barefoot / gait analysis & laminitis

[Jericho]

Would anyone like to have a go at analysing my horses feet and gait?

I am becoming a bit obsessed as to whether she is footy / has low grade laminitis and am currently treating as such especially as she is overweight. Vet has been yesterday and was fairly vague i.e. that she isnt displaying the classic signs but worth keeping her off grass and treating as such and that she is overweight (which I am addressing). He hasnt prescribed any drugs and I found it all a bit vague as when I asked if I could turnout he said see how she is tomorrow...

Well tomorrow is here and I am still not sure. Would very much appreciate any feedback as I keep my horses at home on my own so dont have anyone to bounce ideas off and can quite easily see things which arent there or miss things which I have learnt to live with... (oh dear I sound such a worrier!) Have attached some photos of her front hooves also for any barefoot experts to have a look at as well as a video of her walking and a quick trot today. Am particularly interested to know if she is landing heel first (ultimate aim!!) and whether you think she looks footy or suffering any pain in the toe / laminae area.

Points to note: barefoot for about 5 months, hacked out once or twice a week and a bit of schooling. usually out 24/7 on 2 acres of short grazing , fed brewers yeast, seaweed and rosehips, MagOx and linseed in a handful of TopSpec Top chop lite and very watery speedibeet to make it less powdery. She has been stabled on shavings for last 5 days and fed diet ration of well soaked hay plus some straw. She has no bounding pulse, doesnt react to hoof testers and her hoof wall can sometimes be cool, sometimes hot. No depression above coronet band. Good depressions above eye. No lameness but is shifting weight slightly. Quite willing to walk / turn etc. Her feet were trimmed a week ago (hardly any taken off as no growth).



right fore

left fore

And the video.... (excuse little ginger pony trotting behind - he hates being left out of anything!)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NAZ8vO2Gk7k

Many thanks!!!

 

[soloequestrian]

Definitely not claiming to be an expert, but she looks great to me. The feet look healthy and she seems to be moving nicely. She isn't massively overweight either, perhaps just a little on the cuddly side.

 

[LucyPriory]

PM - unwise to assess via video but horse appears to be toe first landing. It would be easier to assess gait in a straight line on a flat surface and in the flesh.

From photos; there is evidence of deviation, event lines, the heels may not be properly balanced and your horse may need a quarter scoop. Impossible to assess properly from photos, but I'd like to check the depth of sole and get a better investigation of the frog and heel areas.

I would suggest that the short grazing you have is probably stressed, which makes it high in sugar. Add in the Autumn flush and you have a great set up for a horse/pony getting lami or LGL.

Personally I'd skip the straw, it can be too high in sugars/easily digested starches. Plus it may have had nitrogen fertilizer and/or pesticides on the crop which are not a good thing esp for lami's.

You won't necessarily have a bounding pulse for LGL. They are all slightly different, but I tend to find the footiness comes first and is more persistent.

Also I suspect the feet haven't fully transitioned, but that is purely instinct.

Please remember diagnosis by photo is really dodgy - I only comment because I look at hundreds of photos and anything I say in respect of a photo or video is a suggestion only.

 

[cptrayes]

Ditto on the photo warning.

Your horse appears to have bull nosed feet, where the wall curves outwards at the front. I have only seen bull nose feet on two barefoot horses and they were both insulin resistant. Insulin resistant horses put on weight very easily, can appear very hungry, and typically have weak feet and thin soles. They get sub-clinical laminitis at the drop of a hat unless their diets are very, very closely controlled.

 

[Jericho]

thanks very much. Agree that it is very difficult to assess via video/ photos. Her sole is very flat still and farrier says her horn isnt growing hardly at all. Is there any other way of telling whether the pedal bone has rotated or how thin her sole is other than xrays?

With regards to toe landing first would this indicate that there is hardly any pain in the laminae (otherwise she would be trying to avoid that area)? She has only been out of shoes for 5 months (after 8 years with them on) so I guess it would take a bit longer for her physiology and movement to change?

The event line that I can see my farrier and I put down to when I bought her i.e. change of grazing / feed etc, other than that I thought that her hoof wall looked relatively good and healthy?

Also with regards to the grass (and after I have sorted out this footiness) would you recommend turning her out on longer grass for short periods but with a muzzle on instead?

Sorry for all these questions

 

[Jericho]

cptrayes - wonderful! am even more worried now (but obviously better that I know!) She does put on weight very quickly, farrier said she seems to have thin soles but her horn is very hard and strong, and she is always hungry! Apparently she has never had laminitis before but I guess things change. How can I find out if she is insulin resistant?

 

[LucyPriory]

Ah - I can see at least 6 event lines, there are probably more under the mud. Best way to see them if you are not experienced is to very lightly rub the hoof wall with a not too abrasive sand paper.

I agree with Cptrayes regarding the bull nose. But I have seen it in bare feet where the horse had LGL and had a certain areas which could be improved in the trim.

Toe first landing does not indicate no pain in the toe area of foot. It just means that the horse is unable/unwilling to land heel first for one reason or another. But toe/heel landing can not be assessed properly with a horse being lunged in a circle on grass.

A horse will often change how they land in accordance with the footing and what they are doing. If you want to assess foot landing, watch your horse in a straight line, on a level, firm surface such as tarmac or concrete - and it really does have to be level, not sloping in any direction.

Horn quality except in extreme cases can not really be assessed by photo. I prefer to feel the hoof as well as see it up close and personal.

 

[cptrayes]

cptrayes - wonderful! am even more worried now (but obviously better that I know!) She does put on weight very quickly, farrier said she seems to have thin soles but her horn is very hard and strong, and she is always hungry! Apparently she has never had laminitis before but I guess things change. How can I find out if she is insulin resistant?

There is a test but it is very unreliable and horses can fail it time and again but have all the symptoms. Your big giveaway is if she is very hungry even though you know she has had plenty to eat. This is because insulin resistant horses overproduce insulin when they eat . That makes their blood glucose levels crash and they are genuinely hungry even though they have just eaten.

The cure for this is to restrict her food to what you know that she needs and drip feed it during the day. This is, needless to say, VERY difficult unless you have your horse at home and can spend all day there feeding it every two or three hours!! However, if you can do this, as I did with the one I took on, then you should see a difference in her speed of eating in three days, and then you can go back to more normal feeding patterns.

Some insulin resistant horses cannot tolerate any grass at all. The one I rehabbed earlier this year had never had laminitis either but he could not work barefoot without boots at four and was shod. His soles were desperately thin and his feet could be bent with my fingers, yet outwardly his horn looked strong and pretty healthy. But his liver was in a dire state and he had terrible sweet itch issues, probable ulcers and some behavioural quirks too. I took him off grass completely and he grew great feet and thick hard soles and never got sweet itch. The ulcer symptoms disappeared along with the behavioural quirks. Just one hour on grass and his feet go hot and he gets the munchies again. He is a rare case to be so bad though.

Cellulite dimples on the crest of the neck and root of the tail are another big sign.

If you can resolve the insulin issues, if she has them, then her feet will lose their bullnoses and her soles will thicken up. Alongside a stringent restriction of sugar of all kinds, and possibly all carbohydrates, work is the cure. According to recent research most IR horses can be controlled with a minimum of 30 minutes work per day. If mine starts to rush his food, the people who have him ride him twice that day, and he goes right back to normal again.

Your mare sounds like a very good candidate to me. If she gets better as the grass dies off, and worse if there is a frost, then you've got all the clues you need Good luck!

 

[Daisychain]

Anybody contemplating going barefoot, for rehabilitation or benefits for your horse should buy Nic Barkers book. 'Feet First' its fascinating reading, i have just read it and didnt quite realize the real link between what your horse eats to how he will react with his feet.

This would be a very thought provoking read for all the cynics on here too. And it is all fact based. Proof of pudding is in the eating.

 

[brucea]

When were these photographs taken?

CP and Lucy all giving great advice as usual.

On the whole, these aren't hideously bad feet and you shouldn't get too obsessive about it - it liiks like there has been a little separation in one of the photographs and agree the balance may be out - but then again without seeing the horse this may just be the way he wears them.

They just look a little challenged - not any one big challenge, just ongoing little challenges that mount up. At this time of the year they have to cope wiht hormonal ACTH changes as well as a big autumn flush and that can be a double-whammy for the sensitive ones.

They should be putting on a little extra weight now, if they can tollerate it, in preparation for the winter when they will lose it - that's only natural.

If you kept a diary and a picture diary as we all do (of course ) - I bet you might find the rings coincide with warm, sunny weather following rain when the grass put on a flush - these small challenges accumulate.

If it was my pony, I would see this as a warning sign and think about seriously restricting access to grass and providing hay, possibly soaked as an alternative for a month at least.

Great that you''ve had her stabled for the last 5 days but she needs movement - that is very important - so if you can find an area of rough ground, any where without grass - then think about making a turnout area there. Our laminitics have access to an area of gorse, trees and there is some grass, but it is old natural grass and growing under trees it has a much lower NSC value. They seem to tollerate this wgrass here they don't tollerate anything else. They eat the gorse - but then they are native types - gorse isn't right for all horses and some can choke on it.

You said the dark magic words - out 24/7 on 2 acres to short grass. Short grass is the dangerous stuff - long, stalky and rough grass is paradoxically safer! We strip graze our other two on long rough natural pasture - a foot a day - and they get on far bettter with this than they did in the fields that were short. It's the foggage approach!

Look for the other symptoms of LGL - the shifting is one, but look for pre-occupied behaviour, being more itchy than normal, being intollerant of noise and fussing, preferring to be on her own, being grumpy with her normal companions.

We call it "itchy, bumpy and grumpy" - we have 2 who are laminitis prone, one chronic

Remember too that the laminae go all the way to the back of the foot and they are under the sole - where there is horn, there are laminae - it's not always exclusively the toe area that is compromised.

 

[amandap]

We call it "itchy, bumpy and grumpy" -

Love this!
The grumpy part is so often misread imo. Strange, because when you think about who wouldn't be grumpy with sore feet? Somehow feet have become separated from the horse, that's one huge thing holistic thinking puts right.