Barbaro 'Brighter' After Surgery

Kentucky Derby winner Barbaro was "a far brighter horse" Monday morning, said the veterinarian who operated on him Sunday.

"He's acting much more like a thoroughbred colt should act. He's trying to bite people. He's moving around his stall vigorously right now," Dr. Dean Richardson, Chief of Surgery at the New Bolton Center for Large Animals, said on CBS News' The Early Show. "And probably most importantly, there's several mares in the intensive care unit and he's very interested in them. That's an excellent sign."

"He looks happy this morning. It's a long way to go. But this morning he looks happy," Richardson told co-anchor René Syler. Still, " Any one day could be the last day."

One day, Barbaro was on the road to a Triple Crown. A day later, he was on a long and perilous road to recovery.

Unbeaten and a serious Triple Crown threat, Barbaro broke down Saturday only a few hundred yards into the 1-3/16th-mile Preakness. The record crowd of 118,402 watched in shock as Barbaro veered sideways, his right leg flaring out grotesquely. Jockey Edgar Prado pulled the powerful colt to a halt, jumped off and awaited medical assistance.

Bernardini won the $1 million race, beating Sweetnorthernsaint by 5¼ lengths.

Barbaro sustained a broken cannon bone above the ankle, a broken sesamoid bone behind the ankle and a broken long pastern bone below the ankle. The fetlock joint — the ankle — was dislocated.

Richardson said the pastern bone was shattered in "20-plus pieces."

The bones were put in place to fuse the joint by inserting a plate and 23 screws to repair damage so severe that most horses would not be able to survive it.

"All of the injuries that Barbaro had are injuries that we deal with very commonly. It's just he had a combination of these injuries and that's what made it a little bit unusual," Richardson said. "He had an unusual combination of very severe injuries".

Barbaro's surgery to repair three bones shattered in his right rear leg at the Preakness went about as well as Richardson and trainer Michael Matz hoped.

After a dip into a large swimming pool before he was awakened — part of New Bolton's renowned recovery system that minimizes injury risk — Barbaro was brought back to his stall.

"Repairing fractures in large race horses is not a sprint. It's much more of a marathon," said Richardson. "It is going to be months before we know if he survives."

"I feel much more relieved after I saw him walk to the stall then when I was loading him in the ambulance to come up here, that's for darn sure," trainer Michael Matz said at a briefing Sunday after the surgery.

"From the last time I saw him to now was a big relief," Matz said. "They did an excellent job. It's just an amazing thing to see him walk in like that."

Horses are often euthanized after serious leg injuries because circulation problems and deadly disease can arise if they are unable to distribute weight on all fours.

There is "absolutely no chance of this horse racing again. There's none," Richardson said on The Early Show. "We're salvaging him as a breeding animal. The idea is to try and make him comfortable enough that he could basically go to a stud farm and breed mares. That's what we're trying to accomplish."

Tucked away on a sprawling, lush 650-acre campus in Chester County, the New Bolton Center is widely considered the top hospital for horses in the mid-Atlantic region. The center is renowned for its specialized care, especially on animals needing complicated surgery on bone injuries.

Roses, other assorted flowers and cards from fans and admirers expressing well wishes were delivered to the center and displayed in the lobby. One sign said "Be Well Barbaro." Two apples and five carrots, some of a horse's favorite snacks, lay next to the flowers.

"I feel at least better that we've made every effort to save his life," Matz said. "At least he has the chance now to have a career as a stallion."

Barbara Dallap, a clinician at the center, was present when Barbaro arrived at the center Saturday night.

"When we unloaded him, he was placed in intensive care and we stabilized him overnight," Dallap said. "He was very brave and well behaved under the situation and was comfortable overnight."

Barbaro's injury came a year after Afleet Alex's brush with catastrophe at the Preakness. Turning for home, the horse was bumped by another and nearly knocked to his knees before gathering himself and going on to win.