Sunday, October 26, 2014

An angel for Cricket

On Wednesday morning, I took Cricket down to the vet school. Of all the little guys, he seemed to have bounced back the least from the problems over the summer. On top of the ongoing parasite problems, he now had a fever and refused to eat. The vets treated everything they could think of but he didn't respond to anything. On Friday afternoon they sent tests out for mineral analyses and a viral disease called Blue Tongue. Those will come back next week.

Later, on Wednesday night, I took in a tiny kitten from a local barn. Earlier in the week a friend had put out an urgent call for a home for this little one. They said the mother cat kept dumping her in the woods. The barn where she was born has constant litters. By all accounts the birth rate and kitten mortality rate there are about equal. I don't know. I don't know why the owner doesn't just get the adults fixed.

Anyway, nobody stepped up, so on Wednesday night, despite a vow to never take another cat, I agreed to take the kitten home. I was told she was about 8 weeks old. She was a beautiful little girl.

We never got a chance to name her. She died in my hands, just after midnight on Friday night. I'm sure she could not have been even 4 weeks old. I'm sorry she never got to grow up to run and play and chase bugs.

The call from the vet came Saturday morning. Cricket never got much of a chance either. He also died sometime during the night Friday.

I like to think they went together.

Cricket was my first real farm loss and I'm taking it hard. It helps a little to imagine he has a tiny nameless angel with him on his journey.

Monday, October 13, 2014

Zeusie

Anybody remember Zeus?

He went across the road for a trial training stint in August.

And never came home.

Here's the 13-year-old taking him over a small jump for the first time yesterday.  Well, part of him anyway. A lesson student on a humongus Clydesdale trotted across my view just as they launched.

Still, it makes the point I think. Zeusie (yeah, that's what happens when you're a pony in a stable full of off-the-track-thoroughbreds) is doing well.

He and the child are having the time of their lives.