Am I doing the right thing taking this horse barefoot??

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hillbilly

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I like my horses to be barefoot. For me it is easier to manage as their turnout is hilly and they do like to career around and pull shoes off if shod. This has always worked beautifully until now and the horses hack nd compete barefoot.
However my newest horse needed to grow good horn, her feet were shockingly cracked and flaky. She came to me as a shod horse who lost shoes every three weeks or so and had very little growth.
Firstly she was put on to the feed that seems to suit horses here - un molassed chaff, Speedibeet, alfalfa nuts, linseed and mag ox. Hoof started to grow, time for shoes to go and the transition to begin......
It has been four weeks. Without hoofboot and pads she is incredibly footy/sore on hard or stony ground. (She is not being worked hard at mo, gentle walk exercise on various terrain to hopefuly build the sole up. Wears hoofboots whilst doing this. Barefoot in field and stable).After doing some detective work I now find that she had seedy toe in 2013 - to such an extent that her front feet looked like crescent moons. They were all eaten away. If that resulted in pedal bone damage will she ever transition to barefoot as I would dearly like...even if it takes a wee while, or am I being cruel and will she always need shoes?
Her soles are very flat at the moment but in past horses this has rectified given time and careful transitioning, but will she be able to do the same given her history?
Sorry I have no pictures to hand. Hoof looks good now, short toe, great wide heels and large healthy frog, healthy horn growing down and no cracks. It's what state the insides are that concerns me!!!
 
If her feet look better on the outside already then they must be getting better on the inside too.

I am in a similarish situation. All of mine are BF. Now have a WB. It was going great initially but he's unable to be worked without boots now because he insists on bashing his stupid feet around and digging holes when he isn't getting his own way. With hindsight I perhaps should have waited until I had trained the bad behaviour out of him before I took them off but I've done it now so I'm going to persevere for a bit longer. If it doesn't work now, I will revisit it at the end of the season when hopefully he might have learned to behave properly which would help!
 
The only way to know is to get an x-ray. Seedy toe can degrade the pedal bone. I've seen ones with notches or flattened bone. So, I would get an EP in this case. They will recommend shoes if necessary but both of my horses with this condition, rehabbed perfectly well.
 
Well that has given me some encouragement. I know in the scheme of things four/five weeks is a very short time and I would like to give her the chance to be barefoot. She is a big girl, a heavy horse cross, and I would like to avoid ringbone and other arthritic changes later on. Removing the extra concussion that shoes cause to the bones of the legs and feet was part of that.
 
I wish I could show you a photo, but photobox has decided to delete a few of my old albums!! Grr. They are not on this computer either but if you search my posts on barefoot, you will probably find a shot of my old boy. He had dreadful seedy toe, rotated pedal bone and he was completely sound barefoot within a year, 10 months I think. I took him ht and he came 3rd :). He was heavy breed cross.
 
Is she comfortable in the field?
How much 'work' is she doing?

Hard to tell for definite without an xray re possible damage though I am not sure it is that common with seedy toe?

Essentially if she has flat soles she is going to be sore on some surfaces until they improve, we had flat soles - go hand in hand with counter rotated pedal bones ;), we've never had the sort of concavity that many manage - probably still restricted by pedal bone - but they developed enough functional concavity.
 
Hi Ester,
She is comfortable in the field which is the main thing. Work wise she is ridden four times a week, and this is a consistent level. Stabled from 5pm to roughly 8.30am.
Beds nice and dry and clean (it's the only bit of cleaning I am OCD about. The house can go to hell!!).
I am careful with what type of work she does as it is early days. I want her to grow thicker soles but I don't want her to be seriously bruised! Plenty of roadwork in walk and we have EPIC hills, interspersed with stony and mud tracks and sheep pasture. I trot her slowly up hill, good for her bum but also I thought, less pressure on her front feet that way as going up hill would make her back feet take more of the load?
If we achieve functional concavity like you did I will be satisfied!
And Tallyho - my horse loves a bit of xc and I would love to take her round hunter trials!!! I just need to be patient. Which for me is VERY HARD!!!!
 
I believe she will be able to.
But she she sounds like she will need a fair amount of time. Given her history and current hoof condition.
Really Id look at it as once a whole new hoof has grown. so around a year.
This is worse case and with the correct management and feeding she should become better sooner than that.

Dont give up!
 
I always say to allow 4 months to see any changes, this allows time for the sole to thicken but also for your trimmer or farrier to make changes that will be noticeable.

Many horses I take on are footy not from diet but because their soles are thin, either from being shod or bein stretched, so if she has long toes this needs to be addressed before they will improve.

Obviously the seedy toe needs treating, that can make them sore in itself.

And potentially the alfalfa. Some horses do brilliantly on it ... some not so well ... so if you want to remove that as a variable...

In short ... 4 weeks isn't long, especially for a horse that appears to have a serious hoof pathologies

Good luck :)
 
Hi Wild at Hoof,
Thanks for your reply.....
The seedy toe was treated two years ago by the previous owners, the photos I saw were horrific...but i suspect it left long term sensitivity, flat soles and stretched white lines...all these are improving. All the others are on alfalfa as the land is poor and acidic and it seems to balance them out nicely with no footiness......but I will bear it in mind. I suspect she just needs the time to thicken her soles.....and patience from me!!!!
 
hillbilly said:
Hi Wild at Hoof,
Thanks for your reply.....
The seedy toe was treated two years ago by the previous owners, the photos I saw were horrific...but i suspect it left long term sensitivity, flat soles and stretched white lines...all these are improving. All the others are on alfalfa as the land is poor and acidic and it seems to balance them out nicely with no footiness......but I will bear it in mind. I suspect she just needs the time to thicken her soles.....and patience from me!!!!
Click to expand...

How did they treat the seedy toe, iydmma?
 
My youngster had a seriously bad seedy toe infection. She had a major resection at age 3, which had to be repeated a year later as it was still present. The vet (very experienced Olympic equine vet) had never seen one as bad.






She came good! She is now rising 6, and rocks 4 well conformed feet. She went clear XC in her first BE80 last year, and is now working well in her new loan home.

I would suggest XRays to confirm that the feet are indeed healthy, this shouldn't cost too much.
 
Gosh tiddlypom... I'm not surprised it went up that far. Whoever your farrier was at the time really prized open the white line up. You can see that it stops where the good connection is about a thumbs length down. Also those heels are so contracted and the toes are so long. You can see the bulge in the coronet line where the farrier had not balanced the foot at all! Sorry you had to go through that :(
 
Ex farrier had fOOked up big time, hadn't he? He was sacked before these photos, he had managed to lame all of my horses. He used to shoe for some very big names, too, who have all let him go now. I had used him for 30 years.

I learnt a lot after coming on HHO, I can't believe I let that happen.
 
Tiddlypom said:
Ex farrier had fOOked up big time, hadn't he? He was sacked before these photos, he had managed to lame all of my horses. He used to shoe for some very big names, too, who have all let him go now. I had used him for 30 years.

I learnt a lot after coming on HHO, I can't believe I let that happen.
Click to expand...

So did I tiddlypom.... so did I...
 
Well, I think you are doing the right thing going barefoot - mine had two tendon injuries shod -only a happy hacker with a few bits of low level dressage thrown in.

Farrier was absolutely crap, caused his feet to be massive unbalanced with a hugely long toe - two tendon injuries later, plus latterly after a navicular diagnosis from vet which I had to really push for after x rays and nerve blocks where he was bilaterally lame, I decided to not go the farrier route of bar shoes and pads.

I am not saying its quick or easy and I have walked a lot of miles in hand for a long time, mine has refused to leave his stable to go to the corral without boots and pads, added to which the thrush caused by shoeing is hard to shift, but he is growing a proper foot 7 months in - I wish I had gone barefoot years ago - he was always ouchy even with shoes on stones - this should have told me something - but sadly you listen to the 'foot professionals' who quite often know very little and you are left to clear up the mess they have caused.
 
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