11-03-08

          Something alittle different today. I'm posting an actual email recieved from a reader of this blog who's very concerned about her horses feet and how the farriers have been doing their job. Her "Erin's" concerns are very legitimate, no one wants their horses feet going out of balance and risking their horses becoming permanently lame.  

          I have more work to do on this article with the photos Erin sent me but want to post her actual email ahead of time to get this on a roll. You'll be able to Erin's email and understand her concerns then i'll follow up in a day or so with the answers and explanations along with the photo examples and suggestions to Erin posted right here for you to follow along.  So here we go.   Here's Erin's email , the follow up response from me coming soon.

          Dear Mr. Silveira,
 
I hope very, very much that you are still providing free consultations as I have two horses desperately in need of your help.  Home is where the military sends you and so just over one year ago I moved my horses from California to Arkansas.  My biggest fear in terms of moving is having to find a new farrier so when I arrived in Arkansas I opted to pay an outrageous fee to a Certified Journeyman Farrier with the foolish notion that he would know what he was doing.  WRONG! 
 
Stupidly, for eight months I paid to have my horses trimmed and/or shoed religiously every six weeks.  By the eighth month both of my horses feet had developed  broken back hoof pastern axis's resulting from toes left too long and heels that had crushed underneath the hoof so badly that both of my horses were standing on the hairline/heel bulb of all of their hooves. 
 
Rock, my twelve-year-old ex-racetrack Thoroughbred gelding was forging nearly every step at a walk and at one point severely overreached causing a deep, nasty wound despite the professional's choice ballistic overreach boots he was wearing.  He had also been showing signs all last winter of hind limb lameness that I thought was due to back pain so I hand walked him and massaged and stretched him nearly all winter.  He also was not extending his front feet normally at any gait and appeared to be standing over at the knee.  He was always standing on diagonals all of the time versus ever standing squared up.  He also refused to lope off with his back rounded and head down specifically on his left lead.  He had never presented any of these problems before (which should have been a big clue to me).
 
Blue, my six-year-old reined cow horse American Quarter Horse mare also had the broken back pastern axis's and was standing way back on the hairline/heel bulb of all of her feet.  My concerns for her developed when it appeared her knees were wobbling like jello after each ride and she couldn't "get in the ground" with her rear-end to stop like before.  Then, she began cross firing in the pasture and on the longe line resulting in a huge bruise on her inside front leg and repeatedly hitting it in the pasture has given her a permanent hard knot.  I was truly surprised when my mare also began to forge very frequently as she has a very long back. 
 
I called my now ex-farrier out to my place to address the issue that I felt both of my horses needed more toe to be taken off and figure out how to get them standing back up on their heels.  My ex-farrier requested watching me ride (I am a horse trainer and have a very successful show career) so he could asses what the problem was.  After sitting on my horse and walking around as instructed he admitted that my gelding was forging (as he was hitting/interfering nearly every walking step), but my farrier came to the conclusion that all of my concerns were a result of my horse following his nose around in a circle (and I wasn't even using the reins to turn him)!!!
 
I have since switched to another farrier who has been trying to correct the angles of my horses' feet.  He tried to put slideplates on my mare which she stepped on and ripped off in her stall the very first night my new farrier put them on.  I would love it if you did an article on how to properly shoe a horse with sliders.  The pictures I have attached were taken two days ago.  What you see is after only three weeks from their last trim which is the second time my new farrier has given my horses hooves attention.  The first trim with my new farrier was five weeks apart, and the next trim will be four weeks apart meaning the farrier is due to arrive November 5th.  My goal is to get their hooves back to normal and I thought getting their feet trimmed more often would help expedite the growth of new angles.  My horses have been very sore footed after my new farrier's trimming as he has been taking off as much as possible to help correct their hooves.  Should I be worried about this or is he on the right track?
 
This is why I have contacted you.  My horses desperately need your help!  What do I need to do to get my horses feet back to normal.  Specifically, how do I get their angles back to normal and get them standing back up on their heels?  I am not convinced my new farrier knows what to do, but he tries very hard to do what I ask him to.  Both my horses are fed the best quality hay I can buy and are fed Omelene 200 (they were on Ultium) along with Platinum Performance and are currently on smartpaks with grandflex, grandvite, msm (thanks to Sandy Collier a trainer friend of mine from Buellton, California).  I have wondered if their forward growing/crushed heels is the result of moving from a sandy, dry environment to a very muddy, wet one.  I do notice that their heels seem to sink down and become mushy after it rains.  Do you believe in Kerratex Hoof Gel to keep out the excess moisture or is their another product you might be able to suggest?  Please, please respond to my letter as I have not found a farrier that I can trust here and my horses need all the help they can get to get their hooves back to normal!  I will gladly send more photos if you need them.  My Thoroughbred, Rock, has always had mismatched front feet with the left being more narrow and upright, but this has never caused him problems.  Thank you so very much for any help you may be able to provide.  I can't wait for your book to be available, and I would love to be entered in your hoof pick drawing.  I tried to attach the photos of my horses to this e-mail, but apparently I will have to attach them to different messages because of the big size.  So please view the photos on the other e-mails I am sending.
 
Thank you so much,
 
Erin Kirsten Long

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          Thanks so much for writing in Erin, Doing some editing to the photos you've sent and i'll be right back to you.  There are some interesting things going on with your horses feet that deserve attention.    See you soon.

     John  
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Here's the follow up for Erin's horses 

  
                                          
 
       First lets talk about heels. if you look the heel of this horse has already been stretched forward. Most likely from the toe growing too far forward. I don't have before and after shots of this horse so no visual comparisons but when the heels get sheared it's one of the hardest things to fix. You can see the yellow penciled in where the heel should be.  What happens is the horses weight and center of gravity in this case fall behind where the heel is currently - the tendency then is for this foot to want to rock backwards due to no heel support. At this point it looks like plenty of toe has been rasped back so the toe's not long anymore but the damage to the heel has already been done. Fortunately shoeing is the easiest fix - just fit the shoe longer in the rear at the heels for the support the foot needs - basically we're faking the foot has heels.

         So that's for starters - one thing i did want to mention right off is the feet have a slight appearance of what i call "Impacted" - meaning the feet aren't breathing well - flexing - expanding - contracting - but rather are kinda rigid in appearance and when i examined more photos it started to become apparent why ( cover that in a minute )   so lets go to the next .

                                          

         In this photo the right foot looks like it's lining up well. Angles look pretty good here. The red dotted line of the right foot is where to correctly measure for angles meaning i don't use a hoof guage like many farriers do rather i use the grain of the foot right there where you see the red line. Using this method puts the coffin bone at it's most natural angle. Using the hoof gauge at the toe as some do is not accurate as it completely disreguards any hoof stretch or long toe syndrome at the toe which would throw off the reading - besides what is the hoof guage really reading ?  think about that - it's measuring the hoof wall not the angle of the coffin bone . The comments i've recieved after viewing Xrays of horses i shoe in this manner always come back that the coffin bone is in the correct position - obviously the only real way to know if the coffin bone is correct is with the Xray, so follow this method will be closest to natural angle for your horse.

          If you look where it says coffin bone not level you'll see that foot is not trimmed correctly and the coffin bone is cocked to one side. Foot is short on the medial side coffin bone slopin toward the medial side as well. Remember horses are straight ahead animals and don't make turns well at all , that's due to the bone construction of the feet and pasterns mostly. The feet just don't move much except in one direction (forward and backward ) horses basically are Stiff.

          The worst part about feet not being level is the stress being put on the navicular bone. With the navicular bone riding right up against the coffin bone if that joint is not meshing correctly it's stressing and causing undue wear to the bones. There's a correct way to measure and trim a foot for level that has nothing to do with the coronary band of the foot ( the hairline ) being horizontal - it's really irrelevant what the hairline is doing, the foot must be trimmed in a way that when the foot is on the ground the "Bones - coffin joint" are all lined up correctly- and the hairline is no indication of how to establish level so in the archives here there is a link called "True Level" find the one that works and you can understand the correct way to establish and trim for level. I'll be posting more videos on this aspect .

         Lastly with this photo you'll see the flare on the lateral (outside) of the left foot. Not adressing flare can lead to hoof drift, basically as the flare keeps spreading to one side as in this case the other side of the foot gets pulled with it causing the whole foot to stretch and fall out of alignment with the bone column of the leg - it would be as if your own foot ( the whole foot ) was now slightly - lets say one inch - farther to the right or left. With a horse once the foot starts to stretch there's a tendency for it to continue to stretch , the outside keeps flaring ( as photo above ) and the inside ( medial side ) of the foot starts to buckle and round itself as it gets dragged toward the outside ( the medial hoof wall actually bends and takes that set ) now the only way to fix these issues is to start removing the flare and allowing the medial side of the foot to grow a whole new foot ( more on this later as it's all related to what i call "FOOT LOAD" and how load characteristics change depending on how the shoe is placed and how the foot is trimmed ( that part gets to be alittle complex to discuss ).   Ok now moving on - next photo is about contraction.

                                                     
    
        Here you're seeing both feet quite contracted. Contraction can be caused by the long toe syndrome ( bozo feet ) when the toe is not rasped toward the rear and then can be caused due to just the genetics of the horse. Some are born severely contracted. So how do you know which is the case for your horse ? What should you be aware of to establish if contraction is a result of Farrier malpractice or Genetic. There are some clues . Obviously if your horses feet look like a ski at the toe ( very long out in front ) ( or long toe and low heel combined ) there's a good chance it's farrier related. In the photo above i'm seeing mostly genetic , and most likely all genetic. If you look at the sidewall of the foot at the hairline you'll see the coronary is very straight - the coronary curves around the toe nicely but from the side of the foot to the heel it's straight as an arrow and not round; that's your clue to genetic pattern contraction. The extreme straight line of the coronary band will be next to impossible to change.

         Looking at the bulbs of this foot there's basically no room between the heels. If your horse is narrow in the heels balance is all the more important - remember the conversation we just had about navicular disease ? The foot not being level causing Navicular ? well contracted heels is another culprit to Navicular disease. When the rear of the foot is so narrow there's no room for the navicular bone in the foot. No room for it to move around and find it's most comfortable spot. Navicular bone is getting crushed from sideways pressures. There are some preventive measures such as pads that help spread the heels , some like to let their horse go barefoot for a while which helps the foot expand at the heel and other methods worth using. So Erin since your horse is contracted here it becomes all the more important to keep this horse up on it's heels and keep the toe moved to the rear so the foot breaks over easily - at this point ease of breakover is the best thing you can do for this horse. Bar shoes are always the go to fix for horses with Navicular so any heel support / help would also be beneficial to your horse.
 
       So lets move along to the next photo just to give you a little bit of comparison. This photo the horse has much better width to the heels. But let's not wander away from this point as the photo following this one will tie things more together - so we're not moving away from Navicular issues just yet.  Ok here's the photo.


                                                 

          You can see the width is more acceptable here. I like it !  this is fine.  Ok lets move on as this next photo will help bring things together.

                                                 

        We've talked about the feet that look what i call "Impacted". Now when you look at this foot which looks nice and wide at the heels ( no contraction - good thing ) you'll notice either the foot is actually flat footed or simply none of the sole has been removed. Judging by the length of the heels the foot looks long to me so i'm suspecting more sole can be removed. With so much depth to the commisures ( tracks between frog ) i'd say more sole can be removed.  
 
        I take my nippers and grab those bars of the foot and cut them out - then i can grab the sole with the nippers and start to pop the excess sole out. Once that is done i get my hoof knife and trim as much of the bars out as i possibly can. Doing so will expose more hoof wall all the way around the foot which can be shortened - of course not too much we don't want out horses coming up tender footed.  When the sole is all cleared out nicely now the foot will breathe better - flex more at the heels - and basically undulate within itself better. With all the sole in there (not removed ) the horse is pounding the extra sole INTO the foot putting alot of pressures into the foot- the energy of this translates into an appearance on the outside of the hoof wall that makes the foot look excessively hard and Static !  It's not what i like personally over 18 years i've been doing this. I don't like feet that are like granite.  I like the feet to breathe - it's just healthier for the whole foot - expansion contraction breathing and ALIVE. 

           Same thing with the frog - you can see in the photo i'm suggesting removing more of the frog. Some horses don't like much frog pressure , since all frogs are different , some soft some hard , and since all horses are different, some almost impervious to pain while others super sensitive , having too much frog can cause pressure within the foot and the horse is going to be uncomfortable. So don't hesitate with trimming the frog - it grows back fast anyway. 

           The other side to this is the contraction issue we've talked about. We want feet to expand in the heels to prevent navicular risks. If the bars of the foot are left in and not trimmed as in the photo above , well the bars LOCK the foot across the heels making it more difficult for the expansion we want to occur. On barefoot horses i used to leave the bars in ( that's what they taught us at the schools ) but over time i take the bars out on barefoot horses as well - always when shoeing.  Moving on again - we're coming down the home stretch.  (-:

                                           

        This photo above is quite common. The foot is out of balance regarding width across the foot in relation to bone column - basically too much foot to the medial side and not enough to the lateral side. Very common with pigeon toed horses. Most horses and i've approximated 97-98 % of horses have this condition ( pigeon toed ). It's too complex to cover here this time but i'll be making videos to cover this aspect.  Fixing this is all about shoe placement and rasping the excess foot at the medial side ( which is basically flare ) and growing new foot. We've already talked about how feet drift and this is a view that helps explain it.  As that excess foot on the medial side is not fixed it typically gets worse. It's basically just flare but the problem is as it keeps moving toward the medial side and flaring that lateral side of the foot gets pulled in the direction of the flare ( i know i'm repeating myself ) but wanted to show you this from a different direction of view. The dotted line shows two points - one the difference between how much foot is on one side and how much on the other - but also that dotted line is not lineing up with the leg ( not shown in photo ) basically telling us this foot is pigeon toed.  Nothing too serious here but if you're after balance and removing risk of lameness these things need to be adressed.

                                               

           Finally for today i want to talk about this frog. This frog is not intact. Now Erin has informed me the horse's were in a moist environment and surely contributed to this but nevertheless. The frog is separating. And separating deeply. What looks like a deep fissure there on the right side of the frog is an indication there is bacteria creeping all the way under the frog. The bacteria will keep spreading and eroding the frog until it reaches where soft tissue starts. 

            i was just at a ranch yesterday working on a horse with this same issue. All i did was to poke a tiny bit into the fissure and the horse jumped in pain. You don't want to let these become Chronic. I saw a horse quite a while back with chronic thrush. The frog was completely eroded away and the horse just wasn't growing any frog and bleeding where the frog should be. Any touching of the area where the frog should have been caused immediate seeping of blood from the tissue.    Any Thrush buster applied daily for a month should take care of this. Hopefully a dry environment is also available.

             So i've covered some of the basics again here . These photos are not shoeing feet with too long of toe like bozo - so the farrier is rasping toe back - but there is some sheared heel issues indicating that probably somewhere in the past the toes were long. Sheared heels don't typically fix themselves - something has to be done about it  ( another article coming ) . The rest we've talked about here is not so difficult to understand . I kep going over some things because sometimes it just takes a little time and different examples to really start to get and grasp the ideas. 

              For me i'm finding out as i keep delivering this information that Videos are going to be a must. So this is definately going to become a part of this blog - i expect to be video blog casting soon , also look for an audio blog cast soon as well (Podcasting) you can recieve it from your iphone.

          Thank you for being here taking in this information , thank you Erin for allowing others to see your particular situation,  i don't particularly feel your horses are in as bad a shape as you may have thought (Thankfully right?)

           so i'll say goodbye for now. 
     
            for the new folks to the blog i do continue to give consultations at no cost , just email me at the following address John@Care4Horses.com and let me know whatever issues you're having and i'm happy to help. Photos are welcome. 

As usual happy and safe riding and always remember to www.Care4Horses.com

ps.
    Working on chapter 5 of the Ebook "INSIDE HORSESHOEING SECRETS OF LAMENESS PREVENTION" which is also free. 
        Just leave me your email address and you'll be placed on the priority list for notification soon as it's done.

thanks .