Ena is a 10 year old Peruvian  Mare.

Diagnosis: Laminits

Occupation: Dressage/companion

Human Companion: Ursula Braun

Located in California

Ena and Ursula

Email to Lisa St.John   on July 7, 2009

Hi Lisa,

My daughter send me the link to your webpage to check it out and contact you for my peruvian paso mare who has laminitis at the least.

So I write.
My name is Ursula Braun, original from Germany, crazy about horses as far back as I remember, but never had horses until 8 years ago. I live now in the Inland Empire in Southern California in a small town called Wildomar. It’s hot and dry here.
I grew up using homeopathic remedies (my aunt is one), try to live healthy and try to do this for my family and all my animals, horses, cats, dogs too.

My mare, a 14 hand high grey Peruvian mare with very small feet was never shoed, always barefoot, until my last farrier left her heels grow to high.
I will not blame him alone, there was a precondition and I made some wrong moves there too, food wise, and of course I only got her when she was already 5 being on a wrong diet her first 5 years.
Ena, my mare, was the first and only foal of her dam who developed laminitis and foundered some time after giving birth and was put down after a year of suffering. Ena might have been an early birth, her owner doesn’t remember exactly (too many horses).

Ena, 10 years today, was on a diet of mostly alfalfa hay, (typically for Southern California) until she came to me 5 years old, and I changed her slowly to a pure grass hay diet of orchard and timothy until about October 08. Then I had her for a couple of months with a friend and her old arab for company, but my friend was feeding alfalfa/orchard which was a mistake I know today. In December 08 I took her home again and she got laminitis.

I had taken away the processed grain food when I got her and replaced it with very little whole oats, whole flaxseed and, but not daily, whole sunflower seeds which I all cut out when she started eating the alfalfa mix at my friends place. She had carrots, sometimes an apple or orange, water melon rinds, almonds and once a week bran with food grade diatomaceous earth for mechanical deworming.

She also doesn’t go well with vaccinations, especially mixes of more then 2 vaccines, so I don’t vaccinate except for Tetanus.  I now deworm her again with common dewormers because of the laminitis and the possible connection of too many parasites causing it. Another small thing is that she gets very ichty from insect bites and scratches herself bloody if I don’t fly spray her. The flaxseed had helped but I was afraid giving it again because of the laminitis.
But I use a natural oil repellent (citronella mainly) mixed with apple cider vinegar and water. It doesn’t work as well as the poison stuff but I don’t dare using poison in any form and especially not on the skin of anyone.

Today she is still on the orchard/timothy hay but hasno grains, just 2-3 carrots a day and very rarely anything else as water melon rinds maybe. Besides I started her on micro-minerals (I take them myself with great success) by the enviromin.com company, which I mix with water for her and a tiny bit of bran, half a teaspoon redmond seasalt and a carrot. (No more diatomaceous earth since she is sick.)

Still since she first started with the laminitis in December 08 and had her feet trimmed correctly from then on, she falls back into bouts of laminitis, small ones compared to the first one, and occuring in 4 weekly intervals with stronger ones every 3 months around.
These bouts come together with swollen glands all along her jawline, with moister poops, often her budd is smeared from it, less and less with time though, and of course foot pain in the front feet.

She was overweighed and still is, I think, she has a crest and some other fat polsters but much less than before.
Right now she gets 11.5 pounds of hay per day and declining 1/2 pound each week until 10 pounds per day. Then I keep her on 10 pounds for longer to see if she is loosing the fat polsters or not. She had about 16 pounds of grass hay (no alfalfa then) between November and January.

She is doing definitely better now, but she is not healthy, maybe never really was?!
She also never was on any medication of any kind or bute (except for white willow bark from Dec thru May) for the laminitis pain.
Her seasons are not showing, except for one time years back, but she also never was pregnant.

She could be insulin resistant, I was told Peruvians tend to get it more easily than other breeds, but I haven’t tested her yet.

Truthfully I’m not only writing you because my daugther urged me to but because I saw your picture on your page and saw you with Foxy and something clicked watching you and seeing you.
Maybe it’s just that you seem to like turquoise, have red fluffy hair (I love turquoise and I have red fluffy hair too) but how you stood there with the arab and how he reacted, I cannot really explain it, it’s just a feeling.

You have a connection to them, probably to all animals and they know.
I cannot say I have the same but maybe something similar. I treat each of them as a person and they always reward me with their trust and kindness

I would need your help, I know I cannot do it myself, helping my horse, at least not fast enough, but I believe with your help I might.
Would you help me please?

I would like to see her running again, feeling her under me again when we go on trails.
She is such a joy, everyone could ride her bareback and she loves people, especially kids.
I hope I can save her from her mother’s fate.

Thanks for all your patience reading this.

Ursula

This picture was taken of Ena on December 28,2008 when she  become inflicted with the laminits.

Ena  was placed on the nutrition and herbal  program Lisa Designed for her.