Mods I hope you will allow this information to stay out here on the main forum due to the large amount of foundered little horses there are.
Brief Review:
Sonny my senior citizen Quarter Horse came up drop dead lame practially over night. One morning I went to turn him out and he refused to move. I insisted he had to go out because of artheritis circulation but his knees buckled at the door of his stall and he nearly went down on me.
We battled thrush this summer (and won) but I still thought that could be part of the problem.
His heels were contracted and grown at a rapid rate for some reason I could not figure out why they were which caused them to flare out the side walls of the hoof
The walls of the hoof had cracked, and were chipping and falling away from the hoof like paper everytime I cleaned his feet. His hoof walls were separating plus he had a split in the front. I thought that was White Line Disease.
His feet were so hot they were literally on fire.
I got out my one and only soaking boot (someone ripped off the other one) and used a bucket for the other hoof and began soaking him in epsom salt and ice water.
I got the vet on the way.
This is the front right which is more severe than the left. A quick glance looks like he does not need a trim right ? Except just rasp off those darn cracks......wrong. Then you pick up the foot and look what has happened underneath it. The top picture, the dark portion on your right is where the flare is from being shoved over by the heels growing out of control.
The vet dianosed navicular and laminitis, put Sonny on bute right away, and she said we were fast on our way to founder. She cleaned up some dead frog tissue and old dead thrush she found, took some heel off but Sonny still could not walk at all. He acted like a horse that foundered and rotated really bad.
I had to locate a super good corrective farrier right away.
I located Pete Ramey's website and began to study his barefoot trimming method and learned how they trim to help crippled horses walk and decided to give it a try.
www.hoofrehab.com
Then I called him to see if he could help me get someone up here to me in the middle of nowhere to trim Sonny. I was referred to a list and found "Nora" a Pete Ramey trained corrective barefoot trimmer who came within two days of my call.
She proceed to trim away the "flares" on the sides of the hoof walls and do a slight re-section of the front of the toes, lowered the heels more slightly at first to open them up to get them to stop contracting. She said he would walk again "someday" but it was going to take some time and she would be back in 4 weeks.
This is after Sonny's first corrective trim:
Instructions were to continue soaking twice daily in cold water with epsom salts
Keep Sonny stalled and heavily bedded and on bute (not a problem, he can't move an inch anyway)
Change his feed to something low carb, no corn, no sugars etc. and feed all the grass hay he wants
Put him on Biotin, Msm, and and Cipex ( www.jeffersequine.com)
which is for horses with Navicular etc. feet problems and also buy Easy Boots.
I argued that Easy Boots were crap as I used them, or tried to use them some 20 odd years ago and they make sores in the back of the foot and do not stay on. Junk.
Nora insisted I order one of the later models, Old Mac G2 which is made for horses with Navicular/ Laminitis/ Founder horses etc. As she said in 20 years, they have come a long way in their designs. She said they might not help right away but I should have them on hand. Ok, anything for the Son Man.
www.easycareinc.com
I did a 2 day rush order and began using all the products.
I took Sonny off all his bute so I could see if he would be able to walk in these boots without being on pain meds. I just knew he wouldn't walk a step.......
I cleaned Sonny's feet and began to put his new "sneakers" on. They look like some kind of space age moon walking boots.
These boots are the most difficult things to figure out I have ever seen. They have all kinds of buckles and openings and straps and velcros, and inner pieces that it's insane. Took me a good 30 minutes to figure out how to put them on correctly and I still had them on wrong. Finally figured it out all over again after another 30 minutes or so cause let's face it, I'm not the smartest brick in the load.
I began to lead Sonny to the field and he started to walk in slow motion with me, doing the march where he picked up one leg really high, then the other really high until we made it to our destination of his field out front. When he realized he was in fact walking, he picked his head right up in the air and pricked his ears forward calling to his friend, the horse across the road who missed him. By the time we got there to his field gate, Sonny took off walking like there was not a thing wrong with him! He cruised every inch of his field, walking more and more briskly with every step he took. He spent the whole day out side walking just fine.
When it was time for him to come in, I called for him and he picked up a trot and came right to me.
Today, he cantered.
My eyes got wet.
Sonny is still totally lame without the boots but there is no longer any heat coming from his feet.
Nora is hopeful and confident that he will be fine before winter hits without them as that is our goal. I am to keep up on soaking and do the whole regimine until Nora comes and re-evaluates in 4 weeks. He only gets one half dose of bute now at night because he doesn't wear the boots in the stall.
Brief Review:
Sonny my senior citizen Quarter Horse came up drop dead lame practially over night. One morning I went to turn him out and he refused to move. I insisted he had to go out because of artheritis circulation but his knees buckled at the door of his stall and he nearly went down on me.
We battled thrush this summer (and won) but I still thought that could be part of the problem.
His heels were contracted and grown at a rapid rate for some reason I could not figure out why they were which caused them to flare out the side walls of the hoof
The walls of the hoof had cracked, and were chipping and falling away from the hoof like paper everytime I cleaned his feet. His hoof walls were separating plus he had a split in the front. I thought that was White Line Disease.
His feet were so hot they were literally on fire.
I got out my one and only soaking boot (someone ripped off the other one) and used a bucket for the other hoof and began soaking him in epsom salt and ice water.
I got the vet on the way.
This is the front right which is more severe than the left. A quick glance looks like he does not need a trim right ? Except just rasp off those darn cracks......wrong. Then you pick up the foot and look what has happened underneath it. The top picture, the dark portion on your right is where the flare is from being shoved over by the heels growing out of control.
The vet dianosed navicular and laminitis, put Sonny on bute right away, and she said we were fast on our way to founder. She cleaned up some dead frog tissue and old dead thrush she found, took some heel off but Sonny still could not walk at all. He acted like a horse that foundered and rotated really bad.
I had to locate a super good corrective farrier right away.
I located Pete Ramey's website and began to study his barefoot trimming method and learned how they trim to help crippled horses walk and decided to give it a try.
www.hoofrehab.com
Then I called him to see if he could help me get someone up here to me in the middle of nowhere to trim Sonny. I was referred to a list and found "Nora" a Pete Ramey trained corrective barefoot trimmer who came within two days of my call.
She proceed to trim away the "flares" on the sides of the hoof walls and do a slight re-section of the front of the toes, lowered the heels more slightly at first to open them up to get them to stop contracting. She said he would walk again "someday" but it was going to take some time and she would be back in 4 weeks.
This is after Sonny's first corrective trim:
Instructions were to continue soaking twice daily in cold water with epsom salts
Keep Sonny stalled and heavily bedded and on bute (not a problem, he can't move an inch anyway)
Change his feed to something low carb, no corn, no sugars etc. and feed all the grass hay he wants
Put him on Biotin, Msm, and and Cipex ( www.jeffersequine.com)
which is for horses with Navicular etc. feet problems and also buy Easy Boots.
I argued that Easy Boots were crap as I used them, or tried to use them some 20 odd years ago and they make sores in the back of the foot and do not stay on. Junk.
Nora insisted I order one of the later models, Old Mac G2 which is made for horses with Navicular/ Laminitis/ Founder horses etc. As she said in 20 years, they have come a long way in their designs. She said they might not help right away but I should have them on hand. Ok, anything for the Son Man.
www.easycareinc.com
I did a 2 day rush order and began using all the products.
I took Sonny off all his bute so I could see if he would be able to walk in these boots without being on pain meds. I just knew he wouldn't walk a step.......
I cleaned Sonny's feet and began to put his new "sneakers" on. They look like some kind of space age moon walking boots.
These boots are the most difficult things to figure out I have ever seen. They have all kinds of buckles and openings and straps and velcros, and inner pieces that it's insane. Took me a good 30 minutes to figure out how to put them on correctly and I still had them on wrong. Finally figured it out all over again after another 30 minutes or so cause let's face it, I'm not the smartest brick in the load.
I began to lead Sonny to the field and he started to walk in slow motion with me, doing the march where he picked up one leg really high, then the other really high until we made it to our destination of his field out front. When he realized he was in fact walking, he picked his head right up in the air and pricked his ears forward calling to his friend, the horse across the road who missed him. By the time we got there to his field gate, Sonny took off walking like there was not a thing wrong with him! He cruised every inch of his field, walking more and more briskly with every step he took. He spent the whole day out side walking just fine.
When it was time for him to come in, I called for him and he picked up a trot and came right to me.
Today, he cantered.
My eyes got wet.
Sonny is still totally lame without the boots but there is no longer any heat coming from his feet.
Nora is hopeful and confident that he will be fine before winter hits without them as that is our goal. I am to keep up on soaking and do the whole regimine until Nora comes and re-evaluates in 4 weeks. He only gets one half dose of bute now at night because he doesn't wear the boots in the stall.
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