Grass, carrots, mash, meds

There is always something to be learned, even in bad situations we rush away from.

When Kacy ever gets her "Bitching Post" blog started, the one about bad boarding situations, I will have some bitching.

But there are things we can learn from people who leave such a bad taste in your mouth you spend every day eating raw garlic as a remedy. (mmmmmmmmm.....raw garlic)

Salt against scratches.

Scratches (in German, Mauke), is something we have fought every wet season for ever.

They come early here in Germany, and the vet confirmed yesterday that it is another nasty creature out here, called "Milben*" that attack the skin of my horse. He even has a raw patch on his nose for the first time. A tiny, almost invisible spot, but I was like WTH is that.

But my last BO (barn owner?) said to put a mix of 25% salt water on scratches. I tried it and it immediately cleared up.

Sure enough, the Internet confirmed that walking your horse in the Pacific Ocean helps with scratches, because the bacteria and fungus hate salt. We don't have that particular ocean here, so...

I sprinkled some salt water on his ankles yesterday, and omgosh, today they are better. He doesn't have scratches yet, but this damp summer has his ankles in a flakey, sticky state. Better now!

Completely anecdotal, but I would recommend this to people whose horses do not have full blown scratches....that requires intensive measures, but if your horse has just the start of it, a little salt water might help!. It certainly was the cheapest solution a problem, alongside my bottle of wine vinegar for his feet.

I love home remedies that work, and simply moving to a foreign country has forced me to look into new solutions (like, if you cannot understand a label on a horse care product, don't buy it!).

Baasha has a sedation appointment with our vet, because his assistant visited us yesterday, and agreed with me when I said he needs those calcium deposits removed from his tear ducts. His scratch on that eye will not heal when his tear ducts are blocked. For now he gets so much cleaning and medicines, he has started to refuse to come to me in the morning for his mash. So I lock him on the hang all day so he will be easy to catch for his evening treatment.

We were in the city of Wuppertal all day, and when we came home tonight, Baasha was so happy to see us, he nickered as if to say, "Yesterday, too much human contact. Today, none! What is that!"

My man gave him carrot after carrot, and Baasha was lifting his "paws" for him, and stretching, posing, trying to win more as we stood there talking.

He got a lot of plums...I think the tree is almost empty, but we'll see.

He looks great, his right eye is so much better. His left one needs the doctor, who will come Tuesday. I am praying a lot, because it pains him, and it hurts our relationship that I am always messing with it.

Tonight we ran into friends in Aldi, and one of them spent time in America and was speaking to me in perfect American English. I was thrilled! We started talking about Trader Joe's, cuz when we were in Seattle, we heard that the owners of Aldi bought Trader Joe's. That is why there is always stuff at Aldi that says Trader Joe's on it. (And I always buy it in respect for TJ.) He went on to say that TJ is a Bio shop (that means organic) and I agreed, "Only cool people shop there, and when you go in, you are instantly cool!" They went on to discuss ways that Aldi and TJ are similar and I was left perplexed. I can think of a couple ways, small size, great quality, and the limited selection, but type of food...hm. TJ to me is an International shop. Aldi's German.

The clouds made promiscuous shapes tonight, as I sat on my lawn chair and watched the eye candy, my horse, trimming the hang (our sacrifice area is a grassy lawn that I actually have to mow to keep orderly). (Note, must mow tomorrow!)

When I finally took Baasha out to pasture tonight, he said, "Finally!" and dug in. If he doesn't come to his breakfast tomorrow, I understand. The pasture is just too wonderful.

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* Milben? Can anyone tell me what that is in English?