Equine influenza?

Oh, ok. Is the barn your barn? Do you own it? So you own any of the horses's on the property?

The barn is owned by a third party.The women who owns the horses gave me one of them but the rest all belong to her.

Oh, well you still have a right to call the vet.

I would if it were a severe situation and the owner were unavailable.I hauled one of her horses off to the state university last week when he cut his side open(she was out of town and not answering her phone) and her vet wouldnt come out.Greg fortunatly is doing better-temp stayen down,eating again,drinken lots of water and looked much more like his perky self this morning.

Hmmmm, ok

As mentioned, Influenza is common in the US but other conditions can show the symptoms your are seeing. If it is influenza or equine herpes virus, then penicillin isn't effective. If it is a bacterial infection you should NOT give antibiotics without talking to a vet to get an accurate dose and treatment period. You should never ever give a single dose of antibiotics to a sick horse as you will just make it more likely that the bacteria will develop resistance to that drug. You can't know for sure what it is without an exam and generally a culture or bloodwork being sent of to determine exactly what the causative agent it.

Likely what helped was the Bute.

This horse should be quarantined and the vet called at the very least for a phone consult. He may recommend that you continue Bute to minimize fever and watch for worsening of symptoms or he may recommend a physical exam.

We only gave him the bute once and he is still doing well.But that info does make me a bit wary.Ill call the owner and give her the rundown so we can get a vet involved.She has to line up a new vet,there were complications with the previous one so this will be a good reason to get a new one asap anyways.Thank you. P.S.The horse was quarentined right away when we saw he was sick and all the feed tubs and water buckets bleached,stalls stripped.Anyone who handles him rinses with straight alcohol.

Very good post! I didn't know that and thanks for enlightening me! I plan on going into Equine Vetrenary Medicene, so I try to learn as much as possible, thanks!