Most horses are One Tenth Lame

Oh god like I need to be any more paranoid! I try to lunge/free school my horse once a week to assess his soundness/movement/gait but what if I'm missing lameness? He always moves really well and has really lovely paces so I *think* he's ok. I can't really lunge him on a surface tho because he is a git, and there's no where suitably flat/safe in the yard (v small) do other owners get a regular vet check to get an expert opinion even if they have no cause for concern? I worry that my boy is so good he wud just go on even if something was niggling him
 
Yes, absolutely true. Though I would say unlevel rather than lame as the word lame does often provoke hysteria!

We need to start accepting that horses don't need to be sound in all gaits on all surfaces to be productive members of equine society and use the tools we have available to maintain them better.

To pass the trot up at Badminton or any 4* event I believe a horse can be what is considered 3/10 lame.
 
Gg. I'm as paranoid as you. BUT this is not something to worry about. What they are saying is if it is always there and doesn't get any worse, it is just them. Just their way of going and us nothing to worry about.
 
amandaco2 said:
Can a 3/10 lame horse pass a badders trot up....?
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Absolutely, plenty of grooms stay up all night after XC cold hosing, applying ice/ cold packs, walking out etc etc to get the horse ready for the trot up.
I'm sure if you just shoved them in a box over night then dragged the straight into the trot up they would be hopping!

In general I think most horses over 10 wouldn't pass a vet for something or other, not sure I'd describe them all as lame (which to me means in pain) - just stiff/ short

In the same way few of us over 30 would pass a full medical without the Drs finding something that didn't work as well as it could.
 
1/10 is too little for most horse owners to even notice. It is also often caused by mechanical issues - lack of body symmetry for example - and not pain and it completely irrelevant.

What worries me more is that at competition warm-ups I see a substantial proportion of horses which are more than 1/10 lame, especially in spring summer (laminitis?) and especially when they are going round corners (navicular?).
 
Polos Mum said:
Absolutely, plenty of grooms stay up all night after XC cold hosing, applying ice/ cold packs, walking out etc etc to get the horse ready for the trot up.
I'm sure if you just shoved them in a box over night then dragged the straight into the trot up they would be hopping!

In general I think most horses over 10 wouldn't pass a vet for something or other, not sure I'd describe them all as lame (which to me means in pain) - just stiff/ short

In the same way few of us over 30 would pass a full medical without the Drs finding something that didn't work as well as it could.
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I'm pretty sure that's not what Amanda meant, and that she meant can it be 3/10 lame in the trot-up itself and not be failed.

The answer to that is surely an emphatic NO ?
 
cptrayes said:
I'm pretty sure that's not what Amanda meant, and that she meant can it be 3/10 lame in the trot-up itself and not be failed.

The answer to that is surely an emphatic NO ?
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Opps sorry - I'd like to think with an audience and no vested interest a vet could spot 3/10ths on concrete in a straight line.

There are plenty that don't present (presumably as they know they won't get through) and often some are held and have to represent when there is any doubt (re my comment above I suspect some of these would certainly be 3/10ths or more an hour earlier/ later)
 
The point about the Badders trot up comment is that a certain amount of unlevelness is considered acceptable, even at the top level. Many horses are 'managed' to keep them productive, I think it's very short sighted to expect everything to be 100% lame or to class a horse as usuless or unsuitable for a job due to a little bit of uneveness. You will find something wrong in most horses.
 
3/10 is pretty lame though Scarlett. Surely a horse which is 3/10 lame in the trot up in front of a vet at Badminton would not pass?
 
I think there's a difference between 'functionally sound' and lame. 'Functionally sound' horses may take the odd duff stride which may or may not be a sign of something brewing.

These are the US definitions - maybe someone can find a UK equivalent online somewhere?

Classification: Approved by The American Association of Equine Practitioners/ December 1981
  • Grade I. Difficult to observe. Not consistently apparent regardless of circumstances (i.e., weight carrying, circling, inclines, hard surface, etc.).
  • Grade II. Difficult to observe at a walk or trotting a straight line; consistently apparent under certain circumstances (i.e., weight carrying,
circling, inclines, hard surface, etc.).
  • Grade III. Consistently observable at a trot under all circumstances.
• Grade IV. Obvious lameness at a walk: marked nodding, hitching, or
shortened stride.
  • Grade V. Minimal weight-bearing in motion and/or at rest; inability to
move.
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Grade 1 may include those with niggly arthritic issues that actually improve with work. I'd stick the 'functionally sound' into this category.

If you're mid competition the US guidelines say that a Grade 1 will pass, a Grade 2 may 'proceed with care' depending on the cause (it could just be a tired horse), and a Grade 3 will fail.

In UK and FEI endurance the paces are graded A-E. A is great, C will fail, and B indicates that there may be an issue brewing or that the trot up wasn't brilliant. If the horse is consistently lame in trot, they're out regardless, but the occasional duff stride may be tolerated - it's not a pre purchase vetting, the vets are looking for 'functionally sound' and 'fit to continue'. Even at the end, the vets are looking for a horse that is sound enough to do another 15% of the distance without coming to harm. Some horses start with a B for action and improve as the ride goes on, because the work supples them up.
 
Hi, a horse that is 3/10 lame would not pass any trot up, badders or anywhere else. We have just had to say no to a horse due to being 3/10 lame at a vetting, this was on vets advice.
 
Of course the 'scoring' system is subjective too, ie. my 3/10ths might be different to someone else's 3/10ths.....
 
cptrayes said:
3/10 is pretty lame though Scarlett. Surely a horse which is 3/10 lame in the trot up in front of a vet at Badminton would not pass?
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Have you seen a trot up recently? Theres a lot you would look at and go 'hmmmm'... But then it's accepted that most of those horses will be on some sort of management for hocks/back/feet/whatever. I'm not trying to be argumentative or anything, just think it's an interesting topic.

I read the bit about the 4* trot up somewhere, I'm trying to find it again. The more I think about it the more I think its 2/10, but it's certainly more than none or 1/10th.

ETA - Just watched some trot up vids from Badminton on YouTube - there were a few that were not the cleanest of movers, shorter step on one leg, dragging a toe etc that passed. Many would consider that lameness.
 
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I'm not an eventer so please correct me if I'm wrong but I believe:
- The question the ground jury is asking itself is 'will bobbing round a course of relatively low showjumps be detrimental to this horse?' not 'is this horse sound enough to go round the cross country again?'. So you may well get a few more borderline ones being passed, compared to say at the midway point of an endurance ride with another 50 miles to go at speed, because the question that will be asked of a possibly sore/tired horse is different. One would hope that if a horse was consistently lame in trot in a straight line they wouldn't pass in either discipline.
- The ground jury in eventing are not vets although there is veterinary oversight for any they wanted to have a closer look at. I believe it's the ground jury that makes the actual decision though.
 
My boy has done badder twice (and Burghley a handful of times) he's passed the trot up each time but has a list of insurance exclusions that covers 2 pages from all his various injuries/ problems and there is almost no way he'd pass a vetting (trotting on concrete on a circle and flexions specifically would give him a real problem)

As rightly stated above a trot up isn't a vetting, it's just to check they are fit enough to continue.
 
I wasn't too far off. From the FEI eventing rules (Annex I, Section 7.f):

If there is any disagreement among the Panel, or if they are all inclined not to pass the horse, it should be trotted in both directions once more, unless it is seriously lame. The Panel should bear in mind that the test is whether or not the horse is fit to compete, not whether it would pass a soundness examination for a potential purchaser!
Particularly at the Third Inspection, the Panel should allow horses to continue in the competition if they have minor injuries that will be of no long term consequence or interfere with the horse’s welfare, provided of course that it is not unacceptably lame or in any other way unfit to compete.
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Also see Sections 8 & 9 of the annex:
http://www.fei.org/sites/default/files/file/DISCIPLINES/EVENTING/Rules/Annexes1-13.pdf
 
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ps Polo's Mum - my old lad wouldn't have passed a flexion test or a pre purchase vetting when he was doing advanced endurance either. He has a big hole in one ligament and it was actually all the long slow distance work that we did to put the ligament right that got us into the sport in the first place. He's 28 now and still sound-ish although I don't ask any big questions of him these days - now he spends most of his time playing 'I'm gonna bite yer knees' with my pony, like a big kid :) Hopefully your lad will continue in rude health as long as H has.
 
Thanks EY, he gave up the big time 4 years ago and hasn't had a proper days lameness in that time working just at my low level (the odd 1m ODE, SJ and novice dressage and the odd day out with the hounds). Like you say at this level, which he would certainly consider 'retirement', fingers crossed he's got plenty more years left of fun, and if not - well he'll be a most beautiful ornament for my fields.
 
I second EstherYoung: I spoke to a vet once who had been vet to the UK Endurance team. He said that once when he was at a big international event where there were Eventers as well (presumably WEG?), the vets from the different disciplines were observing each others' vettings. He said that an Eventer vet was really surprised at the stringent standards for the endurance horses, saying that 90% of the eventers wouldn't pass.
 
spookypony said:
He said that an Eventer vet was really surprised at the stringent standards for the endurance horses, saying that 90% of the eventers wouldn't pass.
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I guess, as said above, that's related to what the horse is going to be expected to do after the vet check, eventers have a c.1 minute round of show jumps, on a surface and not a massive height (to pure SJ's anyway!)
Not that I know much about endurance but they are expected to do a further 20/50 miles at fast speed over varying gound which will take them (I guess) several hours.
A minor injury probably would not cause perminant harm for one round of SJ, while it could turn into something nasty after a couple of hours hard fast work, hence they are judging against different standards.
 
Polos Mum said:
I guess, as said above, that's related to what the horse is going to be expected to do after the vet check, eventers have a c.1 minute round of show jumps, on a surface and not a massive height (to pure SJ's anyway!)
Not that I know much about endurance but they are expected to do a further 20/50 miles at fast speed over varying gound which will take them (I guess) several hours.
A minor injury probably would not cause perminant harm for one round of SJ, while it could turn into something nasty after a couple of hours hard fast work, hence they are judging against different standards.
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Yup, exactly this. Ours have to be passed "fit to continue" at the final trot-up.
 
How on earth can so many people not feel/ignore that horses are wrong?

OK, novices and real hobby riders but for anyone competing above riding club there's really no excuse, is there? :confused:
 
Flame_ said:
How on earth can so many people not feel/ignore that horses are wrong?

OK, novices and real hobby riders but for anyone competing above riding club there's really no excuse, is there? :confused:
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a 1/10 horse is not always the easiest thing to spot - especially if a horse has always been like it, even before the owner had bought the horse so they know no different. As someone else has said, 1/10th's is more an un-level look and can take a well trained eye to spot.

Unless you're my completely non-horsey OH who seems to have a natural talent for spotting unlevel/lame horses and is about 90% accurate on which leg :eek:
 
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