Is YOUR horse this awesome when the farrier comes around? Mine stands immobile without so much as a halter on, and will pose for pictures on the stand like some sort of extremely tall Misty of Chincoteague. She'll stay that way for an entire trim, fronts and hinds.
Mom. Why you do this.
Now, onto something completely different.
When I first started writing the Eventing-A-Gogo blog almost four years ago, I had just moved to a magical situation which revolved around Gogo 24 hours a day. I breathed, ate, slept, worked, and functioned solely for Gogo and what we were working for, and had nothing to distract me from my drive. We even lived together, only a doorway and a short walk down an aisle apart. I woke up every day with a center to spin around: her, and her only. Part of my compensatory package included lessons, so I usually rode her during the day, and even on the days that I didn't have lessons, I was allowed to ride at some point during the day most of the time. The entire barn rooted for us at shows, and were all collectively involved in the process, even chipping in for clinics and travel money. Gogo was my primary focus, and everything revolved around her.
With Pangea, things are different. I am in a completely different situation now, and it isn't easy. Working two jobs, going to school full time, having a Future Hubs who I only get to see for a few hours after work every day (we don't share a day off, so any time we have together is small and precious), and boarding her at a small facility without a lighted arena makes it very hard to ride on the days when I leave my house before the sun comes up and come home long after the sun has gone down. It isn't exactly possible to ride in complete darkness... even our barn doesn't have lights! This is how I made grains last night:
Patron saves the day, as usual. I HAVE considered turning my headlights on the arena and riding in their light.... but somehow it doesn't seem like that would end well.
What I am really waiting for is a spot to open up at WD, a nearby private eventing facility with an enormous full XC course, several arenas (including two properly sized dressage arena, one standard and one short court, a stadium arena with a full set of jumps, and a 300'x150' covered arena with lights and synthetic footing), and a galloping lane with mile markers. It is only two miles away from where P lives now, and I am next on the waiting list for monthly access. All I have to do when my spot opens up is pay a monthly fee, and then I have access to the gated facility whenever I want, as many times a week as I want. The lighted arena will DEFINITELY come in handy as winter closes in on us.
I LOVE the barn I am at now, by the way. It is tiny - just the owner's horses and my horse - but it is peaceful, out of the way, and drama-free. Oh, and cheap. Did I mention cheap? Did I mention I can do whatever, whenever I want? Feed whatever I want, however I want? Love it. AND it is only two miles from WD. AND only three miles from my house.
Along with the vanishing daylight hours, north Texas seems to be finally cooling down a bit. The horses are all starting to grow their winter coats already (!!!), but temps are still in the 80's and 90's.... which makes for some toasty ponies. P's horrible bleached coat is finally shedding out, but she is still sweating every day, leaving me to find this on her pretty much every single afternoon:
Well, we can't have that if we want to ever grow in a decent coat... she'll bleach her winter coat out too! I figured out that a large part of the problem revolves around the bugs - she spends so much of her day stomping, swishing, and walking around in order to try and shake them off of her that she lathers up first thing in the morning and stays sweaty all day. The weather has cooled down enough that I felt it was time to try and break this magical thing out again:
Obviously, from the look on her face, she was not amused. She hates clothes... HATES them! However, she seems to hate the bugs an awful lot more than the clothes, so we seem to have reached an agreement to wear them without completely shredding them. Nothing I've put on her has lasted more than a week, so the fact that this actually has lasted almost TWO now with only a few tears is nothing short of magical. The flymask is also still half-alive:
But I did have to cut the ears off of it, seeing as they were completely in tatters. The rest of the mask is starting to look pretty poor now, but it is still hanging on for the most part. I quite imagine it won't be long before it receives a ceremonial burial in the garbage bin though... no mask can stand up to her wrath for long.
In terms of her soundness, her hind end looks amazing as of late - I've never seen or felt her move so freely behind right from the get-go of every ride and workout. It is now her front end that we have to worry about, and with all the wet-dry cycles we've had as of late, her front feet are suffering. She was casted for a little while, but the material was a different brand from my usual preferred and it didn't take long for them to fail. When the casts came off, she was still very footsore. It has taken me a very, very long time to figure out WHY exactly she cannot seem to grow any sort of solar depth at the toe, but it finally dawned on me a few weeks ago, and I've been stumped as to trying to figure out an answer to it. Have you ever noticed the way she always stands? I'll give you a montage and see if you can pick it up before I give it away:
Despite tons of bodywork, chiro adjustments, aqua therapy, a well-balanced and low NSC diet, and good trims... she is just plain camped under in the front. It's not uncommon in horses with short, upright pasterns like she has... but I was kind of hoping that it would go away with regular workups. It appears that isn't going to be the case, and if you look at the collage you will spot a picture with a date on it from an old sale ad of hers from 2005. Yep, I guess she's just camped under and always has been... and there you are.
The problem with this? A horse constantly standing with her weight distributed unevenly over the front of her foot will be constantly applying unnatural pressures to that area. It is hard to grow a nice, thick sole underneath an area that is constantly being crushed. I don't have any recent radiographs of her front feet, but given the state of things visually I would expect to see quite a lot of bony changes going on here - ringbone, sidebone, and possible remodeling of the coffin bone (but let's hope not). Radiographs would also, obviously, show extremely thin sole at the toe, and more than adequate sole at the heel. Just like with Gogo's club foot, if you put weight on your toe and unweight your heel... your heel is going to grow like crazy! Her feet have come SO far in the seven months that I have had her, and the new hoof hasn't yet hit the ground, so there is still some hope left that she might grow a thicker sole once we reach that point. I'm not holding out for any miracles at this point though... standing like this for 16 years will do plenty of damage.
It explains why she is so willing to land heel-first for the most part, and can still be so ouchy on hard ground at the toe but doesn't take that typical ouchy-toe stance like you would see in a founder case. You would expect that a horse that is sore at the toe would not want to stand on her toes ALL the time, but she does. She's just built that way, unfortunately, and it creates a perpetual cycle of soreness every time the ground softens up and hardens quickly again after a good rain. Postural issues have a disturbing effect on the body's wellness and soundness, and as much as I'd like to think that so many of these things can be resolved through bodywork, some of them just can't, especially not after 16 years and body remodeling because of it.
This rehab is obviously going to continue to be exceedingly tricky.
Casting has worked exceptionally well in the past for her during these times of wet-try, but it has come to the point where I decided to just bite the bullet and get some boots for her. Despite my obvious barefoot loyalties, I really just don't like boots very much. They are bulky, they change breakover, they add weight to the foot and change the horse's stride length, they twist, they fall off, they break, they rotate. They are a right pain in the fanny. Despite all of that, I still want something that doesn't have to be worn 24/7, something that can be modified and changed should I want to alter something. Thus, enter the Renegades:
I took a chance with these seeing as P doesn't *quite* have the perfect hoof shape for them. They favor a completely picture-perfect hoof, and she obviously doesn't have that yet. I sized up a bit in order to accommodate for a pad, and made some modifications:
And here's the semi-finished product - it needed some more fine-tuning at this point, but you get the general idea:
After that, it was time for a test-drive! First clip is of her mincing over our somewhat hard and crunchy arena (it gets that way after the wet-dry cycle runs through), second clip is of the Renegades. Night and day.
They need more fine-tuning - the first test-drive was yesterday during a dressage school, and they both spun. Today I got some thinner pads - perhaps the Comfort Pads were too thick - and will try that tomorrow. I might also use a little Vetwrap ingenuity to see if I can create a better bond... we'll see.
On an unrelated note, I had the amazing experience of being able to see my favorite band live in concert last week, and it was heaven and a half. If you ever get to go see these guys, do it. You won't regret it. Most amazing show of my life.
Tomorrow, P swims and goes out on a small conditioning ride with the Renegades (to see how they'll stay with the new modifications), and then we road with the hounds on Saturday. We just found out that the opening meet is on Thanksgiving weekend, which isn't all that far away... time to get down to business!
I haven't blogged about Pangea in nearly a month. A MONTH! Mostly I've had little to write about, honestly - I've been working insanely long hours at my two full time jobs as well as trying desperately to keep up with full time school (yes, three full time things plus riding doesn't work out very well) - and I haven't been riding very much due to the heat and Pangea's inability to cope with it. She's been doing a lot better, thankfully, but she has struggled over the past few months to keep herself cool. Lots and lots of sweat and one sunbleached coat later, and we seem to be reaching the end of summer, sort of. As I write, it is currently overcast and 68 degrees. I know it will warm into the low 90's later today, but I'll take that as "cooling off." We're not supposed to reach into the 100's again in the foreseeable future, so I am hoping it won't happen again until next summer!
Most of what Pangea has done over the past month is nothing at all, save for going in the AquaTread once a week, a few dressage rides, and a few trail rides as well. She is still teetering on the edge of comfortable enough to be strongly rideable, and I have been debating whether or not to really pursue a foxhunting career with her. Is she going to stay comfortably sound enough to do it, or not? I figure I will keep trying to find her magic combination for the rest of the year, and then reevaluate. To be honest, if she isn't going to make a foxhunter, then she'll be semi-retired and become a happy trail pony and momma. I don't want to hear ONE NEGATIVE WORD from people about her being a momma. I've made the mistake of talking about breeding in the past, and I am not keen to get the same negative response. My horse, my money, my decision, end of story! ;)
Anyway, back to Pangea's comfort. As her issues have unfolded, I have realized they are far more complicated than I ever imagined. It isn't just that she had an old stifle injury that was unattended to, it was that her entire body has been compensating for years due to that and her feet. The soreness in her body made her stand in odd positions - camped under a lot in front, for instance - which in turn made her wear her sole thin at the toe and grow a long heel... which made her body sore. Her entire body developed a sway to the right, feet included. We have come a VERY long way in helping to improve her posture, but she is still very body sore and restricted. Two chiropractic adjustments have failed to help her, and dental work didn't improve anything either. (I thought the dentist was great but the chiro was not great... we'll be looking for a new one.) Regular trims and a balanced diet have done an awful lot of good for her feet, but she is going to need boots if we want to get any further on tougher terrain. Devil's Claw Plus and Cosequin ASU were very helpful, but not quite enough. She is currently going through a course of Acetyl-D, and if that isn't helpful enough, will do a course of Adequan as well. She had a massage yesterday for the first time, as I suspected it would do her a whole lot of good, and holy lord did she ever need it! She spent the entire time trying to bite me and kicking out violently at all the knots the massage therapist uncovered. As she's not a biter or a kicker, it speaks an awful lot about the level of pain she was feeling. (At least she wasn't trying to kick the massage therapist... she was just kicking out backwards to show how she really felt about the whole thing, instead of aiming for her!) She was stuck basically from head to tail, poor thing. It's all compensatory soreness... it's all just a big mess. She'll get another one next week, and we'll see how she feels then.
The saddest part about this whole ordeal is that had somebody bothered to properly treat her injury when it first happened, none of this would be happening now. Now, it is up to me to play clean-up crew, and it isn't pretty. Truthfully, she doesn't owe me anything, and if I can't get her to where she needs to be to be a consistent riding horse, then she'll be retired to broodie and trail duty. There isn't anything that she has to do for me in order to earn her keep. Just being who she is is enough for me.
A few of the things we've been up to this past month:
Also, systematically destroying flymasks. She is very good at that.
A few shreds at first...
... to the full Phantom of the Opera.
No more nice Cashel masks for you mare... this is the fourth one you have destroyed this summer!! She wore the one Gogo had for FIVE YEARS for three days and completely ruined it. She also blew through a Quiet Ride mask and now TWO more regular Cashel masks, one with ears and one without... fail! I hear Horseman's has super cheap masks with durable mesh... gonna have to check them out for sure.
Again, I am lax on my blogging. My blogging muse seems to be stuck in a perpetual coma I guess. I keep hoping that one of these days I will wake up and find myself inspired, but so far that hasn't been the case. Blogging just hasn't been the same for me after Gogo died. Also, I'm pretty sure that none of what I have to say is remotely interesting anymore. It doesn't make for a lot of collective motivation, unfortunately.
Miss Herself is back to work again, and feels basically exactly the same as she did before all of the massive workup that I did on her. This is a little bit disappointing, but I guess not altogether unexpected - she's been living this way for years and years now, so nothing is going to be magically fixed overnight. Whether or not it will ever seriously improve is hard to say, but she is getting along decently enough. In addition to the dental work and the BL Pellets, I also casted her all the way around for a little temporary help while we are experiencing this neverending wet-dry-wet-dry-wet-dry cycle.(Hopefully it is all over for the summer... bring on the um, drought?)
She loves the casts. The wet-dry cycles we were going through were wreaking havoc on her poor little thin soled feet, and I had to do something a little more drastic in order to break the cycle. It would pour, her feet would get soggy from the massive amounts of rain, and then would still be soft by the time the ground hardened up again (which is always within a day). She was right crippled on the sharp gravel driveway, and was starting to even be footsore in her pen. Since boots are not really designed for 24/7 usage (she needed them in her pen as well), I opted for temporary casts. In her casts, she can march up and down the gravel roads without issue, and clearly feels much better. The casts are not long-term, and will probably come off in another week or two. We'll reevaluate then to see what we have going on.
We're slowly going to up the workload and see how the handles it in preparation for fall and winter hunting. I don't really think she'll be up for first field (although you never know), but she'll make an excellent second field horse for sure. I spent yesterday morning getting to know the members of our local hunt, roading the hounds on foot and drinking entirely too many mimosas at their annual picnic. They were all very funny and welcoming and I certainly hope to make roading with them a regular summer occurrence... and hunting with them in the winter one as well!
And if you haven't heard yet.... check out Bay Girl's blog for some very exciting news!!
Contrary to the evidence, I am still actually alive! I've been a bit too swamped with life to be able to really sit down and write out a lengthy update, and now I am faced with the daunting task of playing catch-up with all the major highlights of the past week and a half. I used to be such a good blogger, bringing everyone along for every step of the journey... which is part of what made the Eventing-A-Gogo blog so popular. People always told me they really felt like they knew us... like they were really there for every step of the way. When I lost her, I lost that part of my motivation. I've never really been quite able to write in the same engaged kind of way. Maybe it will come back to me someday. I don't know.
Well, anyway. When we last left off, we were discussing Pangea's dental issues as well as her problems with thin soles and general overall stiffness. She'll be started on Adequan shortly (my ever-intelligent self of course asked the Canadian prepurchase vet for an Adequan script when she came down.... of course I then later realized the problems with filling an international prescription.... d'oh!), but in the meantime I've added BL Pellets to her daily ration to see if a little Devil's Claw helps her out. I've seen this product really help some creaky old farts to get around better, so we'll see if it has an effect on her.
In terms of her feet, boots are still probably my best bet in the long run, but I am still carefully weighing my options here and there isn't one perfect solution or easy choice to make. Despite being a trimmer, I've just never been *that* into boots, even though they of course have their important places in sport and rehab. We'll come up with a solution of some sort for the long term, but as a temporary measure, I do have this to back me up:
Casting material! It's a very good temporary and short-term way to help give her a little bit of sole protection without compromising on vertical flexion. I had no intention of leaving this cast on for any particular length of time, so all I did was use half of the roll of cast on one foot and half on the other. My main goal? Temporary protection on a rocky trail ride! (Which actually didn't have all that many rocks on it after all.... go figure!)
We made a very triumphant return to Benbrook Lake last weekend. I was a bit worried about the terrain, given that last time it got a little bit intense, but I didn't have anything to worry about. There were actually big, wide mowed paths throughout the majority of the trailways... can you say gallop tracks? Also, have you noticed that pretty much everyone we go when we are on Trailventures, we can see the city of Fort Worth? See if you can spot it in the pictures!
The last time we were at Benbrook Lake, things were a little heated on her end. She spent most of the ride jigging and hot, ending up completely drenched in lathery sweat despite it being cool and nice outside. During this ride, despite it being nearly 100 degrees (what was I thinking!?), she finished the ride nearly dry, without hardly a moment's worth of freshness or attitude. She actually sauntered - sauntered people! - on the buckle for the entire 2 hour ride. Deer crashing through the woods, Memorial Day partiers screaming and blasting music, roaring motorboats, hikers.... nothing bothered her. Who is this animal and what did she do with my Pangea!?
Look at that, clean and dry! She is really becoming a solid citizen... no more pawing, pulling back, jigging, stressing or snarky attitude! She stands immobile when tied for as long as she is tied for, doesn't jig, doesn't give me the 'tude, and comes to be caught when she sees me with a halter. Hooray progress!
The casts did their job perfectly, and are already back off. She actually seems more comfortable on rocks after her brief stint in casts, which is strange considering the fact that her feet are soft from all the recent rain/deathstorms, and her soles are still as thin as ever. Her heels have come WAY WAY down all on their own, so perhaps her feet are just finally starting to sort themselves out a little bit. She still has a very long way to go.
It is late, but there is more to write about.... namely a visit from the DENTIST! Stay tuned!
How can you tell if your horse needs some dental work? Well, I can give you some good pointers:
1) You refer to her as Ol' Ironmouth when doing your dressage work (i.e. she hangs on the bridle, she has difficulty maintaining bend)
2) Giant asymmetrical temporalis muscles on her forehead, indicating that she tends to chew more up and down as opposed to properly chewing side to side:
3) Oh, and this:
Chalk that one up as a big DUH for me. I've peeked in there before, and I KNOW how important dental work is to the entire biomechanical machine that is the horse, but I also weighted the prepurchase vet's opinion on this ("no abnormal findings") as one of those "well, I should get that done soon" things, but not as one of paramount importance. Of course, it occurred to me that I should probably check again when going over my checklist of reasons-why-your-horse-might-be-hanging-on-you, and was relatively alarmed by what I found. Well of COURSE she's hanging on the bridle, wouldn't you too? To go along with those honking temporalis muscles and those daggers on her third incisors, her incisors don't quite line up evenly when you look at them from the front - which means we have a probable TMJ issue going on. They're actually pretty common, but they suck to correct. The dental specialist is already scheduled to come out the morning of the 29th, so hopefully we can get this straightened out, quite literally!
In other extremely related news, here's some video of Pangea and I schooling dressage yesterday!
Thank you Future Hubs for being nice enough to let me drag him out to the barn to take some video for me even though it was 90 degrees outside. Thankfully, Pangea is adjusting well to the increase in temperature, and is getting fitter and fitter as time goes on.
You can see what I mean about the hangy-ness. She's not always hanging, but she likes to break at the 3rd vertebrae and bear down on my hands, which effectively disengages her hind end and lets it trail out a mile behind her. Those are the moments when I feel that I don't have the left hind under my control anymore. I think it's a rather complicated number of small things adding up: hocks, teeth, front feet.
First problem: Her feet are still mid-transition, and while they are a WORLD better than they were, they are still far from perfect and not only are her soles still far too thin at the toe, but the back of her foot still has beefing up to do. That, of course, negatively effects her on anything but good soft footing. You know what that means.... it's time for some boots and pads!
Second problem: Teeth issues. We'll have a better idea of what exactly is going on when the dentist looks at her. When her teeth are uncomfortable, she bears down on the bit and hangs, which lets her hind end drag out behind her. Which leads us to...
Third problem: Hocks/stifles. This is where everything adds up to create the big picture. If her hocks and stifles, which have some arthritic issues, are bothering her in any way, then she naturally won't want to push from behind, and will hang in the bridle in an effort to disengage herself. If she is pounding away on her front end because her hind end hurts, then it will make her front feet increasingly sore. If her front feet bother her and she weights her back end in an effort to lighten the load up front, it can make her hocks and stifles sore.
All of these things need assessment. Her teeth will be checked by the specialist, boots and pads will be ordered, and we'll be discussing a plan for joint care with my vet. I decided to start conservatively with the joints, like I always do, and have had her on Cosequin ASU from the get-go. She of course needs Adequan additional to this, which is the next step from here on out, but I wanted to see how much the Cosequin would help her by itself (and it did, quite a bit). If all else fails and teeth/boots/chiro/bodywork/joint supplements still aren't giving her what she needs, we'll probably be looking at injections. Sure, she looks pretty ok in this dressage video, but she starts out feeling like garbage and with a total flat tire on the left hind. If you look for it, you can see it in the video too, although greatly diminished.
She is getting on in age, after all.... 16 years old, if you can believe that. (I would never call a 16 year old horse OLD, but she is aging, albeit rather gracefully!) I had to check her papers just now to see when her birthday was, and it was on May 15th... dangit I missed it! I'll have to make that one up to her!
(This is partially crossposted to the Bay Girl blog! Sorry for the overlap!) Sorry for my brief absence - I've been out of state at a practicum for a few days and have been insanely busy in the meantime! I didn't even have time to say I was leaving! I made it back all in one piece thankfully, armed with ever-increasing knowledge and a desire to get under even more horses. (I'm glad you all are horse people, because upon reading that sentence for a second time, it could be taken horribly the wrong way.)
The one thing I never even got a chance to mention before I headed frantically off for my journey was Quincy's day. May 3rd marked the 8-year anniversary of his death, and at this point it seems like such a sad, distant memory. He's been gone for so long... sometimes it feels like just yesterday, sometimes it feels like an eternity. Take a little time to go and honor his memory, if you like reading about Pangea, Gogo, and Bay Girl. I wouldn't be here without his love, and neither would any of them.
I miss you, Fuzzman. Every day, and I always will.
In other news, I can't tell you how remarkable the changes in Pangea's feet have been over the past three months. Can you believe these are the same hind feet?
They still have a long way to go, but compared to where they came from? Holy moley.
Looking so much better though. SO much better.
Here's an interesting comparison of her LF, from two months ago (on the left) to today (on the right). The older picture has Keratex on it, which is why it is shiny, and the one on the right is fresh after a trim. Again, I don't normally dress outer wall like this (if you notice, I didn't do it on the hinds), but she is still fighting some low-grade fungal infection in the little cracks on the lower part of her foot. This is nearly grown out (and nearly fought off with topical treatment) so I doubt I'll do it again.
The two pictures aren't taken at quite the same angle, but you can tell that the distal descent happening in the first has been for the most part reversed and the entire hoof capsule has shortened. The flare has tightened, and if you notice, the toe crack is neatly growing out without issue. This foot is pathetically dry however - you can see it in her periople - and needs soaking. Lots of soaking.
Now here is the most interesting picture, and I'm sure there are many barefoot folks (AANHCP people and Strasser-type people) who are just going to die when they see the monster heel on this mare in the second shot.
Obviously, the more recent picture is the one on the right. It's a misleading angle to take a picture at, because it looks like her heel is even longer than her toe (it's not!), but it's very interesting to see what is happening here. In the first picture, three months ago, she was hobbling footsore on rocks, her heel squashed and pathetic behind that super long toe. The back of her foot had absolutely no support, and her frog and sore were being regularly pared away by her old farrier. Her entire hoof capsure was pulled forward and was full of flare and a neverending stream of subclinically laminitic rings. It was not a happy foot.
Three months later, and that toe has backed itself up without much assistance on my part. The platform in the back of her foot has strengthened so much that I can hardly believe it, but in the process it has taken letting her have that length of heel to keep her comfortable and landing heel-first. I tried to take it a smidge lower last time I trimmed her, and she let me know immediately that this was not okay - she couldn't walk on gravel to save her life. I let her have the little bit that she was asking for this time, and was rewarded with a comfortable, happy stride over gravel following her trim. Maybe it isn't within natural parameters right now, but if I took it away from her again, she'd land toe-first and bruise those still too-thin soles. When she lands heel-first, she will build up the back of her foot, and when she no longer needs this length of heel to protect her inner structures, she'll let it go. It's a lot more complicated than that, with measurements of collateral grooves and all, but if I go into that here I am liable to confuse people. If you're interested in how I gauge where to place heel height, let me know!
Video stills taken from today post-trim:
That is what we're going for, right there. That is what will heal these feet. That is exactly, exactly what she needs.
I have plenty to write about, as usual, but again as usual I have been completely overwhelmingly swamped with life, working full time as well as managing an ever-growing small business AND doing schoolwork, riding Pangea, and trying to squeeze in a little time with poor neglected Future Hubs as well. Literally I am nonstop on the go from the second I wake up until the second I pass out, more than I think I ever have been. It's actually a bit of a blessing to not have a horse that I am gearing for competition right now, simply because there is absolutely no possible way I would ever be able to find enough time to do it - much less have the time on weekends (my prime trimming time) to actually ever GO to a show. Someday when I am only working ONE job... then maybe I will have time for blogging. As it is, I am pretty sure I am behind on absolutely everything that I have to do anyway.
So this post is quick, just a little update on Pangea's yecky little feet. She came to me with a history of being shod for years, feet hacked apart, bruised and sad and thin soled and weak. I was told, just as I was told with Gogo when I bought her, that her feet were terrible and would have to be therapeutically shod for all of eternity. Well, we all know how well that went over with Gogo! Pangea's feet, while still very poor, have shown remarkable rapid improvement inbetween trim times, but it wasn't until I put comparison photos side by side that I really got a good look at how much better she is doing already.
Today's lesson in managing the barefoot horse: don't cut away good healthy frog material! The picture on the left is Pangea's left foot before her first trim done by me, clearly showing where someone took a hoof knife and pared away loads of material. The entire back of her foot looks shrunken and small. On the right you'll see the foot just a mere 4 weeks later, again before I trimmed her. LOOK at the difference in that frog! All I did was not touch it and ride her regularly on differing terrain. She's not particularly comfortable on gravel but everywhere she lands, she lands heel first on this foot. (The other front foot lands about 90% of the time heel first and the frog is taking a longer time to develop.)
Awesome. More on our most recent Mr. Toad's Wild Ride trail adventure soon!
Since Pangea has been here for nearly a week now, and has settled in so very nicely, I thought it would be prudent to toss her in the roundpen to see how she was moving. A creaky teenaged mare who is on absolutely no joint maintenance and who just tumbled off a four day trailer ride to a strange and alien planet (let's face is, sometimes Texas is really that strange)? I expected her to be a bit stiff and creaky starting out, at least until her joint supplements start to kick in. Instead, I had this on my hands:
For comparison, here's a video of Gogo taken last July when she was looking really quite sound all things considered:
How about that. Given how well she has settled in, how good she seems to be feeling, and how well she looks, I decided that I just couldn't wait another week... I had to get on her!
She was really quite good! Our indoor is a Cover-All, which is great for late nights or inclement weather days but also very noisy in a strong wind. And our area is known for, erm... rather fierce winds. As in, don't-bother-doing-your-hair, cover-your-mouth, you-might-want-to-wear-long-sleeves kind of winds. We had some of that going on today, which made for quite a lot of scary rattley ghoul noises coming from the doors of the arena.
Aside from trying to offer a trot a few times, and walking a bit faster and sideways the first few times past the door, she was fine. (As a comparison, here's Gogo's reaction to a rattly door monster. Never a dull moment.)
We walked for 1/2 an hour, and called it a day. Half of it was spent on a long rein (or well, as long as I could give her considering her freshness and spookiness to begin with), and the rest was spent in varying forms of on the bit. Her inclination, like her father's, is to break over at the third vertebrae when she gets tired, so I was careful to switch it up and give her lots of stretchy breaks. After all, the last time she's done legitimate dressage work was probably about 6 years ago. Gotta cut her at least a little slack! Our arena footing is also deeper than I'd like right now (dang barrel racers...), so I don't want to wear her out.
I plan on treating her reconditioning like more of a rehab than anything else. We'll walk for a month, trot for a month, canter for a month, and then see where we are. To begin with, I'll sit on her three or four days a week, and put her in the AquaTread one or two times a week. She needs to be in relatively steady work, but not more than five days a week. We'll sort out a schedule where we switch it up between doing dressage-y walk work, walk work over poles, and walk work up and down hills, all geared towards strengthening her topline and hind end, and creating lateral flexibility. We'll also walk - and possibly trot - in the AquaTread.
I also got around to doing those nasty awful feet of hers... ugh they looked so gross!
Yeck. Lots of flare on both fronts, moderate concavity, frogs that have clearly been pared away at her last trimming (which was less than 4 weeks ago!), and all four feet have some level of extra sole growth extending all the way around the frog. Her foot needs that right now... it would be detrimental to take it away. This is a foot that has been routinely pared away as per regular pasture trims, and it is throwing down any bit of support that it can in order to keep itself functional. It would do harm to remove this right now. Some trimmers like to take away the 'lumps and bumps' on a transitioning horse's sole, claiming that it causes pressure points. I haven't found this to be so. In fact, all I've found is that you might be taking away crucial support that the horse has worked hard to lay down for itself, and it will probably come right back - as is the case with this ridge of sole, which I see often on transitioning feet. This will go away by itself as soon as her sole is strong and healthy enough to support itself through the regular callusing process. It just has not been given the chance to do so up until now.
(LF trimmed, RF not yet trimmed, showing flare and cracking.)
These feet also show signs of a major nutritional issue. Notice all the little rings and cracks? Not only has it been plagued with a superficial fungal infection, but it has been in the throes of subclinical laminitis for probably a very long time. Not enough to cause a full on laminitic attack, and not enough to cause lameness (though I quite imagine she was probably often sore after trims), but the writing is on the wall. How many feet do you see with lots of little rings and marks on them like this? Chances are, you either see it very often, or you never see it at all, depending on your horse's nutrition and your farrier! Most farriers will heavily rasp the outer wall of the foot in order to remove these (often seen as superficial, instead of the warning sign that they really are!), so owners never notice that they are there until the foot shows up with a problem. If your horse's feet look this like, you are in need of a major dietary and lifestyle overhaul.
I can't wait to see what kind of a foot she grows in with her dietary chance and differing hoof care. Chances are this foot will tighten up, get quite a lot shorter, and stop producing rings. (Or at least it will if I am somewhat worth my salt!)
That's about all that could be done for today. I was conservative in the back of her foot, seeing as I found big angry bruises on her heels on BOTH hinds (!!), but she seemed perfectly comfortable and happy afterwards, walking solidly heel first over the gravel driveway without any issue. I normally don't dress the outer wall like this, but she had small fungal infection in the form of lots of thin little superficial cracks, so I got rid of those. Quite a lot of cracking remains, but it is all superficial. Many of the rings still remain as well, and that's fine - they will grow out in due time. I saw no need to take off excess hoof wall in order to make them 'prettier'. She still has some flaring issues, but that will go away in time with some diligence. The most important thing is that she is landing balanced and is comfortable on all surfaces. That's all I really care about right now!
She's enjoying sampling all this delicious green stuff too, that's for sure.... bet she hasn't seen green grass in a looooong time!
I also wanted to mention that I'll explain later on why I called her Pangea instead of Pangaea, simply because so many people were asking about it. I have my reasons... you'll find out soon! ;)
