Rumen8tions - D8 Blog Sunday, April 19 2009
Our first halter show of the spring season was the Maryland Alpaca Show & Sale. We were quite proud of our show string of four which left with four ribbons including two red and one blue. While we have always been happy with the quality of our top female, Double 8 A New Day's Dawn (Color Champion and multiple Blue ribbon winner) and our newest black stud-to-be, Brookhollow's Midnight Express (co-owned with Nancy Johanson), our biggest delight was with our top stud's, FD Panther's first female cria on our farm, Double 8 Panther's Pride. The name sure fits, as we couldn't be prouder. Pride took the blue ribbon in her very first show, a juvenile light brown class. Pride is very dense and has a med-high frequency crimp with high amplitude, but it's her amazing handle that we find so appealing, and so did judge Ken Hibbits. UPDATE: Pride ribbons at MAPACA the following week. We are very excited to see such early success from a Panther cria, since this line tends to get better with age. The future looks bright for Pride and her daddy's offspring. If you have an offspring from Panther, please send us an update on it's fleece histogram, show results, and generally what do you think about your alpaca. We will add your results to www.Double8Alpacas.com. Thursday, April 02 2009
Elivra showed a 10 lb weight drop on Feb. 25th from her previous weight taken in January. She was offered an extra feeding each day and gained back half the weight lost. She was found lethargic on March 12 (laying around most of the day, and showed a decreased appetite) Blood work was run the following day, which showed an elevated WBC of 28 thous. Our veterinarian prescribed antibiotics and a week later blood work was run again. Unfortunately, the WBC had climbed to 37 thous! Another week of a different antibiotic was prescribed, but the 3rd blood work had shown yet another increase in WBC to 47 thous! Elvira was admitted to Mid Atlantic Equine Hospital on Monday, March 23. An ultrsound of her abdomen showed an excess of fluid in the abdomen. It was tapped, and tested normal. An ultrasound of her liver showed spots, which was thought to be cancer of the liver. Blood work showed an increase of WBC to 53 thous, and total protein slightly lessened than previous tests. They inserted a catheter in Elvira's neck and prescribed another round of antibiotics, hoping that going IV would be more affective. Near the end of the week's IV antibiotics, Elvira continued to weaken. She could hardly stand and often stumbled. She was being syringe fed a mash of pellets, calf-manna, timothy and alfalfa hay, which she glady ate. She would tell us she had enough...as she wouldn't swallow and the mash would just roll out of her mouth. It was agreed upon by both of us and our veterinarian, that Elvira gave her best fight for survival, but she was beginning to suffer and it was her time to go. The decision was made to put Elvira to rest on Tuesday, March 31st. A necropsy confirmed liver cancer. Her liver was found to be a white firm mass with lobular surface. The entire mestenery was seeded with white firm nodular masses 5 to 25 mm in diameter. The Gross Pathologic Diagnosis was Lymphosarcoma, Abdominal. Thank you to the veterinarians who worked so hard in trying to diagnose and save our Elvria; Dr. Nancy Lee, DVM and the veterinarians at Mid Atlantic Equine Hospital, Dr. Rodney Belgrave,DVM and Dr. Dean Nealy, VMD Phd.
Thursday, April 02 2009
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