Anyone successfully treated a sand crack?

[brightmount]

My horse has a sand crack to the outer quarter of her right hind where the wall is thin. It runs up from the quarter clip to the coronary band, and looking at a photo I took in January, I can see it has spread up to the coronary band since then, as it was half an inch below when I took the picture. My farrier says it is superficial, but it may not grow out (great)

My EP who looks after my other barefoot horse and whose opinion I greatly respect, says the hoof wall is overloaded. To address the imbalance, I need to take the shoes off at some point, although not now as she is at a crucial point in her training as a 6 y.o. I did have the farrier take the hind shoes off briefly in January and she trashed her walls and went lame (my EP wasn't involved), so I realise her workload would have to be severely cut back if I take the shoes off.

I am supplementing with NAF Pro-Feet although haven't seen any improvement yet. My EP says Hooflex Liquid Conditioner is good.

Does anyone have any thoughts or experiences? Have you managed to get a sand crack that goes to the coronary band to grow out successfully?

 

[spaniel]

In my limited experience of sand cracks there is no need to remove the shoe if you have a decent farrier looking after the foot. The do often look a lot worse than they are. The foot needs good trimming and good supportive shoeing and personally I would not remove the shoes if there is any doubt as to the integrity of the hoof wall.

 

[eventersrus]

My husband is a farrier he had to put screws horizontally across 2 enormous sand cracks due to neglect 6 months later sand cracks completely gone!!

 

[brightmount]

OK that's encouraging. Our crack is only a hairline really and the farrier doesn't think it needs stapling or gluing or whatever, but I wasn't so happy to hear that he thought it wouldn't go away. I would think it will be vulnerable to infection and could make her lame. I'd like to get rid of it!

 

[debradley]

Hi, when I first bought my horse 7 yrs ago her hooves were in a terrible state. Good regular farrier work, farriers formula and stapling. She also wasn't allowed any canter work for first three months as ground was very hard and dry; farriers recommendation as feet so unstable. Her feet were great after six-nine months but have always had to look after them since. True what they say "no hoof, no horse".

 

[puddicat]

"My EP who looks after my other barefoot horse and whose opinion I greatly respect, says the hoof wall is overloaded"

They're guessing (badly) - overloading isn't necessarily going to cause or develop cracks. Ask them why they think the hoof is overloaded and how that would lead to the development of a sand crack.


"I am supplementing with NAF Pro-Feet although haven't seen any improvement yet. My EP says Hooflex Liquid Conditioner is good."

why would you expect to see improvement? Even if we assume the products actually do something which would be useful (I wonder what that would be), the hoof takes about a year to grow down so any change in horn quality would take place over that period. But the crack has already propagated from the edge of the hoof to the coronary band so changes induced by feed supplements are unlikely to reverse that.


"Our crack is only a hairline really and the farrier doesn't think it needs stapling or gluing or whatever, but I wasn't so happy to hear that he thought it wouldn't go away. I would think it will be vulnerable to infection and could make her lame. I'd like to get rid of it!"

Yeah but why do you think that ? Perhaps your farrier knows what he/she is talking about having trained in the subject! So if the crack is a surface crack and doesn't either penetrate the sensitive structures or look like it is about to in your farrier's judgement, it will not be a pathway for infection or cause lameness. I guess if you don't trust his judgement get another farrier to give you an opinion but it comes down to whether the crack will propagate further. If it is likely to then mechanical stabilisation is a practical approach. if the crack is superficial, mechanical stabilisation might not cause it to grow out - it's your farriers call on that one.

 

[henryhorn]

We don't gnore cracks anymore after having a horse off for 18 months with one. In our case it was an imbalanced hoof that caused the crack, and it isn't a sand crack but runs from the top downwards.
I would take your horse to a specialist farrier who is recommended as skilled in remedial work. many farriers just say ignore because they feel unhappy about doing the work needed to fix them. No reflexion of farriers, after all if you wanted a brain op you wouldn't ask your GP to do it would you?!
I think they will likely drill out te crack, staple across it and glue and possibly shoe with a heart bar or round shoe.
What you don't realise happens is that once a crack is there, the whole foot is unstable and the only way to make the crack go is to make it stable enough for the crack to grow out top to bottom. (hope that makes sense and doesn't sound patronising!)
We have lots of pics of our horse's hooves through before and after treatment, if you pm me your own email I'll send you them (can't do it via here I'm too stupid..)

 

[_daisy_]

my pony has a HUGE sand crack caused by injury
from this:



to this:



We have taken our barefoot trimmers advice and gone barefoot with her (for other reasons too) but the sand crack is slowly knitting itself back together.
I have just been recommended to try horse fat on her feet to see if this helps with the growth etc. I cant believe the difference taking her shoes off has made to the crack as I expected it to break open and cause more damage but so far so good - im really pleased with it and must take some photos of her foot now after about 8weeks of being barefoot.


ETS - this is a completely different sand crack to yours but its very interesting.

 

[puddicat]

"I have just been recommended to try horse fat on her feet to see if this helps with the growth etc"

growth comes from the coronary band so doing anything lower down won't have any effect on growth whatsoever. Massaging the coronary band might help - who knows. This is best done with a magic potion that you buy and rub into the coronary band each day so the potion manufacturers get the credit for the growth and sell more potion. In practice however, hoof growth is like human nail and hair growth - there's not a lot a product slapped on the outside of the body can do considering one of the main biological funcitons of skin and hoof horn is to keep what is inside separate from what is outside !

 

[Spot1]

Just a few quick points (running late

)
In general treatment for sand cracks is usually very successful. Untreated sand cracks can cause problems, so you were wise to highlight the matter, but from what have said [ QUOTE ]
Our crack is only a hairline really and the farrier doesn't think it needs stapling or gluing or whatever,

[/ QUOTE ] I would agree with Puddicats assertion that your farrier is probably right. [ QUOTE ]
To address the imbalance, I need to take the shoes off at some point,

[/ QUOTE ] ( I am assuming not just during the process of shoeing

) This does seems to be a worrying misconception peddled by some "EPs". There are arguments for and against shoeing, this is just plain wrong

As Spaniel said [ QUOTE ]
there is no need to remove the shoe

[/ QUOTE ]

[ QUOTE ]
Have you managed to get a sand crack that goes to the coronary band to grow out successfully?

[/ QUOTE ] Strictly speaking sand cracks start at the coronet and "grow" down. Cracks that "grow" up are called false sand cracks or grass cracks. Cracks that reach from the ground surface to the coronet are deemed complete, these will also grow our in response to treatment. Damage to the coronet may result in abnormal horn growth which will remain.