Bath time

Finally last weekend the weather was warm enough so we jumped on the opportunity to bathe the horses. Kim has been the first on the list of horses to bathe since December. I started with her on Friday with help from Stefan, a ranch volunteer. Kim enjoyed every moment of scrubbing. She has been so itchy, that she has scratched herself to blood on several parts of her bony body. I don't know why we never thought of it before... but scrubbing her through to the skin surfaced tiny little white particles, which looked like dry skin. Soon her entire body was covered with this white stuff that didn't come off. I had NEVER seen lice before so I had to call Raul to come and heck whether this could be it. Raul said that it indeed was lice eggs. Then he parted the hair just enough to see the lice on her skin. Not lying Kim had more lice on her body than hair. No wonder she has been so permanently dehydrated. I cannot even begin to describe how disgusted I felt. They say that humans can not catch horse lice, but I was itching all over from the mere thought. We bathe her with a microbial shampoo on Friday and afterwards I sprayed her with anti-fungal spray since she does have fungal problems also. On Saturday we bathe her again, with lice shampoo this time and sprayed her afterwards with a heavy fly-tick-lice repellent, that we got from "Feed n' Fuel" for her that morning. On Sunday I groomed her with a metal curry and she stood there untied with a lip quivering, so totally loving me scratching her. I believe we killed most of the lice, but this certainly isn't the end of it. Her face and ears were the difficult part. The lice were stuck all over the inside of her ears. Virpi dampened a towel with the lice spray and rubbed the insides of her ears as much as she could without hurting her.Needless to say, That Steal and Madeira got a nice bath too. Luckily they didn't have any lice. Afterall Kim has lived right next door to Madeira for the past few months.Check out Steal shaking. His ears are bend.Madeira sparkling after her bath.