Barefoot help, please - Navicular (again)

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Delta99

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Could I have some more advice, please?
My 6 yr old with navicular was so close to being sound after 2 remedial shoeings but then suddenly went hopping lame.
We took the shoes off about 3 months ago, I gave him some time off in the field, then started walking in hand and have been riding him in walk for about a month now.
His feet have changed dramatically, his frogs are definitely on the floor but he's not quite landing heel first yet.
He's 100 % sound in walk but still very short and choppy in trot on a straight line and on a circle is lame on the outside leg, equally on both reins, about 1/10th - 2/10th.

I'm a bit concerned as it's been 3 months and most rehabs seem to return to full work in this timescale. I know I've been taking things a bit slower and unfortunately I don't have any help locally at all, the trimmers around here don't have much experience with navicular and as my farriers is pretty good, I'm a bit reluctant to try someone else.

I'm seriously considering doing the mri now even though I don't think it will give me more options in terms of treatment but just to rule out that it is something completely different.

For those of you who have done a rehab at home, how long did it take for the horse to be sound again in trot?
Would I better off turning the horse away for the winter?
Any suggestions about how to get more advice? I really need somebody knowledgable to look at this horse ideally but where to find them?? (have spoken to various trimmers but they did not sound confidence inspiring... :o)

Thanks a lot
 
Have you spoken to Nic at Rockley Farm? She's got the most experience on rehabs and is a wealth of knowledge.
I wouldn't get too hung up on timescale, horses spend an average of 4 months at Rockley and they seem to recover much quicker as they're moving around on comformative surfaces pretty much all the time.
I don;t think i'd turn away, feet will only improve with stimulation and he won't improve much mooching around the field. Where abouts are you? Maybe someone on here is in your area, and have you tried positing on the UkNHCP forum? :)
 
Yes, have spoken to Rockley but decided not to send him there as it's too far and have posted on UKNHCP forum but not had too much response. Must be asking the wrong type of questions... :D
I'm in Worcestershire.
 
I have a Rockley Farm Rehab and it was a long way for my horse to go (200 miles) but oh my god, it was THE best thing I ever did for him!!

Have you got your diet sorted?? (hay/grass analysed and feeding any minerals etc accordingly?)

Exercise is also important, how much work is he doing, on what surfaces etc

eta: turning away will not help, IMO, as like maggiesmum said, the feet need the correct stimpulation (exercise) to improve
 
^^^ this, what are you feeding? and whats a typical routine re exercise e.g. how much, how often and on what surface?

Also try PM'ing cptrayes - she's done a few rehabs at home and if pretty good on the advice front. :)
 
Please try not to compare yousefl with Rockley, or me for that matter. Rockley has the most fabulous facility to reform a horse's feet, and I had all the time I needed, to walk mine like a dog for hours on end! You sound like you are doing well, with precious little help. Where are you? Can any of us help, I'd be happy just to come and talk to you. (sorry, just spotted that you are Worcs, too far for me to pop in for a brew:()

I echo the diet thing, it is absolutely crucial. You may need to completely restrict sugars, and possibly even winter grass to enable your horse to grow a hard enough foot to support her bones properly.

Work is also very important to the speed of recovery. You can turn away and might get the same result in the end, but it will probably take a lot longer.

Are you absolutely certain that your horse has no thrush making him reluctant to put the back half of his foot to the floor first? If you have any suspicion at all, treat it. I personally use household bleach on the recommendation of a vet, but I know others throw up their hands in horror at the idea :) 3% hydrogen peroxide works well too. Sudocrem can be very effective stuffed into folds and cracks. Tesco probably thinks all we horse owners have babies in nappies!

Have you tried boots, possibly with pads in? Is the horse still unsound in them? If not, then it's not the navicular, of course, but the feet and that's a matter of conditioning and time.

You sound like you've made a lot of prgress with your horse and you are poised to get the heel first landing which will change everything for you.


ps do your xrays show any bone spurs? The only barefoot rehab that I have seen which failed had a bone spur. She came sound but went unsound again each time she did any serious work. I'm very cautious about the future for horses with bone spurs now.
 
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More thoughts. Where are you working him. I recommend a lot of work on flat tarmac and not on too much circles until he is flat foot landing, or hopefully heel first. He almost certainly has soft tissue damage and the toe first landing will continue that damage until it stops, so I would avoid any pace or direction in which he is obviously lame. I did lunge mine in walk a lot too, but I had a very conformable grit surface at the time which was constantly massaging his feet.
 
1) Diet - you need to give The Best diet in order to grow a strong hoof and wall connection.

2) Deal with any thrush, either with bacterial or fungal preperations. I believe you shouldn't put anything on your horse's frogs that you wouldn't safely gargle with first.

3) Use boots for exercise. The horse needs movement and if he can't do it comfortably, then he needs support. He will then develop quicker and you prob won't need them anymore.

4) Get some support, even just for a one off consultation. Even if you need to travel for the day. Find someone you can trust to give you hands on advice and fit the boots.

5) Post on UKNHCP that you thinking about giving up and going back to shoes - that'll get them responding to you;)

6) Post us some pics of the feet for us to look at. It's not ideal, but there might be something someone can see with a fresh pair of eyes.

7) Relax! - the horse is getting there. He isn't dog lame and he's trying his best to heal. We just need to let him and try to help.
 
Thanks, this all helps a lot.

Need to look at diet - I'm feeding unmolassed sugarbeet, mag ox, brewer's yeast and linseed plus salt at the moment but have not had a forage analysis done as using different hay suppliers so quantities may be wrong.

We were doing 35 mins in the school twice a week, 20 mins on road under saddle once a week and 1 hour on the road led from another horse but with the wet weather he's gone a bit footy so have stopped the road work until I can get some boots for him (proving difficult as his feet are a fair bit wider than long...)

cptrayes, it sounds like you did a lot more with yours?

Also, if he wears boots for roadwork, do I need him trimmed more often as his feet won't wear as much as they would without boots?

Definitely no thrush and no bone spurs on x rays.

Will keep looking for a knowledgable person, would you say it matters whether they are uknhcp or aanhcp?
 
It doesn't matter who trained them IMO. You get good and bad trimmers in all schools. Just find someone from any organisation (or even independent) who has a happy client list and knows how to rehab a navicular horse.

The horse needs to develop the structures at the back of the hoof. They will have been weak for a while. You don't fix that overnight. It's like becoming a body builder.

The key is to keep him comfortable enough to keep moving.

Your diet sounds ok. Perhaps a good mineral supplement may help?

Re boots, the trimming can stay at 6 - 8 weeks. You can be shown how to rasp the wall in between if necessary.
 
I recommend that you supplement copper at the dose rate in Copper Trition right away. This dose is low enough not to cause toxicity problems, but it will be enough to help if your horse is copper deficient, until you have a forage analysis done. You would need ONE gramme, a tiny amount, of the Copper Bioplex tht Forageplus sells. You can buy copper sulphate from Equimins but I have no idea of the weight of tat which you would need to feed.

I worked my rehab twice a day every day. I walked him like a dog or lunged him and did whatever he could do without being lame. I kept him on a yard where he kept moving too, he could not have grass as he also had pretty severe metabolic issues when he arrived. I let him out with a muzzle on once, and another time he escaped me on the lead and he lamed himself going for a hooley with weak feet, but apart from that his progress was pretty consistent and he has now been sound for well over a year (he had one day when he was mildly lame and we never knew why) and has rock crunching feet.

You will get there, you have already come a long way. But it is clear from the fact that he has gone footie with wet feet that his feet are inherently weak, and that is very likely to be a diet issue. You have already done most of what we would recommend, which is why I suggest copper, which is the commonest deficiency coming out of forage analyses. Supplementing copper has made a lot of difference to my friend's horses in particular, but mine too.

After testing your forage and adjusting for that I'm afraid you'll be left without much else to try but a VERY severe reduction in grass intake/soaking hay for 12 hours, but you aren't there yet.
 
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About 6 years ago I did my own Navicular rehab at home. I did have a good barefoot trimmer, I did loads of walking first in hand, then later ridden, in boots with pads. Initially I spent loads of time cutting up gym mats for pads in various shapes, with frog area cut out, with frog support, with extra frog support, what ever she needed to get her comfortable to walk out. Unfortunately I have 1/4 mile of nasty stone track to get down before being able to get onto tarmac.

Her diet had always been pretty good, she was on forage (haylage & grass) and a feed balancer with magnesium oxide.

It was about 6 to 7 months before she could trot up sound on concrete, without boots and landing heel first. I stayed away from circles in a school as she had a hock issue which showed up when the nerve blocking for her navicular was done.
 
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