Remedial shoeing v no shoes

Copperpot

Copperpot

Well-Known Member
Joined
27 February 2010
Messages
3,187
Location
Bedfordshire
Visit site
I am not sure what to do for the best. Horse aged 9 diagnosed with DJD of hocks, side bone in front left foot and pedal bone changes due to loading the front end in September. Had hocks injected and Tildren. Saw no improvement so took his shoes off and turned him out for the winter.

He is on a joint supplement and is fed happy hoof, fibre nuts and a splash of sugar beet along with hay.

When the ground got hard he was very footy on his front feet and mincing about, so had front shoes put back on. He's always been a shoe looser and sometimes pulls a fair bit of foot off too.

Vet wants him to have wedges on. I want to try bringing him back into work but am unsure whether leaving his back feet unshod will be better or to try the wedges option.
 
Could you post some photos of his hooves please?

It has been mentioned on here several times that Happy Hoof makes some horses footy, also is your sugar beet molassed?

I would never put wedges on any of my horses, but then I've seen the amazing recovery that even severely compromised hooves can go through given the right diet, stimulation and time. For a hock problem, I would want to lower the concussion on the hocks and having no shoes (boots if needed) would do this.
 
I will take some pics of his feet tomorrow. The beet is unmollassed.

Do you know of any good alternatives to happy hoof? All 5 eat the same but I can happily change my 2 over to something better.

I am torn between wedges and no shoes. On one hand I want to believe the vet knows what's best but on the other I think that they will change his whole biomechanics and surely that's not a good thing. I think his back feet are tough enough to remain unshod, the fronts may take some work.

The joint supplement is Maxaflex which I read good things about.
 
I feed Hi-fi molasses free, but my horses are fine with alfalfa.

It's a sad fact that Vets are not trained about unshod/barefoot, so unless your Vet has a personal interest and has researched it themselves, they will always advise remedial shoes.
 
When he was in work he was fed Alfa A oil, topline no 4 and haylage. So his diet now is a fair bit different. Ironically he has always been hard to keep weight on but since living out he's hardly required any feed at all.

I will hose his feet off tomorrow and get some photos. Thanks for the advice so far :)
 
I've not seen any hooves improve in wedges......
Imho I'd take the shoes off, strip the sugar out of the diet, treat any infections in the frogs and see how he is in a few months....
Diet wise, fast fibre will be fine over the hh. Add linseed meal and I use powder suppliment pro hoof/balance +
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top