OK I give in...

J

Jericho

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I have tried everything to help my mare go barefoot, i loved the idea of it but its just not going to work for my mare and I feel terrible for putting her through it. She looked a little footy about 3 weeks ago and suspecting laminitis (even though on restricted grazingf and no sugar diet) she was stabled for a week, soaked hay diet and then out on bare paddock at night for the last 2 weeks. Vet saw her, said could be / might be lami as no 'classic' signs but keep her off grass anyway. She was showing no footiness in her movement so I lunged very lightly her last week on soft grass and she was 100% sound there.

She has been out of shoes for 8 months now but her feet seem softer than ever, admittedly it has been very wet here but her feet have had a minimum of 6 hrs of dryness everyday and I have been putting Keratex hoof hardner on as well. I have put sand and pea gravel down in her paddock, she has no sugars, her feet/ frogs /heels look great, before the lami she was hacking out once a week albeit in boots mostly and yet I took her a 20 min walk in hand today on tarmac and on some muddy very puddly tracks and she flinched on every stone and looked totally fed up and was worse than I have ever seen her. If I could have carried her home I would have. When I cleaned her feet when we got back about 2-3mm of her sole had/was flaking off. She went straight back into her stable with an extra thick shavings bed, soaked hay. Just been to see how she is and she has been laying down and looked very sore. I was going to turn her out but I cant so she is now fed up because she is in and has sore feet probably because 1) laminitis somehow and 2) her feet are incredibly sore. I obviously havent done this right or something far worse and far more sinister has reared its ugly head. I suspect a vet call is in order for tomorrow.

Sorry for rant - I am cross at myself, that it still could be lami and I walked her out ( she showed no signs of not wanting to walk out), guilty that I have put my poor little mare in this position, frustrated that I havent made barefoot work for her and cross at the amount of money I have spent on boots / supplements / books. I know the barefooters will be cross at me for posting this because I havent made a success of it but just needed to get it out of my system
 
First of all big hugs. It is horrible to watch any horse be miserable and one of the prime 'rules' in barefoot (where I come from anyway) is that you don't leave horses miserable and limping.

You are doing the right thing in pursuing vet support, I'd be right there with you.

However I am surprised you don't mention your trimmer? Have they been supportive and what advice/recommendations/observations have they made?

It is possible to have lami/induce lami symptoms even when the horse is off grass.

However you did say that the footiness started about 3 weeks ago. This time of year there are two unhelpful things which are lami triggers. 1) Autumn Flush 2) Seasonal Rise

Your horse may be suffering the effects of these and if you keep them off the grass and booted when ridden you may be ok.

Less well know is that lami symptoms can also be triggered by wormers, vaccinations and/or laminitic feed products.

And don't forget thrush - which is enjoying a minor explosion at the moment because of the warm wet conditions.

Also when was your horse last trimmed - do they have any foot irregularities? I do a couple which need very careful and regular trimming otherwise they will go lame.

If you rule out all of the above and can not boot then you may need to shoe, for your own peace of mind if not the horse's.
 
Please don't beat yourself up, I don't think barefoot is the solution for all horses all the time and even the barefooters would agree with that.
 
Is there any reason for wanting your mare to go barefoot?
I have one that simply cannot go barefoot is incredibly footsore on the slighest of stoney ground.
How has she been over the whole 8 months? Has there been times she has been ok? If so what were the ground conditions? What were the ground conditions like when she started to get sore?
If you cannot shoe, then boot, and see if it makes a difference.
Sadly yours just may be one of those that cannot go without shoes.
 
thanks for replies. I was guesisng that the increased footiness may have been due to flush of grass and increase of ACTH rather than lami (although I assume the two go hand in hand really - if she has been shod I probably wouldnt have noticed) Vet also said this but obviously without doing lots of tests , xraying the pedal bone for rotation it would be fairly difficult to confirm. its just so frustrating for me and her to get this far and then have to treat her so delicately/like an invalid just because the grass is growing. I am sure she would say put those damn shoes back on so I can have some grass! I know thats not point but anyho!

Interestingly she was wormed with Pramox just over 3 weeks ago and I have heard that this can cause problems so maybe it was that.

She is trimmed by a farrier who is very supportive of her going barefoot and even was very against me putting shoes back on her when he trimmed her 3 weeks ago just as she went footy. He said she has some hoof imbalance in that she wears the inside of her hooves quicker but nothing too drastic and basically she has very good strong feet and no sign of thrush. He didnt touch the sole last time he trimmed. He seemed to think that the increase in footiness would be due to the flush of grass (lami incidences high around this area at the moment) and lots of stones, gravel coming to tohe surface after the amount of rain we have had.

She didnt grow any hoof in the 8 weeks prior to the most recent trim but I am noticing that in the last 3 weeks the hoof wall was starting to grow beyond the sole level :-) I havent see this before and whether it coincides with the fact I started feeding her Formula4Feet 2 weeks ago, who knows. I did use F4F when she first when barefoot and she was brilliant on it and although she was a little footy on the more stony tracks she was far better than she was now. I took her off it because of cost - so I dont think that is contributing to it. Anyway most of the growth at the toe wore away yesterday when I led her out :-(

She looked much better today, normal in fact, after 24hrs confined to stable and concrete yard and I feel a little better. I think I now just want her to get her past this current episode and make some decision then
 
Ah the dreaded Pramox.

I am glad to learn your horse is improving now.

Good on your farrier, if only they were all as enlightened.

I've had barefoot for over 15 years and when I started there was very little support or information.

I don't treat the footy ones as invalids. I get them comfortable and then; comfort being a priority, make sure they get moving. For some this is boots, some need boots and pads. Others just need an easy surface for a bit.

But the footiness of course is not really a foot problem - it is a symptom of a gut problem and shoes won't fix that.

What you can do is feed things which will support the metabolism and gut mechanisms.

Milk thistle, nettles, rose hips, hawthorn, burdock leaves are all things you can find in the hedge and are helpful.

If you want to or have money to spend you can also try Aloe Vera and/or Slippery Elm can also be useful.
 
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