TicTac
Well-Known Member
My mare has gone lame.( She is 10 year old dutch warmblood and I have had her for 2 years now with no previous problems) It has only happened in the last 4 or 5 days and she is not hopping, she is just not right. It is more of a shorteneing of the stride rather tham a reluctance to put the foot down. As yet I haven't had the vet to look at her because the farrier is coming out tomorrow to shoe her and I want him to have a look first. Obviously if he can't find anything then I will call the vet and take it from there.
However I have been down this road before with my previous two horses and after many months of treatment I lost them both at the age of 10. Each had a different problem but equally neither had a good prognosis for a full recovery. I had owned one of them for 10 years and the other for 3. Now I am getting a bit stressed and worried that my mare may have some long term degenerative problem that would involve months of box rest and trust me, this horse will not do box rest. Plus she is at the 'bogey' age of 10 which seems to be my achilles heel horse wise.
So, if the worse case scenario is that she has some long term problem that will require long term box rest, would you ignore that advise and just turn her away and let nature take it's course? or go for the long and stressfull option?
As mentioned my mare hates being in the stable, to the point that she will chest the door, swing her head in and out, snap and grab hold of the top of the door as if to crib. However she is completely different once out in the field, calm and happy. My stables become unbearable hot in the summer as they get full sun from about 11am onwards. She is Miss average and has an easy life anyway and do I have another horse I can ride. I may sound as if I couldn;t care less but keeping my mare's mind happy is half way there to getting her better anyway and I think she would have a far better chance of coming sound again out in the fleld. She generally doesn't do wizzing about as she's out 24/7 at the moment anyway.
What would you do and have any of you experienced the same problem? At the moment untill I know for sure what the problem is this is all hyperthetical, I'm just thinking ahead really!
However I have been down this road before with my previous two horses and after many months of treatment I lost them both at the age of 10. Each had a different problem but equally neither had a good prognosis for a full recovery. I had owned one of them for 10 years and the other for 3. Now I am getting a bit stressed and worried that my mare may have some long term degenerative problem that would involve months of box rest and trust me, this horse will not do box rest. Plus she is at the 'bogey' age of 10 which seems to be my achilles heel horse wise.
So, if the worse case scenario is that she has some long term problem that will require long term box rest, would you ignore that advise and just turn her away and let nature take it's course? or go for the long and stressfull option?
As mentioned my mare hates being in the stable, to the point that she will chest the door, swing her head in and out, snap and grab hold of the top of the door as if to crib. However she is completely different once out in the field, calm and happy. My stables become unbearable hot in the summer as they get full sun from about 11am onwards. She is Miss average and has an easy life anyway and do I have another horse I can ride. I may sound as if I couldn;t care less but keeping my mare's mind happy is half way there to getting her better anyway and I think she would have a far better chance of coming sound again out in the fleld. She generally doesn't do wizzing about as she's out 24/7 at the moment anyway.
What would you do and have any of you experienced the same problem? At the moment untill I know for sure what the problem is this is all hyperthetical, I'm just thinking ahead really!