Toe out - vetting

[Long horse]

Anyone corrected with good shoeing and maintained soundness of a young horse with toe out - in front. Sound and all good on xrays. Three years, broken ( shouldn't have been) no shoes on but had been regularly trimmed ( apparently) moves beautifully and wanted for dressage. Just worried it will cause problems long term?

 

[TheMule]

You can’t correct it now the horse is 3, you just have to trim/ shoe accordingly. If you try to correct it you end up loading the limb all wrong and crating more problems. If the horse places the foot down square and the x-rays are good then it wouldn’t be a hard 'no' from me

 

[ycbm]

It isn't unusual for a young horse to be toe out at three and come straight, it depends where the twist is.

If the whole leg is twisted so the knee is also pointing slightly outward, then work to strengthen the shoulder cradle will widen the chest, push the elbows out and that will bring the legs straight.

If the leg is twisted lower down then as Mule says, it's too late to untwist the leg but widening the chest will still reduce the toe out appearance. Most horses will have a wider chest at 5 than at 3. It's a common fault, better in my experience than toe in and as long as the foot lands flat I wouldn't be too unhappy about it.
.

 

[TheMule]

It isn't unusual for a young horse to be toe out at three and come straight, it depends where the twist is.

If the whole leg is twisted so the knee is also pointing slightly outward, then work to strengthen the shoulder cradle will widen the chest, push the elbows out and that will bring the legs straight.

If the leg is twisted lower down then as Mule says, it's too late to untwist the leg but widening the chest will still reduce the toe out appearance. Most horses will have a wider chest at 5 than at 3. It's a common fault, better in my experience than toe in and as long as the foot lands flat I wouldn't be too unhappy about it.
.

See, I'd say the opposite- they tend to toe in when the chest is narrow and then straighten as they broaden. And I would consider toeing-in to be less of a fault. But maybe that’s my bias because all my best horses have tended towards being a bit pigeon toed!

 

[ycbm]

See, I'd say the opposite- they tend to toe in when the chest is narrow and then straighten as they broaden. And I would consider toeing-in to be less of a fault. But maybe that’s my bias because all my best horses have tended towards being a bit pigeon toed!

If the elbows are pushed out by the chest, the legs will rotate and the toes turn forwards. I was taught to look for slight toe out in a two year old otherwise you can end up with a toe in five year old as the chest expands.

There are other experienced buyers of young stock on the forum who say the same.
.

 

[TheMule]

If the elbows are pushed out by the chest, the legs will rotate and the toes turn forwards. I was taught to look for slight toe out in a two year old otherwise you can end up with a toe in five year old as the chest expands.

There are other experienced buyers of young stock on the forum who say the same.
.

I can see logic in both ways! Like you said above, it probably depends where the deviation is coming from

 

[Goldenstar]

I won’t touch toe in I have forgiven horses for this twice because they where lovely people and they both went lame young
On the other side my first horse was quite toe out and dished by eight she was almost straight and the dish was almost away .
I know that she had a very weak thoracic sling and as she developed she built muscle bulk.
I would try to work out where the deviation is from.
Sometimes laying a dressage whip down the front of leg in the middle is enough to show you .

 

[Jojo2go]

My horse in my avatar toed in raced with us (Standardbred) until he was 7 and after we sold him ended up pulling an Amish wagon for about 5 years (not our choice!) and was a sound riding horse for about 4 years after we finally got him back until I lost him in an unrelated mishap.