cure for seedy toe, or information on it.

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SKY

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hi,
just got one of my horses feet paired today and blacksmith said he has seedy toe in his front right hoof, but not to worry too much as will grow out. but i am looking up some online and it says hoof should be bathed, what would you do. blacksmith isnt bothered. but i want rid of it i know it, he said it will have to grow out and he said could take 4mths.
is there a cure for it, never had it before so any information on it would be great.
horse is fine not lame or sore at all, i am just worried.
thanks in advance
 
Real seedy toe is an infection of the white line.

I think what your farrier is describing is a stretched white line caused by bad hoof angle/breakover which has stretched the toe as the horse walks.

If real seedy toe, you need to kill bacteria, so a course of ab's will dry it out then topical creams and keeping it clean for 4 months is probably best strategy...

Google it and look for Pete Ramey and see what he does.

Mine had seedy toe/stretched white line (one sort of exacerbates the other) and navicular which I think caused it so I just ended up taking the shoes off and it's fine now.
 
A horse of mine had mild seedy toe, on the farrier's advice I scrubbed the area with hydrogen peroxide solution and an old toothbrush everyday, then sealed the hole in the hoof with Stockholm Tar and cotton wool. When I did that every day the infection went quite quickly. (I wasn't that rigorous initially and it didn't go). That's quite a few years ago, so may not be modern thinking.
 
Mine had seedy toe, I put antibac down it every day from the vets for a few months (nail holes and around shoe). It completley went and then my new farrier put gels in and it has come back so changing farriers again (for more than just that - original one moved to sweeden!)
 
I had a horse once with seedy toe, the farrier was very 'laissez faire' about it, said he'd pack it out when the weather dried up, it got worse and worse and finally the horse went lame; she ended up having major re-section of both front feet and it was all a bit touch and go but the remedial farrier was amazing and after 6 months of anti-bacterial applications, leather pads and scrubbing and taping up she came good. If I knew then what I know now I would certainly be using anti-bac or similar as described above, and probably being a bit more aggressive about it, if it is true seedy toe.
 
One of mine has had it for a while. The farrier cuts a little triangle and I was cleaning it out and putting purple spray in but although it helped it never quite went so now I have some terramycin (prob wrong spelling but thats how you say it) spray from the vets , seems to be doing the trick but won't really find out til farrier is back. Has never stopped him doing anything , he has never shown any signs of lameness.
 
We bought a mare that had quite a bad case of seedy toe, our farrier reckoned her previous farrier had just ignored it, she had to have quite a large section of the hoof cut away and it looked awful. Farrier sprayed it with some sort of antibacterial stuff and that was it. We just had to wait until the hoof grew back down but she was still shod, lived out over winter and we hacked out with no problems.
 
My older horse had a bit of seedy toe, my farrier advised to clean area with a soft toothbrush to get rid of any debris picked up while turned out then treat with some bactakill 55 onto the area, cleared it up very quickly
 
In my experience and reading it is down to diet. A healthy white line (lamina connection) doesn't get seedy toe aka white line disease.
It's a huge and mind blowing subject but too much carbs and or mineral imbalance, excess or low levels of one or more minerals are all probable factors.

Read some of the IR Cushings dietry info available widely that might give you some pointers. This is purely because the diet is discussed in more depth in these conditions and is often relevant to many horses who don't have these conditions but are having problems such as seedy toe.

I do find soaks help a severe attack. Apple cider vinegar solution and cleantrax are fairly safe solutions to use for this I believe.

Don't forget it wont 'heal' it has to be grown out and a good lamina connection is needed to be able to grow down to do this effectively.

Have a look in the article section here and at healthy hooves article. http://www.unshod.co.uk/articles.php

An article with loads of info so might be mind boggling but is very useful. http://hoofrehab.com/diet.htm
 
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Magnetic Sparrow said:
A horse of mine had mild seedy toe, on the farrier's advice I scrubbed the area with hydrogen peroxide solution and an old toothbrush everyday, then sealed the hole in the hoof with Stockholm Tar and cotton wool. When I did that every day the infection went quite quickly. (I wasn't that rigorous initially and it didn't go). That's quite a few years ago, so may not be modern thinking.
Click to expand...

Ditto, sometimes the old ways are the best. Stokholme tar kills the infection and the cottonwool blocks the hole so stones and grit can't go in. Ivery cheap and effective method, although a little messy to apply.
 
Bearing on mind we had been trying to get rid of it for a year with vet & farrier care and it kept coming back. This was my boys' "WLD"... and after a good few months. They were threatening a resection but luckily I found Pete Ramey & Co. It worked for us in anycase but not saying it would for you... just an example.

photo0114-1-1.jpg
 
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I swear by 'White Lightening Gel'. My old cob had really bad seedy toe on one of his front feet, where the toe clips went.

My farrier dug out the area and shod him with quarter clips instead. This allowed me to apply the gel everyday and the infection cleared up very quickly, although it took around 5 mnths for the damaged horn to grow out.
 
One thing, I wouldn't google it. You get a lot of stuff about navicular and the lies, ending up with horses being permanently lame. Reg had a very mild case, farrier dug it out and sorted it and it was scrubbed with antibacterial stuff each day. However, Al googled it as she didn' know anything about it, and got very very worried!!
 
My pony gets seedy toe, originally from when he was stabled for the 1st time when he came to be and got into a bad habit of pawing the ground. We cut it out (he looked like he have a cows foot) and scrubbed and sprayed for a while but didn't help so I asked farrier to cut out and stick shoes on the front and continued to scrub and it grew out in 1 farrier cycle although I have had the shoes back on for another to make sure and he has now stopped pawing so hopefully it shouldn't reoccur when he has the shoes off next time- finger crossed :rolleyes:
 
where can i get white lightening gel, cant find it to buy online. also whats best that or anti-bac.
 
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