re my post about lame horse- further info

[clairefeekerry1]

thank you to all who have responded to my earlier post about close to giving up-lame horse. further to some suggestions i have carried out some tests in different saddles and bare back.
i have found in a much shorter saddle, and vastly different shape to my current saddle (16.5 inch i think) there is a vast improvement (i.e he's not lame in trot) BUT he develops a different movement where his hind leg crosses over the other one- bit like plaiting i think- any ideas/thoughts???
i have found if i trot him bareback he is just as bad as previous, if not slightly worse!- any ideas/thoughts?
thanks

 

[horsimous]

I did type a nice long response but then the system lost it all!

You would expect the horse to be a bit sore still bareback as the muscles are probably still in spasm. What size of horse is it and what size saddle? Have you any pics or video to help?

I think your saddle may have been jammed onto the shoulder so the horse stopped working through and all the muscles went into spasm. There are alot of problems which this can cause. Putting a shorter saddle on an inch further back may help but initially physio will be needed to unblock the horse. Lateral work will help free up the block. We were told by a top physio to do some exercises in hand before riding:

lead in very small figure of eights to get the horse crossing the back legs over

get the horse to do very tight turn on forehand ensuring horse is straight but making it cross over the front and hind legs

get the horse to back up

Someone I am helping has a similar problem as you and we found all this helped alot, though we are only at the start of the process and I have told the girl that there may be another underlying problem as we are finding saddles get pushed forward while riding.