A Poor Detective

It was dusk, and I was out swapping ponies from pasture to paddock and paddock to pasture.  I had handled three when I noticed I had blood on one hand.  A quick scan of my hand led me to conclude I wasn’t injured, so then the question was where did the blood come from.  I examined the three ponies I had been handling and found nothing, so I thought perhaps I had wiped a bug bite I had been scratching on my neck.  But then when I went back to the barn for the next phase of pony movement, I found a trail of blood drops on the ground about thirty feet long.  So I went back to again examine the three ponies I had been handling who had had access to that area all day.  Still I found nothing.  Maybe a barn cat had made a kill and carried a bloody prize somewhere? 

I finished my chores as darkness fell with no further information to explain the blood I’d found.  I went to bed puzzled, but since I hadn’t seen any unusual behavior from any of my ponies and I had a reasonably plausible set of explanations, I decided perhaps the blood wasn’t pony blood after all.

The next morning I discovered I had been a poor detective.  I went out early to check on the three ponies that I had been handling the night before when I found the blood.  Sure enough, Madie had an injury.  It was a puncture wound on her cheek; I apparently had brushed it with my hand when haltering her.  In hindsight I realized I had seen her be a little tender about chewing a treat I gave her.  Sigh.  The wound had obviously bled well the night before, but I cleaned it up and treated it with my healing products.  Then I made arrangements to transport her to the vet to have her checked.

Madie of course has her foal Aimee at foot.  I felt so fortunate that I had been taking Aimee on trailer rides for nearly two weeks so the trip the vet with her mom wasn’t too much of a stretch for her. Especially since my truck was in the shop so I had to borrow a truck and trailer and ask Aimee to step up into a higher trailer.  It turned out it was the unload that was more challenging for her!  It took her a bit to figure out how to jump down those extra few inches.

I had been a poor detective by not doing a thorough physical exam after I found blood.  I had checked back, neck, flanks, belly, and legs but I hadn’t thought to check faces.  Lesson learned!  And I’m grateful that no harm came from my error.

© Jenifer Morrissey, 2020