Ultium | Red on the Right

So, I kind of fell off the bandwagon for my February updates, and now we’re on month 3 of the new Ultium based diet.

Ignoring that Foster came out looking like a pig yesterday, here are his glamour shots for the month:

Granted, my picture taking skills last night were abysmal, and I Foster didn’t have much patient for getting perfectly square. His hips are slightly tilted in the hind end photo, and his hips are slightly away from me in the profile picture.

Winter is never kind to Foster, and I have been supplementing with an alfalfa mash to get some extra nutrients into his system. Still, with the Ultium and the extra mash, I don’t see a discernible different over the last couple months. Perhaps it would be different if our riding had been more regular over the last month, but it’s hard to say.

The biggest difference in Foster that I have seen of late has been in his attitude. He’s been overall quite grumpy, not wanting to go forward, and generally not as happy to see me as I’m used to. So far I have been putting this down to everyone’s bad opinion of the horses being stuck inside for 2 weeks straight, or being part of the PSSM theory that lack of work affects Foster a lot worse than most horses.

Of course, I am not ruling out ulcers, and will be thinking about scoping him if a week’s worth of routine work has not improved his outlook. Anything to get my happy pony back!

As I mentioned before, Foster has officially been on his new diet for a month. In that month, he has been sound but back sore, and hasn’t noticeably increased weight or muscle. If anything, he started looking a bit gangly again, and myself and others suspected a possible growth spurt. Luckily the vet/chiropractor had a measuring stick and we were able to confirm- Foster has grown to 16.2h this year (he was last measured a year ago at a hair under 16.1h). So, the Ultium could be doing its job, but my warmblood baby (who turns 8 next month, ah!) used those extra nutrients to sprout upwards rather than out.

In the interest of consistency, I still took pictures of his backside. Boy, equestrians are weird- I’m pretty sure dog people don’t do this shit.

And from the side…

To me, there’s no noticeable difference, except that he’s standing somehwat hollow backed in the second picture. The only thing this picture proves to me at the moment is that I need to shave off those little feathers; the way they collect dirt is driving me nuts.

In any case, we’re sticking with the Ultium and Performance Supplements, and hopefully it will start to make a difference in some months.

Otherwise, the chiropractor (slash vet) and I discussed at length why he may have gotten back sore and why he is not straight. There are some guesses out there, with treatments that include hock injections and possibly scoping for ulcers. For now, we’re going to see what happens with this second adjustment (many of the same adjustments made), and I’m desperately hoping it doesn’t come to anything more. We hand walked for 20 minutes after his adjustment last night, tonight he gets light work, and tomorrow back to a regular routine.

So what will it be? A happy pony tonight, or a grumpy sore one?