lame going downhill

[dwi]

Daisy has been on box rest for 9 days now after going lame on her near fore. She has improved massively with box rest, vet could only find intermittent 1/10 lameness when he came out on Thurs, he advised me to continue with the box rest and then start walking her out today, turning her out at the end of the week if the walking went okay. because she was so mildly lame when he came we don't know what caused it. He thinks it was possible it was her shoe so she has new shoes on now.

We went for our first walk today and she was fine apart from several stumbles going downhill. I presume this is because more of her weight is going on the front leg as she goes down hill? Would you perservere with the walking out or hold off for a few days? I know you might say walk on flat ground but nowhere is flat near our yard.

In case you're worried I will be ringing the vet tomorrow to check what he thinks but I wondered what your opinions would be

 

[Patches]

Does she always stumble on the same leg? Does she seem to be on her forehand?

How walk....heel or toe first?

Are you sure it's her foot and not her shoulder for instance?

 

[Allykat]

I would be inclined to look higher up if she isn't right going down hill.

Last Summer my gelding suffered a kick to the inside of his stifle he was cut and sore and on box rest for about a fortnight. Once he was trotting up sound I started to walk him out and discovered he was unlevel going downhill. I wouldn't say lame as it was intermittent and I couldn't pin point anything in particular. My vet looked at him and felt he had probably tweaked something in his back that would right itself with flatwork. I invested in a "back person" who discovered he was sore all over!! He had slight displacement of the pelvis proabaly resulting from the kick and where he was sore he'd loaded all his weight off the bad leg (near hind) resulting in bad muscles diagonally over his back and under his belly, through the shoulder and right down to the off fore fetlock. After a few days of quiet hacking he was back to normal

Good luck I hope Daisy gets better soon

 

[dwi]

Interesting that you've both said something along the same lines

yes, it is always the same hoof, she walks toe first rather than heel but generally has a lovely even motion and doesn't dish/plait/brush or anything else. She's not particularly on the forehand

thanks

if anyone else has any other ideas please keep them coming

 

[Box_Of_Frogs]

How old is Daisy? My previous horse started stumbling going downhill and as he was 20 I thought it was just a bit of arthritis. But then I read a worrying article in one of the horse mags on BILATERAL lameness. It put a big question mark in my head. To be certain, I got the vet out and - long story - turned out that he had a truly terrible case of DJD/navicular in BOTH front feet. I wanted to weep when I saw him try to trot in a circle with one foot nerve blocked - he could hardly hobble. But because BOTH feet hurt the same amount, he hadn't shown any lameness apart from the odd stumble going down hills. It wasn't a good outcome so worth getting it checked thoroughly. Good luck!

 

[SpruceRI]

Friends pony refused to walk downhills - had her saddle checked. She had a back problem

 

[Box_Of_Frogs]

Good point from Madhossy - friend has TB ex racegorse - started creating BIG TIME going down hill. Turned out saddle was sliding rowards and pinching his withers hard on a steep downhill. New saddle and avoided hills for a few weeks...right as rain now.