Natural Horse Health Centre

How to Heal a Nasty Leg Wound

Using a Regular Cleaning Regime, Devotion, Faith & Fiske's

by Tami Gribling, Oregon, USA

This testimony is regarding Smokey. Smokey is a big black 20 year young running quarter horse that was trained for high school rodeo. I have lived next door to her owner for 10 years or so. I finally started feeding her over the fence about 7 years ago. We live in a very cold area and she was getting fed about 1 time a week. Several times a year she would be gone from the field and I knew she would be back with some type of wounds that would not be cared for. I can't tell you how many times they were turned in for the condition of this sweet mare but never once fined or Smoke removed. 

After two bouts of Pigeon Fever this last summer, I beg him to sell her to me. Now this is important for later. She was not lame, she would run, bucks, farts to the fence when she saw us coming with food.

Wednesday night, 1/15/2009, I got a call from our renter. She said that Smoke was cut real bad. This was about 9:30 pm. We ran out and sure enough she was bleeding very bad at the fetlock. It was so dark, that I couldn't really get a good look at the wound. I rinsed it out and put a pressure bandage on it.

Thursday morning (23º F) I went out and noticed the huge thick wrap was soaked with blood and puss. I took it off, realized I had a major problem on my hands and called the vet. They were busy till 4pm. I once again cleaned it and wrapped it back up to wait for the vet.

At 4pm when I went out to see her and get ready for the vet, I could not be more shocked by the condition of this wound. It was huge, nasty and dripping puss. I had never in my life seen anything so infected within 15 hours.

When the vet saw it, he was more shocked than I was. He said he had NEVER seen anything like it. I didn't think to take pictures at this point.

The vet cleaned it up and said that he felt that for this to be so bad, it had to have been injured before, and not cared for at all. I explained to him, that happened many times. These people were not nice folks. I knew if they had ever caught me in the field bandaging their horse they would have turned the injury onto me somehow. But I would spray healing products on it from across the fence.

Here is what the vet said on 1/16/09. The inside of the leg right above the hoof had what he thought a lot of old proud flesh. There is a split about 3" clear to the bone. But it looks old. He thinks that, due to this old injury, it took almost nothing for her to break this whole area open.

He said that he felt she needed to be put down. I said, "No way". If he thought there was any hope at all, I would do everything in my power to help her. We decided to give her a week. So he gave her a shot of penicillin and put Fura zone on pads, then wrapped her in a pressure wrap. I was to change the wrap every other day. She is also on Bute and daily dose of Uniprim.

So on Saturday I did a change. So now I have started the pictures. 

This is right after taking the wrap off. 

After finding a excellent site on how to clean the wound, I started washing it with surgical scrub (only thing I could find in our area). Then pressure rinsed it out with cold water for 3 minutes. Then, of course, re-wrapped the area in a pressure wrap. I have done this every single day since the 16^th of January.

We were in VERY freezing temps now. Low 20ºs during the day. Which of course is good for the wound. But nasty for spraying water on the poor horse's wound.

On 1/22/09, a friend who saw the wound from day one, wanted her vet to come out and give his opinion regarding the outcome for Smokey. This vet dealt with equine only. So I felt that what ever he said would probably be the truth. Once again we had a shocked vet, that looked and just shook his head. I don't think he honestly thought she would pull out of it. But he felt as long as we could keep her comfortable, then maybe there was hope. It honestly looked so bad, he just gave me some oral and topical antibiotics. We scheduled him to come back out in a week and remove the flap that was pretty much hanging there.

Dr Jared came back out on the 29^th of January. We weren't seeing a lot of change in the wound. I know everyone thought I was working on a lost cause. But I loved this mare, I wanted her to live her years out happy on our place. I knew she was a fighter and figured if she could put up with me spraying and changing her bandages in the freezing snowy weather and still love me...I was not going to give up on her either!

So that is when the miracle of Fiske's came into my life. I spent hours upon hours on the computer looking for different ideas and products to help. I knew I wanted to go as natural as possible with the wound care. I was worried about the long term effects of some of the products that I was using on her. Liver and kidney damage to name a few. I read about pine tar and the effects of its healing agents. But I didn't feel I was educated enough to just start mixing a salve in my kitchen.

One night I was on the computer feeling honestly very alone and worried that I was going to have to give this goal of saving her up, when I came upon a product out of Canada. I read the entire contents and thought this is it...Thank you God. My only concern was her wound was more open than others I was seeing on the site. I felt I had to try, so I sent them a letter. I explained all about Smokey and sent pictures. I really wondered if I would even get a reply. So off to bed I went depressed and alone.

First thing in the morning, I started getting replies from the company. There were some who thought the Fiske's could help and other's that wrote and said give it up, let her go in peace. But I knew I had found my product. I was willing to give it a try if they could just tell me that it would not be a major set back. The owner, Melanie Fiske, wrote to me about Smokey herself. We chatted a couple times and I told her my whole story. It touched her so much the love I had for this old gal and the health problems that I had. I wasn't sure how I was going to afford the product since I had been spending so much money on vet bills and then the cost of daily bandage changes. I am on social security due to my Lupus. I told them I would be ordering the product in the next couple of weeks. The next thing I knew, Melanie was sending me everything I would need to care for Smokey. The kindness of this company is unbelievable!

2/12/09 Smokey is now at our place. She is doing great. Eating well and walking around. I took her off her pain medication because I was not seeing pain. In the beginning, she was always pulling her leg up to her belly. Which I knew was bad, I had never seen a horse do that. Then it got to the place the she would only stand on it while bandaged. Now she will stand on it without the wrap. She is in a small dry lot area with a stall and also covered area.

So by mid February, I had the largest pail of the product in hand. I honestly think they even thought it was not going to work as well as I just knew it was. I took pictures of the wound that day and then every single day we took the bandage off and sprayed the wound, then I would apply the Fiske's Hoof and Hide Balm. When I would put the antibiotic creams on it, it would sting. Smokey would stomp her leg or try to run off when she saw it was bandage time. But not with the Fiske's. She would stand there and I knew it was giving her comfort. The swelling around the area was also a concern. So I started painting the liquid not only on the wound but around it. The swelling went completely away. The wound started healing, the tissue started coming back in a healthy pink color. First row of photos taken on 2/15/9, second row of photos 3/23/9.

By the first of April we removed the flap. I still kept using the Fiske's. The vet asked if I needed more antibiotics to use after the removal of the flap and I told him no. I would keep using the Fiske's. Dr Jared was very happy with the look of the wound. But I am not too sure at that point, he felt it was because of the Fiske's but there was no doubt in my mind.

Once the wound started looking really good, I would remove the bandage and rinse the wound out. I would put the Fiske's on and turn Smokey out for a couple of hour's without the bandage to allow the wound to have fresh air, but I also knew the Fiske's was protecting the new tissues and keeping bugs out of it....kind of like a natural repellent. I then would re-wrap it back up for the night.

I wouldn't be without this product. We are about 2-3 weeks from the wound being completely healed. It is going to lay flat without any proud flesh at all.

As of today 5/19/09 the wound is about the size of a plum. When it all started it was 6.5" tall and 5" wide. There is no doubt in my mind, without the Fiske's balm I would still have a major open wound or Smokey would have been put down. Things were not changing much until the use of this product.

I have also used this wonderful product on other animals. Came home to several of our chickens dead from a dog attack. One hen was still alive but pretty much skinned on her back. I put her in the house in a warm box but kept thinking how bad that had to hurt. Then a light clicked on. The oils in the Fiske's would help what probably felt like a burn, then all the wonderful herbs would take away the pain, help to protect from infection. I lathered it on her and put her back in the box. By morning she was up walking around a lot better than when I found her. I painted her up 3 times daily for about a week. She is now out with the other chickens in the coop. Pin feathers started coming in with in a month or so. She is almost completely feather again.

OK, Fiske's worked for the horse and the chicken...why not the tumor on the cockatoo? No, I am really not crazy. I have an 18 year old Triton cockatoo, Mimi. In March she had a large tumor removed from her vent. Within a couple of weeks, they came back only she had about 5. Broken hearted realizing that she was going to be put down because I couldn't afford to take her in once a month for the $800 surgery, I thought, hey Fiske's again to the rescue! The anti inflammatory product might work on the tissue. Then of course it had a natural pain reliever, which, the first time Mimi had been in a lot of pain. I started painting on the Fiske's within a day of the noticing the tumors. It took them down to almost nothing. These are located right below her vent. So now when I see them becoming large again, I just put the Fiske's on a few times a day. The first time this happened, she was in surgery within days. The tumors got so large and she was in so much pain. I have been using the Fiske's on her for over 3 weeks. The tumors have not gotten 1/16 the size of the first ones since using it.

I will always believe that God sent me a group of angels in Melanie and Sandy...and all their friends.

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