Haakon is brewing an abscess in his left front hoof and we are playing the usual waiting game.  The hoof testers and poking about abit have come up with nothing.  My money is on the coronet band (the top where the fur joins).  With daily Danilon and inspections, nothing has appeared so far.  He is living on an unmuddy surface while he is hopping lame.  The first night Haakon was with Iacs in the indoor school.  The next night Haakon was in with Taktur, who loves a shed and happily stands in any he can find.  I trusted them and they behaved impeccably, even down to pooing in three neat little piles.

Last night, having thought I had it sussed, Taktur and Haakon happily went into the indoor school.  They had hay nets and buckets of water.

Just before bed, I suddenly remembered that I hadn’t checked them, so I put a survival suit over my pyjamas and went to look.  Taktur had been helping himself to my winter hay.  As the haynets were empty, I could see why he had done it and gave them the bale anyway.

This morning, however, when I went to let them out, there was hay everywhere.  Taktur, bored of the guilt-free hay, had decided to raid the rest of the pile and managed to pile two more bales on top of himself.

So I recovered as much precious hay as I could from the floor and put it into haynets for later.  I moved all the carts around so that there is now a huge barrier between Taktur and the haystack.

I expected more and I know it wasn’t Haakon because he is not that kind of chap.  Now Iacs, on the other hand……

He may be perfection, but Taktur’s halo has slipped.