UTIs in horses

Miniature Horse Talk Forums

Help Support Miniature Horse Talk Forums:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

LindaL

Well-Known Member
Joined
Nov 30, 2002
Messages
3,131
Reaction score
43
Location
Hudson, Florida
My yearling colt has been drinking an excessive amount of water (at least twice what everyone else is drinking in a daily basis), so called the vet to ask her opinion. Just from what I've told her, she suspects a UTI, but will be doing bloodwork on Monday. I have never heard of a horse getting a UTI...must not be very common...?

Has anyone here ever had a horse with one?

The water is his only symptom. He acts normal in every way except that.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
I've never had a horse with a UTI, but I know one time we switched from baled alfalfa to alfalfa cubes (with plain grass hay for long stem forage, couldnt find nice alfalfa/grass mix that year) my horses were drinking 2 to 3 times as much as they normally did. Had the vet out and couldnt seem to find anything wrong with them. Switched back to their "old" hay, and the problem cleared right up. Did you change anything you feed recently?
 
Allot of times when they are drinking water like that is because they have a ulcer.. that would be my suspesion.
 
I had a big mare years ago who was around 28 and seems like she had a infection. I'm thinking she wasn't drinking or eating and had a fairly high fever.
 
Horses with urinary tract issues usually pee less, and you will see them stretch out to pee and then they won't.

I had a gelding that was having issues peeing, and when the vet came out, discovered his urethra was lined with crystals. Surgically shoved a catheter up there to clear the tract. That is normally diet-related, from too much calcium, although the horse was a yearling and on mostly timothy hay so it was just a fluke maybe.

At any rate, my colt drinks a lot of water and has since he was a youngster. So did his mom and sister. I had the vet take two different simultaneous blood and urine tests to determine if it was something metabolic or organ related. Nope. My horse was just bored or a "water cribber" purely behavioral. Per the vet, he has his water rationed. One bucket with each hay feeding.

Some horses urinate a lot, at the barn I work at we have four or five out of thirty that really pee a lot. It's just the horse.

Too much protein in the diet can also cause some horses to urinate more, same with too much salt.

Cushings, pre-laminitic horses, and other metabolic propensities can cause it.

It's probably a good idea to have your vet come out to determine what it is. He could just like drinking a lot of water! Maybe it makes him feel "full."

Andrea
 
Update on Khan:

Vet was out and while we were talking, he stretched out and peed some, so we got a container and when he did it again, we got a sample. We also tried to get some blood, but he was not having it, so we went with the pee sample. She called a bit later and said that he does have a UTI and he is now on TMS for 10 days.

We "think" he got it from when he was tranqed for clipping and while he was down he peed and the bacteria went back up his urinary tract...poor guy!

He should start feeling better in a few days.
 

Latest posts

Back
Top