Horses by nature and some secret code do not like to get sick or hurt during regular, weekly, business operating hours. In the case of that odd exception, priority is always given to those disasters that conflict with routine appointments that we have already scheduled.

 

There is always at least one of the vets on call, 24 hours/day, 365 days/year. Most of the time emergencies, whether illness/colic, birthing, or trauma, are pretty-much self-evident; occasionally what constitutes an emergency becomes sort of relative, even within the realm of one’s own farm over a course of time (what once terrified you may not bother you as much the 10th time you see it).

 

There are some guidelines for those potentially grey areas that we have listed on subsequent pages, but if there is any possibility of something being amiss, it might be a little more wise to just call instead of navigating the internet... there are no stupid questions, only unanswered ones. We will go into more detail about certain, more commonly encountered situations (perhaps prudently perused at your leisure), and what, for instance, would be best to do whilst waiting for the vet to arrive, i.e. hydrotherapy would not be the best course of action for an arterial bleeder.