healthy appetite = healthy animal?

[EJB]

Question for you equine types...in general, if an animal has a healthy appetite, is he most likely more or less healthy? My question pertains to donkeys (mini) in particular, but they are closley related to horses, so horse types please chime in...

Also, I have been told that a normal temp for a mini-donkey is 100...I have been getting consistently 98-98.5, and only occassionaly have read 100 (is 104 a few days ago but we are treating him for what the vet calls "shipping sickness").

We already lost 1 of the 2 we bought, probably because we didn't recognize the symptons fast enough, but the vets says we probably wouldn't have been able to save him anyway...sad day that was.

Anyway, the 2nd donkey seems better, but not 100%, and I am concerned about the low temp. He is eating a decent amount. The vet was not concerned a bout the temp, but then again he wasn';t concerned about the first one either right up until it died so not sure I trust his judgement.

Any helpful advice?

[RichZ]

I don't know about donkeys, but I expect they are similar to horses. With horses, most have a good appetite no matter what. Two different friends of mine had horses that eventually had to be put down, due to very severe laminitis. In each case, each horse was in severe pain and extremely debilitated. And in each case the horse was eating up until the very end.

I wonder if you should call in another vet. Where are you located in Mass. How close are you to NY? And what would the closest NY town be? I use a group of three great equine vets, but I don't know how far they'd travel.

[EJB]

Albany is about 50-60 minutes away from me...I am fairly close to the NY border...as opposed to boston for example, but I tend to doubt that any vet from NY would make the trip unless it was extremely profitable for him/her.

That has been my problem, at least in part, is finding vets that work on large animals...when we first ran into problems it tooks us hours and hours on the phone just to get in touch with a vet that would talk to someone that was not yet an existent client. I had no idea that that would be so difficult.

I suspect that most people that have large animals, have no choice but to learn as much as they possibly can and handle a lot of "normal" problems themselves.

Thanks for the advice.

Do you know if a horse, for example, with a normal temp of 100, would tend to have a lower body temp in colder wether?

[RichZ]

I live quite a bit north and east of Albany. Lets give this a try.
I use Borador Animal Hospital, in Salem, New York. Their phone number is (518) 854-3005. The practice includes three lady vets, who I know well. I would (and do) trust each of them with the life of each of my animals. My animals are like my children, and I love each of them, so, you can tell I think VERY highly of each of these vets. They are all excellent equine vets. It is possible that they may be willing to travel to you, or at least could reccommend a vet closer to you.

Tell them that you are a friend of mine, I know everyone at Borador Animal Hospital. My full name is Rich Zlattner, believe me, they'll know me.

Let me know the outcome, and hopefully, one of these vets will be willing to travel to you. It worries me that your vet was not worried about one donkey, and that animal died.

[EJB]

Thanks very much for the vet's name and number. At this point I am not going to call them because the remaining donkey appears to be getting better each day...but I do monitor the situation very closely; even more so now that we have lost one.

I doubt very much they would consider making the trip, but if I call them it would likely be for advice. Like I said in an earlier post, getting in touch with a vet who is willing to help has been very difficult for us. I wonder if this is a common problem or if I just have had bad luck with vets.

Anyway, thanks again for the advice and the info. I hope I don't need to call them but if I do I'll be glad I have the info.

EJB,

As far as them not giving advice over the phone it's a huge liability thing for doctors. Even though you are not a client if that doctor gives you advice they can be held accountable for that advice even if you had lied to them about the condition. That's why you won't see too many docs, animal or human, that will give advice out to people over the phone, especially those that aren't already clients.

The reason you don't see very many large animal vets is that there is not alot of money in treating large animals anymore and alot of times the people with large animals can't pay as well as people with small animals. It's mostly an economics issue that you don't see as many large animal vets as you used to.

[egon]

Large animal vets also have a tendency to be hurt both by the animal treated and conditions worked in.

Horses can be dangerous and some will refuse to work on them.

Calving cows located in less than desirable conditions and handling of the large calves by section all have there effect on the vet.

They usually have to drive to the large animal in all types of weather conditions and often have to work outside in the same weather conditions. The sanitary provisions can be deplorable.

Egon