Help needed from hoof experts

becky b · Help needed from hoof experts

I have an old 27 year old mare, that has been retired from riding for at least 6 years now. She is a true sweet heart, my daughter grew up on her back. Before we bought her she had foundered around age 8, and at some point had a right front knee injury. She was the perfect horse for a young child, and deserves a comfortable, safe, and happy retirement which I am trying my best to provide to her. She is very arthritic and gets an adequan shot once a month (well lately about every 2 weeks)and she gets fluid flex in her food daily. Her walking has been getting progressively worse over the last few weeks, and yesterday she would not try to come to the barn. I went out and walked with her very slowly to the barn and decided I would keep her in the barn overnight. I decided to let her have the whole barn aisle (it is not paved) plus a stall to stay in (so she could move around), well when I put down her flakes of hay I noticed she positioned herself where she could put both front feet on her hay for cushion. I immediately thought she had foundered, gave her a dose of banamine and called the vet today to come out.

The vet showed me her feet and her soles are dropped more than I remember them being, and her hoof wall is flared out and sorta separating from her foot. The sole of her foot is bearing all of the weight. She had no digital pulse and no heat, did not respond at all to hoof testers, she just doesn't want weight on her feet. The vet made her a frog cushion and wrapped her feet and she started walking about 80 percent better. So where do I go from here? Vet wants to be here when farrier comes to discuss with farrier and take x-rays. (Don't know why she didn't take them today?) She says that she may need to have shoes put on but not sure if that is possible with the hoof wall separation. I asked about boots, she said that might be possible. I can't get pictures for a couple of days until I unwrap her feet. Has anyone dealt with anything like this before? I don't know what to do. I absolutely love my farrier, all my friends brag about how great my horses feet are. BUT the vet said she was not impressed with what my farrier has been doing with Poco's feet. I know she has a hard time holding her feet up for him and the vet showed me how to do it tonight. You cannot put her foot between your legs to hold it because it twists her knee and it hurts her too bad. My farrier has been implying that she is getting to the point that I should be thinking about euthanasia, BUT the vet said without her feet in pain, she could go on for another 10 years.

I don't know what to do next. I have a regular farrier appointment Saturday, but vet said it is too early for her to be feeling a lot better by Saturday. She said she would like to come back in about 2 weeks and have farrier here at the same time. What can the farrier do? Is it possible to trim down the sole of the foot so it is not so close to the ground? Why would her hoof wall be shorter than the sole of her foot? Are there any boots that are fairly easy to put on and take off that I can buy for her to help ease her pain? Just a little stressed out here! She also drew blood to run some tests too.

She also drew blood from my OTTB who is losing weight to do a series of tests on him, and got a stool sample from him, checked his teeth, and told me he has a heart murmur. Vet said she was more concerned with the TB that he was in worse condition than the mare. I know he has lost about 100 pounds in the last month. I power wormed him and put him on rice bran in addition to his equine senior. She said to increase his food, gradually of course, I explained to her that he will stop eating after about 6 pounds of food and will not eat anymore, so she suggested feeding him more often through out the day. That is very hard to do when you work full time.

If anyone has any tips, I am all ears. Also vet said the FluidFlex I am giving the mare does not have enough Glucosamine and Condrotin (sp?) in it. Can anyone suggest a better joint supplement? Sorry so long...

Playenatural

Pictures would be very good.

DON'T TRIM THE SOLE! The sole is lower than the wall most likely because of hoof wall flare, but pictures would be needed. The X-Rays will be great.

There are several threads here that may apply to your case, I would start reading before making any decisions with both the vet and farrier involved. A lot of traditional methods cause these problems not solve them.

Best of luck to you and both your horses.

Oh on the foot between the knee thing, your vet is right. My old mare feels the pain in her shoulders, she just can't stand like that, she will walk off lame. She loves the hoof cradle and so do I.

edit to add Links:
This one may be for you. http://itsaboutthehorse.myfastfor...out2204.html&highlight=sinker

appellativo

This smacks of dietary issues preventing well connected wall. What's this horse's diet (type of hay, type of pasture, is the grass stressed, etc) and has the forage been tested/analyzed?

I've heard wonderful things happening when all sugars/grains removed from diet and horse is done with pads in cast. Once dropped, you have to grow in a new foot so it can take many months.

Mandy'sMarty

It's good that you are now listening to your mare. From what you've written, I would continue listening to your vet. Without photos it's hard to make valid comments on your mare's feet. However, it doesn't sound like she's happy with your farrier.

During the next 2 weeks start to educate yourself on how diet, nutrition, environment, and trim affect your horses' feet. Check out the articles on Katy Watts' site www.safergrass.org and Pete Ramey's site www.hoofrehab.com.

If she were my mare I would be wondering about her diet and nutrition. Mineral imbalances and other nutritional deficiencies can adversely affect her feet and contribute to arthritis.

I have been pleased with Dynamite's Free and Easy as a supplement for my arthritic mare. Particularly during endurance conditioning and competition. It has Condroitin (8130 mg per oz.) and Glucosamine (900 mg per oz.).

Your OTTB sounds like he is having a tough time managing stress. I know you don't want to hear this but it is stressful for a horse to not be eating a little bit constantly throughout the day.

jokersmama

I'm confused why does she want to wait 2 weeks??

Why didn't she take x-rays now?

If your mare is not wanting to move at all I would be calling that vet back out and asking for rads right now not in 2 weeks. I'm not a vet but I don't see any good reason that this shouldn't be done NOW. Did I mention I'm not very patient either??

PasoBaby_CarolU

Yeah, I agree, I'd get x-rays and put her on bute. See what the x-rays show. I'd keep her in DEEP shavings until then...but I wouldn't wait 2 weeks. You need to be aggressive right now.

If you don't have concrete, then I'd look at a good founder trim (based on her x-rays) and Perfect Hoofware or cast material for her feet. This will support her walls and sole, and keep the lamina from stretching farther. It usually provides almost instant relief from pain (still will take 6 months or more for new lamina to grow).

Check her sugar levels and reduce what you can, soaking helps and can help right now.

becky b

Hmmmm the one thing these two horses have in common is they are the only two I feed Equine Senior. I thought this was the best thing to feed them at their age. They both have their teeth dine on a regular babis, both were done in January. They are on pasture 23 hours a day, and get hay twice a day. The TB was severly under weight when I rescued him about 5 years ago. He has done good with his weight until this past year, lost fast in the last month. Have had to mow the pastures 3 times this summer, we have had more rain than in past years, and I honestly thought the mare had foundered from too much grass. I had to take 3 of my horses off of grain and only feed them hay because they are overweight. The TB is the only skinny horse on the farm. Gonna get the Dynamite for the mare, and put the Tb back on rice bran. I need to educate myself on sugar levels, and find out how to test my pastures and hay. Will try to get pictures soon. She is feeling so much better today. She is pretty frisky and wanting outside. I think I will let her out for a couple of hours tonight, if it is ok to still let her eat grass. She is on bute and Isoxoprene (sp?).

Mandy'sMarty

Sounds like better news about your mare. Be careful when she's outside. Because of the bute, she may not feel the "healthy" pain in her feet and may overdo it. If she were mine I would experiment with letting her graze a bit while on lead, and preferably while wearing a grazing muzzle. I use the Best Friends grazing muzzle with break away safety halter.

What kind of feet does your OTTB have? Brittle hooves or slow growing hooves? If so, then I would avoid the rice bran. And wheat bran. According to Judy Sinner of Dynamite, the top-heavy phosphorous level and phytates tie up calcium and zinc, and brittle feet or slow-growing feet are often a symptom of calcium and/or zinc deficiency.

My gut tells me that there's something inadequate about your OTTB's ability to absorb and assimilate the minerals and nutrients in his diet. And I wonder if there is a relationship between his heart murmur and calcium and rice bran. Ask your vet.

And, although this may sound like a contradiction, your mare may be overeating because she's not getting enough of the minerals and nutrients she needs. You can test the hay and pasture, find the correct balance of minerals and nutrients in the diet, and still not be measuring the level of nutrients and minerals in the horse.

Leah helped me manage some very challenging issues with my mare, an"easy keeper" and her diet. Leah recommended I feed Mandy the supplement Equipride, which acts like a pre-biotic. In addition to supplementing Mandy's pasture diet, it enables Mandy to absorb and assimilate the minerals and nutrients she's eating. I also feed her the original Dynamite supplement.

Back to your OTTB...
If he were mine, I would be testing for mineral and vitamin deficiencies.
If you're interested, I can recommend a DVD that teaches you how to test your horse for deficiencies in iron, zinc, manganese, magnesium, potassium, B vitamins. Regan Golob of Dynamite created it. The DVD also teaches you how to identify physical imbalances in your horse and quickly balance them.

And if you're interested, I can recommend an equine communicator/intuitive that can help you identify the specific issues and needs of your horse. With that information, you can seek specific veterinary and/or nutritional help in your home area.

PasoBaby_CarolU

I wouldn't let her out. Bute will relieve the pain and make her more comfortable. It also is a good anti-inflamatory. BUT, that doesn't mean there isn't still ongoing damage to her lamina and the cause is not solved. You are in a marathon and not a race. She very well could seriously injure herself if you allow her out while she's on the bute, since it masks the pain and she'll move more then she should.

She needs to be on stall rest in deep shavings UNTIL you see what the radiographs show!! Then change her treatment accordingly. If you go to the Equine Cushings site, you can go into Forms and download the Emergency Diet. It is what you do when you FIRST notice your horse has laminitis. It boils down to...soak their hay for 30 minutes and pour off water to remove most of the sugars, NO PASTURE, NO SUGAR, NO GRAIN, NO EXERCISE. You add salt and magnesium to her diet...or buy Purina WellSolve Low Starch and feed it instead of the Senior (take her off it, it's way too high in sugar). WellSolve L/S is complete and has all the minerals laminitic horses need. You feed it with low-sugar hay.

Once she is past the acute stage (and you know and have eliminated the cause) THEN start hand-waling her 1 mile each day. Adjust this as she improves.

There are MANY causes of laminitis, but the most common is excess sugar in the diet. Often, just eliminating the excess and keepting them on a managed NORMAL diet will cure them BUT, they still need 4-6 months to grow out healthy hoof and lamina again.

becky b

Well I kept her in, I didn't want to do more damage to her. She is feeling so good tonight I could tell I hurt her feelings not letting her out. And she is really p****d at me for not giving her much food. The vet said she could have a hand full or two to mix the medicine in but no more than that. She has hay but she wants the good stuff!!

I moved the OTTB to a pasture by himself that has a nice shed, good grass, nice shade, right beside the mares/Stormy's pasture but still has a small section of fence line to communicate with his normal pasture buddy. I know it sounds crazy to put him in a pasture by himself, but this will make things more feasible for me to give him better care. He really doesn't like to be stalled a lot, his pasture buddy can survive on air and is a food pig! This way I can put as much hay as I want to in the shed and he can stand in there and eat it at his leisure. I can give him as much food as he is allowed to eat in the morning before going to work and he has all day to eat it without being confined to a stall. Then at night I can give him a full ration of food and again he has all night to eat it. This is the same arrangement I used when I first rescued him and he was terribly under weight. Back then I put a round bale in the shed, tonight I put a half a bale, about 20 pounds I will see how much of it he eats in the morning when I go feed him again. Now I can know how much he ate and not assume he ate half and his buddy ate half.

My husband (not a horse person!) really fussed at me for having the horses separated! I have 3 in separate pastures by themselves, can communicate over fence line, one in the barn and Cheyenne and Stormy in a pasture together. My husband says they are herd animals they need to all be turned out together! That will never happen!!

I am reading as much as I can and trying to learn everything I need to know. Some of it is really confusing. I still haven't seen any of the sites say where to get your hay and pasture tested. Maybe I haven't read far enough. I assume the horses iron, zinc, etc can be measured with a blood test??? The vet drew blood from both of them, I will call her tomorrow morning to see what she is testing the blood for.

Thanks to everyone for your help and the references, I am covered up with information now if I can sort through it all and figure out what exactly to do!

ForgeNHammer

How far is Gastonia from Sanford? I do a lot of corrective stuff.

PasoBaby_CarolU

Becky, tough love will save her life. I go through this with Bien, I feel sad, but not nearly as bad as I did when she was dead lame. You are saving her life.

If you contact DairyOne, they will send you free sample bags for your hay and pasture. They include insturctions on how to take the samples. I didn't use a corer, but took samples from 20 different bales.

http://www.dairyone.com/Forage/services/default.asp

They also have a cost sheet on analysis that you send in with the sample. They will e-mail you the results and follow up with a hard copy.

Once you get the results, you plug them, the weight of your horse and how much you are feeding into the chart on the Cushings site:

http://pets.groups.yahoo.com/grou...iles/8%20Pulling%20it%20Together/

Download it and keep it on your computer.

It will tell you what to add or not. If you have problems with it, there are several volunteers on the site who will help you. You can also put in the information on supplements or vitamins that you feed.

I will tell you that with two of my horses, just keeping them on a regular diet of WEIGHED grass/alfalfa hay and vitamins, they are perfectly healthy. Weighing hay is really important so you KNOW how much you are feeding.

I have a scale and then use a big Rubbermaid tub where I made a twine handle, to weigh and feed. Or you might want to buy her a slowfeeder bag or small mesh hay bag. Feeding like this takes them longer, eases boredom and prevents sugar spikes that can happen with short feed meals.

You're doing great. One of the best things I did for Bien were Perfect Hoofware. They keep her out of pain and stabilize her feet so I can exercise her. Exercise is critical for hoof health and weight maintenance.

Good luck!!!

becky b

Thanks Carol for the information. Can the pasture be tested any time of the year? I'm going to get in touch with them and see about getting this done.

ForgeNHammer you are roughly 3 hours from me. My farrier came out Saturday for our regular 6 week appointment and he looked at her and told me he would treat her the same with or without x-rays. He said we know she has foundered at least once in the past, we know she has some rotation of the coffin bone and we know she has dropped soles, so what he did was trim her, put a mesh on her foot and put a shoe on, then he put this rubbery epoxy stuff in the back half of the shoe to support the frog, and the shoe has the sole up off the ground. He made it sound like the right thing to do to me but what do I know. Does this sound like a normal practice for something like this?

Vet called back today to say that her blood work was normal, no cushions!!! She said I can put a grazing muzzle on her and let her out a couple of hours at a time in a safe place to get some exercise, to start with hand walking, then free time in the round pen, then move up from there depending on how she is responding.

Sebastians blood work was normal too, just said to continue what I am doing and to put him back on the Purina Empower for a couple of months. She wants to come back and see them both in a couple of weeks.

ForgeNHammer

Sounds pretty standard issue lamanitic treatment right there. Good on him! X rays do help though. Especially with shoe placement.

PasoBaby_CarolU

What all tests did you run? Just Cushings? Or did you run Insulin and Glucose levels also?

I agree that the shoeing and stabilizing the foot is pretty standard. Essentially the same as Perfect Hoofware.

Now, all you need to do is get her sugar intake down. Did you say if you are soaking her hay and pouring off the water? This is the fastest way to reduce the sugar level.

Then, I'd start hand walking her for exercise. Start small and see how she handles it. If she does fine, then keep it up.

Remember that although chances are good it was caused by too much sugar and you've caught it in time, remember that it takes 3-6 months for enough hoof wall to grow out attached to her lamina to stabilize her foot. I would keep her on hand walking that entire time. Keep her sugar level down and gradually normalize it at <10% of her diet. That may mean measured hay only, it may mean a grazing muzzle part of the day, or keeping her in 12 hours and letting her out 12 hours. No more sweet feed and no more mixed feed.

Once she is walking 1-2 miles a day with no pain, you can start to ride her AT A WALK. Just remember nothing faster for at least 3-4 months.

You will probably see a founder ridge form on her hoof and can watch that grow out over time. She will probably also get abscesses several months from now as the stretched lamina forms pockets and they fill with pus. Trooper foundered in January (oat hay) and we still got abscesses last week. So, it is a long process for the hoof to regrow healthy again.

becky b

I'll have to call the vets office tomorrow and talk to the vet that runs the office about what tests were done. The large animal practice that I use consists of a husband, his wife, their daughter, and two vets that they hired. The wife no longer goes on field calls, she just gives advice, emergency instructions over the phone, etc. She basically oversees the office staff and does lab work now. The vet that they sent out here is one of the ones they hired and I have not used her before. She is from Ireland, and has an extreme accent, and I have a hard time communicating with her. I want my regular guy to come back next time. I just got her because I called them late in the afternoon and had to take who was on emergency calls.

I started the hand walking today. She is walking more normal than she has in a couple of years. I think pulling her shoes when we retired her was a big mistake. I didn't give her bute this morning because the vet said I could cut it back to once a day, so I decided to give it to her at night. Well the hand walking turned in to me trying to get her to slow down. She was walking at first and then started trotting then actually broke into a canter trying to get away from me. I immediately made her stop and she stood there and started bucking. I could not believe my eyes. I will continue the hand walking for a few more weeks and then evaluate if I can turn her loose, like maybe in the round pen at first. I don't want her eating any grass, just to be safe. I did let her have a nibble or two but no more than a handful of grass.

How long do you recommend soaking the hay? I knew I put that laundry sink in the barn for more than just washing water buckets. I'm thinking I can put the hay in there to soak, then just pull the plug to drain the water off.

I talked to the vet at the office today and what she wants me to do is let my regular vet come out about a week before the farrier and pull her shoes and do the x-rays, then if need be put the lily pads on and wrap her feet for a week until the farrier comes back. Then have the vet meet the farrier here at my next appointment with the x-rays in hand and let the two of them work out what she needs at that time. My farrier said she will probably have to have her feet done like they are now for a few appointments (like maybe 6 months) for the hoof to grow out. I realize it takes about a year to grow a complete hoof so this will be a slow process, but as long as she is comfortable I am happy! I asked the vet about pulling her shoes now for x-rays and she said NO wait until it has been almost the 6 weeks, what you had done costs too much to take off this soon! At least she understands how expensive it is. It is worth twice maybe three times what I paid to see my old girl happy again.

Thanks ForgeNHammer for telling me why I need the x-rays, I didn't know it was to know about shoe placement. Now that at least makes sense to me now.

As far as riding her, I will not even consider that. We retired her a few years ago due to her previous knee injury. If we rode her, even at a walk for 30 minutes the next day her knee would be swollen and she would be uncomfortable. It is not worth it to me, I have 5 other horses I can ride. All I want for Poco is for her to enjoy the last years of her life.

Carol she is almost completely off of feed due to all this and the fact that she is overweight. Three of my horses are off of feed now! Yes I had a pasture of porkers!! I use a handful and a half to soak her isoxoprene in other wise I can't get it in her, she hates that stuff. I guess once the isoxoprene is over she will get hay only. Thanks for telling me about the abscesses I would have freaked out when that started, but now I know to watch for it.

I am starting to feel like I don't know enough to own horses. To think growing up we fed our horses oats and dried corn and oat hay and never had a founder or abscess, and only had one colic and that was when a tree fell on the fence and my mare got out and ate the garden including all of my moms corn!! She looked like she was going to explode when we got up the next morning and found her. I guess we were extremely lucky.

I'm looking into the dynamite products to at least be able to feed the fat horses some vitamins without feeding them sweet feed or senior feed. I'm still looking for a better joint supplement for Poco too.

I really do appreciate all the help from everyone. I am learning all kinds of things I knew nothing about.

edited to add: Sorry didn't mean to write a book!