Atascadero Horsemen's Club
PO Box 2756 - Atascadero, CA 93423-2756
Meetings
Meetings are held the second Tuesday of each month (except August) at different locations. You can contact our club President for current information.
Program begins at 6:45 p.m., and the General Meeting begins at 7:45 p.m. (There are no meetings in the months of August and December). Depending on the Program, some meetings are held at other locations such as a local arena. It is best to contact someone in the group to make sure where the meeting is.
June President's Note:
My Fellow Equestrian Tribe,
Summer is upon us. Peeking right around the corner. Warm, longer, summer evening rides are the best! Make sure you grab an AHC 60th Anniversary Trailer Sticker. $10.00 will get you a nice reflective sticker to represent our fabulous club. $10.00 from either myself or Kathy Redden, our Treasurer. Only 25 in total so don’t wait.
I’m grateful to Dr. Bardo, whom I met at our May meeting. I want to share the not-so-great experience I had last month and give a gentle reminder to all who have enclosed feeders (Noble Corner Feeder is what I have). One evening, I went out to feed, and I always look down inside the feeder and clean out any rocks, debris, etc., that may have been left over from the hay. Ducati is pretty good at eating and leaving nothing behind, so it’s a pretty quick chore. However, what I did not realize until this incident, was hay, cobwebs, and leaves were smushed up under the two top corner feeders not visible to me from looking down into the feeder. Once a month, I also take my shop vac and clean the bottom of the feeder and use a pet friendly sanitizer to disinfect the feeder especially each time another horse eats from that particular feeder. Not realizing this, build up from approximately 5 years was present and home to a black widow (we think) who took the intrusion from Ducati eating out of the feeder that night and bit him somewhere on his face. Although we could not find the bite mark, he swelled something terrible and by the next morning he was in my trailer headed to San Luis Equine as he had labored breathing, his eyes were almost swollen shut, and he was wanting to lay down. He had no fever, but lots of welts on his neck. I had 10mg of powdered Dex that I gave him. This did nothing for him. Ducati is 1350 pounds and needed 40mg via injection. Even at this dose, coupled with Banamine and a cold hose down, he was still not feeling great. I was able to take him home after a few hours and he rested. It took two days and lots of Zyrtec, Banamine, and hand walking before he was back to 100%. Side note: where Ducati lays at night, I found a mound of red ants on the other side of the fence that morning. So red ants/spider? Who knows? What I do know is that my first aid kit is updated, and I now have a monthly pesticide schedule around the barn and feeder as well as walking the perimeter of my fence line and spraying mounds. What to take away from this experience? Inspect everything. Nooks, crannies, crevices. I did not realize these types of feeders had open crevices. I thought they were solid. Lesson learned, and I’m better prepared.
Get out and enjoy the ride!
Lindamae Suprinski, AHC President
