What does this look like?
We were thinking looked like nightshade or horse nettle. But I am really terrible at identifying plants and don’t want to assume the worst…
Looks like horse nettle to me. What does the rest of the plant look like?
Horse nettle
Thanks yall. That’s what we thought.
Found a twig and berries that fell out of a flake of hay. Coincidentally one of my horses colicked today but the vet didn’t suspect any poisoning. Symptoms didn’t quite match up.
Yes, :yes: horse nettle. I don’t imagine horses eat them if they have any other option. They are pretty good a picking all kinds of things out of their hay without ingesting them. Of course, if that’s all that’s available…that’s another story.
I only found this one twig in the hay. So def not poisoning.
Poor guy basically went to respiratory destress from the whole thing. The way it was described to me is that his colon got flipped on top of his spleen. And then when that happens it restricts blood flow out of his spleen so his spleen gets englarged and created a shelf for his colon to sit on. Which puts strain on a ligament. He was almost sitting down he was tucking his butt under himself so hard. Poor guy was in SO much pain.
When the vet got there she was able to do his rectal exam and tube him without any sedation. I think he was just worn out from straining.
Gave him meds to shrink his spleen. Which turns out makes them more “flighty” which explains while lunging him (vet’s orders to ‘bounce’ the colon off the spleen), he tripped, got scared from tripping, took off an dragged me down. Now my knee is nice and swollen and sore today. Thanks, Izzy…
We FINALLY had poop at about 10:00 last night. What a day…
So sorry your guy is sick.
The horse nettle in my pasture looks similar but not exactly like this. The goats won’t even eat it so I doubt that your horse would have, unless his hay is restricted so much that he’s eating everything in sight.
My fat morgan ate horsenettle. He had just finished breakfast, was eating his hay - which was put out for him on top of his pasture, when I called him over to do some “landscaping” in an aisle I was getting ready to mow. Hardly starving. :lol: As I was ushering him out of the aisle, he darted his head into a honeysuckle bush and pulled out a rather large horsenettle plant that I had no idea was in there.
Unfazed by the prickles, he ate the entire top, including about a half dozen berries. I managed to go in after it and pull out the stem, but he ate the rest. Wolfed it. I immediately called my vet, preemptively administered banamine, and he did mildly colic that night.
Horsenettle grows rampant where I board. I walk pastures and hand pull it almost on a daily basis.
I’ve never heard of another horse eating it so willingly and I’ve never seen my horse do it again. I can only guess there is a time during its growth that its palatable.
