Orphan Foals
May 13, 2009
3 Comments
Photo credit Deana Bjornson
I just posted a request for a Nurse Mare. The mom rejected the baby. That got me thinking that there have to be quite a few of you out there who have already raised an orphan and who have lots of knowledge you could pass along to anyone who has less experience. Even for myself, it has been years and there may be new information out there about their requirements; perhaps better formulas? Cheaper formulas would be nice if I remember right. If you have any tips or advice or information about raising orphan foals, please take the time to share it. Just click on the “Comment” link below.
I’ll start it with “Make sure it has had adequate colostrum” and pooped – feel free to elaborate on this.
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We had quite the summer with our orpan foal a few years back. Our little Solana was about 40 lbs when born – tiny – but very feisty! We used a human baby bottle – 4-5mon old I think, and that’s what we used for 4 months. It was funny in the beginning because we had a calf bottle and a lamb bottle and neither was even close to what she could handle – a human bottle was the trick, but we had to punch bigger holes so she could get more milk (but not so much milk that she got any in her lungs). To get her to start using the bottle, I bent over her – this seemed to help her start – more like she would be positioned with the mare. By the time she was older she was getting quite a few bottles of milk replacer a day! We were told we could switch to a bucket (which is likely less time consuming) but we stuck with the bottle as we didn’t want her to be stuck off by herself. We ended up feeding her three times per day (started out with way more than that around the clock). She also spent most of the summer in our yard and could visit the other horses, including her sire, over the fences. We just used a milk replacer, although we had gotten some colostrum to give her when she was born. When she was 4 months old we put her in with our big colt as we knew he’d be good with her, and he was, and she did just fine. At first she was afraid and would charge him, but then he’d just stand there and she got used to him in a hurry. We added two more colts over time, and it took her a while to get this “play” under control – she thought they were killing each other, but she got the hang of it. This is really the readers digest version, but if anyone should have a question I may or may not be able to help with, feel free to ask. Tracy tracy@aquilapublish.com
I raised an orphaned foal on a goat. We built a stand for the goat to stand on for the foal to nurse. When the foal got hungry she would pin her ears back and nod her head at the goat, the goat would then jump up on the stand and the foal would nurse. The hard part was to get the foal to try the goats milk the first time. But it’s really not any harder than training a calf to drink out of a bucket. It took three of us, one to hold the goat on the stand, one to hold the foal and one to squirt the milk on the baby’s lips. It only took a few squirts and they were away! They bonded like any mother and child.The great thing about having a nurse goat is you don’t need to feed the foal every few hours and the milk is very close to a mares milk. My foal is now 16 years old and is as normal a horse as all the others I have.
We at pekisko Ranch have an amazing mare,each year she lets multiple foals nurse,friends lost a mother to colic last week and needed a nurse mare,after introducing the foal it was a few minutes before acceptance,mom and the 2 foals are now in the pasture with 10 mares that have foals and all is well,The amazing part is this mares foals are as strong and big as all the other foals at weining.keep our number for future use
403-314-9027