Jokers Wild is gone

[my miss storm cat]

There's a nice picture of him.....

http://www.nzracingnews.co.nz/news-a...ival-ends.html

Jokers Wild's Battle For Survival Ends
Saturday, 19 January 2008

Jokers Wild (pictured) has lost his fight for life. The dual Gr I winner was finally destroyed in Victoria yesterday after a three-month battle to overcome a bone infection. "It's very sad," said co-trainer Mike Moroney. "It's dragged on for so long and it's such a shame we've lost him.

"It just got to the stage nothing more could be done for him.

"It's a real shame because I thought he could have made a very good sire."

Jokers Wild was the New Zealand's Mercedes Champion Two-Year-old a couple of seasons ago, winning the Gr I Ford Sires' Produce Stakes double, and he headed the NZ Two-Year-Old Free Handicap.

He was also last season's NZ Three-Year-Old Free Handicap up to 1600 metres.

Jokers Wild's injury was suffered in the Gr I $A353,000 Rupert Clarke Stakes (1400m) at Caulfield last September when he finished many lengths behind the second-last horse.

Last October he underwent what seemed a simple operation to remove a bone chip from his right front fetlock and that operation seemed to go fine, but then a few weeks later the joint "blew up" when he was on a rehabilitation farm.

He then underwent further operations after a four millimetre hole was found in the sesamoid near the bottom section of the cannonbone.

He had been treated with a liquid antibiotic in a bid to try and halt the infection, which was "eating away" the cartilage.

Despite all veterinary efforts, the decision was finally made that he could not be saved.

"He's being cremated and arrangements are being made for his ashes to be flown back to New Zealand to his owners," said Moroney.