Balance and trimming

Not all horses are able to self trim.  Maybe they don't do the miles, maybe their work load is inconsistent, maybe everything they do is on the squish.

It can all end in tears.  See the first foot, more or less self trimmed. Then look at the second and third photos.  The latter in particular via the wobbly event lines show just how 'out' the foot was.

Went from very lame to high mileage performance horse.  Not overnight obviously.

 

Crumbling hooves

The farrier refused to shoe this horse any more because the wall quality was too poor (my hat off to the guy for being so honest).

Hefty event lines, crumbly walls the texture of cardboard, quite a bit of bruising, washed out colours, they all add their clues.

This is a work in progress of which we may never see the end.  But here are photos just a few months apart.

Note the changes in angle, event lines, colour, texture.  No bruises particularly in these views, but the other views have quite a few.

LF side beg Aug 10



LF side mid Oct 10

RH solar beg Aug 10

RH solar mid Oct 10





Transition to barefoot of an unhealthy foot

This foot was never 'officially' diagnosed as suffering from laminitis. But the signs were there. Stretched white line with blood at the toe. Significant stress rings and a dropped sole.

The first picture is beginning of Sept 09, the second is today Feb 2010. I have edited this post to put in today's picture. If you click on it you can clearly see how the foot is still scooting forward, but we are getting there. Both pictures right fore.

It's easy to see how distorted the hoof capsule is in the first photo. The toe is too long, the heel underslung and there is a wave in the coronary band where the quarter is out of whack.

In the second photo (apologies for the mud) you can see a much shorter hoof capsule overall, the heel is back in the correct position and there is no distortion in the coronary band. The mustang roll is less than pretty, but we are working on that :-)

These pictures have a bigger time frame between them. The first is beginning Sept 09, the second is today, beginning Feb 2010. Both right fore.

You can easily see how the foot has decontracted and the concavity has improved signifcantly. There is still more to go, but we are making progress. This hasn't been achieved because of the trim, but because the whole lifestyle of the horse has been addressed (DEET).

The horse was allowed to self trim its sole and bars which happened very quickly once the shoes were removed. The bars were badly overlaid and had become embedded in the sole.

Underneath the overlaid bars were substantial, weeping corns.

The 'live' sole was more convex than concave and there was a significant amount of bloody torn laminae at the toe. All in all a very sick and painful foot.

Despite the difficulties we are making progress and today the horse was able to walk comfortably over a patch of large, fairly sharp stones.

Hooves are barometers

Hooves are barometers, with a time lag. The last time Grace had a jab she had an allergic reaction and it has shown up as a significant event line on her hooves.

I wonder if her tying up yesterday will present itself as another event line in the weeks to come?

This is one of my issues with horse shoes. They don't just cause damage in themselves, they mask the symptoms of other health issues which need addressing, but because the horse is wearing shoes the problems go unrecognised.

With Grace being barefoot I know that if I don't manage her diet properly she will get footy. I can address this quickly and she will recover quickly. Depending on how deliquent her diet was and for how long she might not even get an event line.

But I see horses with countless event lines; indicating a more severe problem, which have not shown any lameness; probably because they are wearing shoes. As the shoes restrict the circulation to the foot, the horse can't feel them properly, so vital feedback is denied.

Which of course is why we shoe horses. It allows us to work animals that are sick and to ignore the consequences.

Event Lines

Stress rings, grass rings - call them what you will. They are often thought as normal or natural and casually dismissed. Because they are so common few 'professionals' remark on them, let alone give advice, so its hardly surprising that the uninitiated pay them scant attention.

But Event Lines should be taken seriously, observed, noted and the effort made to link back to the 'event' that caused them. This is where a diary or great memory help, because an Event Line will typically first show about 1cm below the coronary band roughly 4-6 weeks after the 'event'. This of course will vary between horses.

All sorts of things can cause an Event Line. Typically a horse is/has received an overload of sugar/starch. But it could be a bad reaction to worming or an injection.

Grace has had some substantial Event Lines as you can see in the picture below. Grace has had (probably previously undiagnosed) sub clinical laminitis. She is sensitive to sugar, but also to vaccination.

In December she had her second of three set up innoculations and suffered a bad allergic reaction. Sure enough, as her foot has grown down, this 'event' has shown up as a substantial Event Line on her hooves.

Event Lines can be rings or grooves. At the time of writing I know of no definitive evidence as to what influences ring or groove. I just know that some horses tend to throw rings, some grooves and some a bit of both.

Don't ignore them, they are vital feedback direct from the hoof that something has happened to upset your horse's metabolism.

From observation only I am concerned that it is possible that horse shoes mask the symptoms of an event, but it doesn't mean a horse is not struggling metabolically, just that the feedback mechanism is compromised.