Sunshine Coast Agistment

26/10/2024

I am not in the habit of advertising products, but having said that, this is my preferred fly mask, as they stay on so well. The flies are just starting up, and this is a great way to avoid eye infections.

28/09/2024

28/09/2024

And there’s more

3 years of progress with frequent proper trimming after pulling steel shoes.

Over the years, I’ve noticed a pattern where the striping starts to come back after 2-3 years of simulating adequate miles of wear.

No top dressing.
No topical treatment.
No dietary changes.
No environmental changes.

Just trimming to build the foot from the inside out.

*collage is a series of random chronological pre trim/post trim pics from throughout the rehab process.

27/09/2024

It is nice to see improvements in any horse’s feet, as too often a lack of Heel and long toe results in too much stress on the hoof wall leading to hoof wall separation and seedy toe and white line disease.

6 months progress after pulling shoes and making frequent corrections.

26/09/2024

An interesting post I thought worth sharing

11/08/2024

For those of us who like to keep our horses dry during heavy rain, check the weather this week coming. Rugging prevents rain scald, and when rain is this heavy, rain scald is a real possibility.

01/08/2024

A Big Happy Birthday today to all our wonderful old horses!

15/07/2024

Hi folks, we have the most beautiful horse riding trails in Kin Kin, Cooran, Pinbarren and Pomona. But sadly Noosa Council allowed a quarrying company to operate in an area that is totally unsuitable for so many reasons.
1. It is situated roughly 35klms from the highway, travelling through dangerously steep and narrow country roads, shared with 12 school buses, horse riders, cyclists, tourists, and residents.
2. The truck route is a well known tourist route, and listed by UNESCO as an area of significance to wildlife. It is also part of the Noosa Biosphere.
3. The trucks, most of which are truck and trailer, cross all but one of the 8 Noosa trails, which makes them very dangerous.
4. There are up to 280 truck movements daily, 6 days per week.
5. The quarry has just applied to cut down a very large area of forest to expand their business. This area is home to koalas.

Please sign our petition to prevent the quarry getting a permit to expand.
It would be the su***de of the town of Kin Kin for the approval to go ahead.

https://www.aph.gov.au/e-petitions/petition/EN6301?fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAR17o9_SuAl5cfDoaU_49lhYV8jESbywWLOMOWS2fAFA0o1RhUPuYeX6M3s_aem_tEXk1pJZToPdbhLEUW2ghw

e-petitions

02/07/2024

Happy retired horses enjoying their breakfast this morning. Thank goodness the rain has finally stopped.

21/06/2024

If we want more horse facilities in Pomona, like horse stalls, water trough, picnic table etc, close enough to town so you can safely grab a takeaway coffee and so on, please take 15 mins, and fill out this survey which closes on Sunday 23rd.
Brian Stockwell, the Noosa Councillor who happens to be a town planner, told me that the more people who submit in the survey, the more it will become priority to allocate funds to this. He seemed suitably keen to make it happen, but needs you to state in the survey it is important.

We value your input. Help us continue shaping the Pomona Place Plan by providing your feedback on the actions the Pomona community suggested! You can find a summary of the key insights from Phase 1 here or read the full community engagement report here.

17/06/2024

03/06/2024

This poor horse was fortunately discovered during a routine dental examination, with the beards from barley hay impaled into his gums. I have copied this photo from a FaceBook post because it is an important reminder to have your horse’s teeth checked, and to only buy beardless barley.

27/03/2024

Kissing Spine is no longer a death sentence or early retirement for any horse. Surgery is now very affordable, and effective.
The hardest thing is diagnosing it, with so many apparent specialists failing to realise that it is the underlying cause of your horse's behaviour and recurrent sore back.

Learn how veterinarians diagnose and rehabilitate horses suffering from kissing spines.

23/01/2024

We have had several horses arrive with seedy toe, which has been fairly common of late. We believe that this is due to the extra wet conditions over the last 3 years in Queensland, which may have unfavourably changed the nutritional/mineral content of the paddocks, and also encouraged fungal/bacterial growth in horse’s feet.

To help us address this, our farrier provides us a range of services, including seedy toe resection, treatment of white line disease, abscesses and laminitis care. It is always good to have professional advice and help in these regards, from a knowledgeable and up to date farrier.

According to our farrier the newest and most successful cure is resection (cutting away the front of the hoof where the Seedy Toe bacteria is hiding, and treating with copper sulphate)
This also allows UV to help kill the bacteria, plus the hoof dries out which makes it a less hospitable place for the bacteria to grow.

It is necessary to clean out the hoof and treat daily with a copper sulphate wash (copper sulphate and water mixed and sprayed or a foot soak for 3 mins) for a period of 2 weeks, and then treat once a week until the farrier gives you the all clear. It can take roughly 2 -4 months to cure depending on the severity of the infection.
Mix up a pot of copper sulphate with vaseline to apply after cleaning the hoof. Pick out the hoof, spray clean with copper sulphate water, dry and apply copper sulphate/vaseline to the white line and resected areas every day during this period, and then once or twice weekly until cured.

The seedy toe and white line disease are killed by the copper sulphate.

Here are some photos so you understand the procedure. Here you can see the diseased areas after a trim, the black area around the white line is White Line Disease, and the dark area at the front of the hoof is Seedy Toe. Photo 1

Resection cuts out the diseased area of hoof as below. Photo 2

And then copper sulphate is applied to the area to kill any remaining traces of diseased hoof, including around the white line. The hoof will grow back normally over the course of the next 2-4 trims. Photo 3

Copper sulphate/Vaseline applied after a copper sulphate foot bath. Using a sharp pointed hoof pick, cleaning around the white line to remove as much disease as possible. Photo 4

Unfortunately Seedy Toe does not resolve its self, and is often caused by irregular trimming. To prevent its occurrence, have your horse trimmed every 6 weeks, to prevent the toe becoming too long and causing stress between the white laminae and the hoof wall. This is where dirt can build up and provide the right environment for white line disease to begin.
The disease can progress inward, seriously affecting the integral structure of the hoof, leading to severe lameness. We have treated one such pony. Her X-rays showed that she missed having to be euthanised by a very narrow margin. Daily treatment took over 6 months, wearing a boot and bandages.

Good luck, and we wish you every success with keeping your horses happy and healthy!

07/01/2024

This is the largest horse we have ever cared for, standing at 18hh. The other little guy is a miniature pony.

07/01/2024

It’s lovely to see all the dams full again so the horses can cool off on the hot summer days.

05/01/2024

Can anyone recommend any trainers that work with Shetlands and mini ponies?

03/01/2024

An important fact to remember, riding your horse in hot conditions can be injurious to their health.

It’s been soo hot so far this summer. I found this article which is very informative even though you have to convert Fahrenheit to Celsius.