Foal Sitting: Dummies

It is 5: 15 am and I have 45 mins left of my 12 hour night shift. We have been foal sitting a pathetic dummy since Friday at 1am - taking shifts to sit with him. I managed to get yesterday off (awesomeness) to surprise Arthur at Summer Camp. When I got here today, I finally saw that there has been progress with this dude. He needs to hurry up and turn into normal because he is reaching the max amount of $$ the owners agreed to spend. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that he hurries it up and starts nursing on his own soon. There is also a baby (dummy) cria in the large animal ward. It is ridiculous looking. I was able to get it to nurse tonight, so there is hope for that little creature. Dummy foals that are hypoxic during birth. They get cerebral edema and can't function normally. Their full recovery is based on how much the owners are able to give the nursing care as it is a full time 24 hours/day job. Usually they do make a full recovery if you can manage any seizure activity and make sure they get the proper nutrition. This dude is on IV fluids, O2 and a nasoesophageal feeding tube that we put mamma's milk in (after milking her first of course) Luckily the U of I has extra cheap labor (aka vet students). And back to counting down the minutes...