoint. I did add a product to her feed (see below) and we then went 9 months colic free.

March 23- mild colic but it followed a dose of xcede (due to a cellulitis)
April 23- major colic event. Went to VT stayed a week due to a mild but persistent impaction. Rescoped stomach- clean, xrayed abdomen- very small amount of sand in stomach.
May 23- here we are again. Uncomfortable- poops, drinks, normal HR. Vet does repro exam and she has a MASSIVE follicle. 55! She’s hanging on to this discomfort I’m assuming because of the follicle development- impending ovulation.

During these episodes she is completely normal except the comfort level- drinks great eats great poops. Her only abnormality is that she seems to hold her bladder and then flood the stall. (We’ve done bloodwork- normal)

Last year she was on regumate but I don’t have record of when I started it. I stopped it in November.

Her diet routine
Inside at night outside during day on grass
Free choice orchard grass hay. 1 flake alfalfa a day
1 scoop triple crown complete BID
1 scoop stress free forage
Succeed
Kombat boots
Electrolytes BID
Sand rid first week of each month

I’m going to start her back on regumate as soon as she clears this follicle.

Any ideas? Suggestions? Has anyone dealt with this? My internal medicine vet is thinking we might have to remove her overies. Has anyone done this? Can you tell me the good/ bad/ ugly about it? I’m just so sorry for my poor mare.

[2tempe]

Just FYI there is a fairly long thread under Hunter/Jumpers regarding mare spaying. The start of it was related to behavioral problems, not really the same as your situation. BUT in between the usual back and forth, there is some interesting information. Worth checking out.
Note: when I just looked it was about 20th or so on the list of topics so you do have to scroll down. “Spaying a Mare”.

[Peggy]

It is interesting that it’s popped up at the same time of the year, two years in a row.

[4horses]

I would try slow feed nets if you aren’t already, rather than free choice hay. The goal is to slow her consumption down. Horses can scarf down hay much much faster than they can eat grass.

I don’t see how spaying will help. This is colic, nothing related to her ovaries as far as I can see. Unless it only happens when she’s in season?

[grzywinskia]

Thank you for the Hay net comment. We do in fact use the slow feed haynets. As I said in my original post, we did a repro exam during the last episode, and she was in fact in season with a very large follicle, which is why we think this could be the culprit or at least part of the puzzle. Although the latest update is that I have done quite a lot of research on spaying and I do not believe that is a good option looking instead to use the pearl pods.

[4horses]

Are pearl pods well tested in mares? I’ve never heard of them before but it sounds intriguing.

[awaywego]

The timeline of your mare’s colics definitely sets off red flags for me that they are transition periods for mares’ cycles. I would definitely think the two are correlated. It is possible that there is pain from the follicles and ovaries that results in condiitions that make her colicky. (In my experience, pain anywhere can make some horses colic.) It would be interesting if the colic episode resolves after ovulation, which should be imminent with a 55mm follicle.

[sascha]

@awaywego

In my experience, pain anywhere can make some horses colic.

This. I remember saying “See you in an hour” when a vet many, many years ago refused to treat a colic that didn’t exist yet. He had come for fairly minor wound treatment and told me the horse would be fine. Yeah, no, not this particular horse. You’ll make it to your next call and have to come back for him. Having that nasty scrape treated is going to make him colic. And it did. And as far as I can remember the owner did not get charged for the 2nd after hours visit that night

[awaywego]

Quite a few people on the spaying a mare thread have been interested in the IUPOD so if you decide to go that route please update with your experience! I have talked with several repro specialists and learned that there are so many reasons that ovaries & follicles can be painful - unfortunately not necessarily in ways that we can see or test. I posted about my experience with trialing progesterone & estradiole in the spaying a mare thread - it effectively shrinks the ovaries and follicles so it is a way to test to see if by making them smaller the pain is relieved. Just another thought to discuss with a vet - I had not read about this anywhere and am very grateful it was suggested to me.

[cnd8]

@awaywego

(In my experience, pain anywhere can make some horses colic.)

Absolutely. I have a chronic colic horse that ended up being caused by coastal hay. It took us several thousand dollars and about 9 months to figure this out though. But, case in point, if I apply DMSO to this horse, he will colic nearly instantly. Elevated heart rate, down on the ground, sweating, biting at his sides, etc.

[BrownDerby]

I know someone who imported a gelding from Ireland and he colicked if fed alfalfa. It took them a while to figure it out.

[Peggy]

I had a gelding that developed cellulitis every year at the same time (June) for several years. It got worse each time, eventually turning into lymphangitis for the last few times until it killed him.

In hindsight, I suspect that was something that came into bloom or seed or something that he was allergic to. This was before allergy testing was as common as it is now. There was probably also something wonky with his immune response.

LSS to say that things can be seasonal.