July 23

 

Wow how time flies, it is Gems 6th Bday! Read her story below and see how she is doing every day, on our page dedicated to our Salt River rescues. Answer the questions and you’ll be let in on this very special page!

 

Debra L Mykitiak > SRWHMG- Wild Rescues

Happy Birthday to our Gem!

Today is going to be all about Gem.

Background: 🌅Gem was born at Butcher Jones, to what some refer to as the 👑”Royal Family”, as this band is so loved, majestic and well-known locally. Sapphire is her mare, Shadowfax her sire, and coincidentally 💎Diamond is her brother.

Observation: 👀This video is Gem on August 5th, the day we found her limping, she is almost 3 weeks old here. We did not see how it happened, but her symptoms appeared suddenly that day between the 11am and 3 pm.
https://www.facebook.com/groups/152187765122492/posts/504242299917035

Assessment: 📝 As with any injuries, it is our policy to assess for a couple of days. We do not rescue right away, even with an injury like this, because they always have a chance to heal in the wild, and of course we want to keep them in the wild. We’ve seen some really miraculous recoveries.

Monitoring: 👁Our force of volunteers took turns monitoring her on a schedule. There were many questions from the public and she needed to be watched and protected. In the meantime, our president Simone Netherlands was 📞communicating with our 👨‍⚕️vet on Gem’s prognosis and sent videos.

Diagnosis:🔬 On day 3 and 4 she started putting a little weight on that front leg so we felt hopeful we could leave her in the wild and we informed the Forest Service that that’s what we were going to do, but later on day 4 she started showing signs of severe infection. On day 5 she started limping on her hind leg also, which is a sign of sepsis; once the 🩸blood is infected it can start to attack all joints plus other parts of the body. She also started weeping from her left eye and a blue haze started to appear, many 🐜flies were on that eye, and she kept it half closed.

Prognosis: 🩺Her prognosis started to look grimmer every day, but she was still keeping up with her band, so we did not interfere. As long as they can keep up, they still have a chance.

Search: 🏜 However, when the next day, her band came to water without her, we called in our troops to search for her, as they would not leave her unless she was dead or dying. The band eventually led us to where she was laying under the bushes, luckily she was still alive but she was no longer able to get up. She was pawing the ground and grinding her teeth in agony. That’s when the decision was made to rescue her, and the Ag department, Forest Service and MCSO were notified at that time.

Rescue: 🚨We needed only 15 of our people for this rescue, plus a 💪strong guy and a horse trailer. We waited for the band to move on without her and then swooped in to give her some pain meds and oral sedation so that she would let us carry her into the trailer. That was August 13th 2017, she spent 13 days in the ⏳hospital and was able to come home on the 26th. She fully recovered and can run like the 🌪wind. She is just like her name suggest, precious and one of a kind!

Today: Gem and Mori have become BFF’s and pretty much take charge of things at the rescue facility.

 

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