Bare Remedy Equine Podiatry

03/08/2024

Lovely hard working pony hoof 🤩

24/07/2024

Some progress on these little hooves since April, nicked out the last tiny slither of wall separation that had apparently been there for around four years. A combo of trimming, exercise and thrush treatment.

Still progress to be made on getting the foot more under the leg and build some more palmar structure (but is harder in these tiny feet) but good so far!

09/06/2024

Just over a year later and I'm pleased with the progress of these tricky feet. The client has done a great job helping her horse lose weight, in hand walking and now ridden work. He's always been sensitive on his soles, often slightly retracted, but with boots and persistence he's doing much better.

What I'm looking at-
-Straightened hairline meaning improved palmer foot function and structure
-Foot more under the bony column
-Not having to trim so much toe and leave as big pillars at 10+2

There are a couple of other improvements, can you spot them?

29/05/2024

Now is the time to be particularly careful about watching for inflammation in your horses. If it looks like there isn't that much grass out in your fields it's because it's in your horses bellies.
My own horses are on a minimal grass track which looks practically bare and yet they are choosing to graze over free access hay and straw.
Inflammation doesn't only mean laminitis it can mean colic and abscesses. No horse is immune to inflammation. If your horse is showing footiness, reluctance to turn, heat at the coronet or raised pulses, lethargy etc then put on laminitis protocols straight away

27/05/2024

When a foot is interesting, take a picture of it!

22/04/2024

Positive changes for this front foot, came out of shoes two years ago now

31/03/2024

14/02/2024

All right, y’all, I’m going to vent a bit.

I’ve seen plenty of posts on social media of lame horses and owners asking for help with rehab. Unfortunately, hoof issues are a bit of a pandemic, but fortunately - through attention and research- we are learning so much more about the foot and ways to keep it healthy and give it a fighting chance at soundness.

So this morning, when I scrolled across some radiographs of a laminitic horse- where the before and after didn’t seem much better to me- I stopped to read the post.

The horse had been sore for quite some time and nothing seemed to help, so they tried bigger and bigger interventions to the feet, until finally they found an extensive shoeing package that allowed the horse to amble around a bit more comfortably.

My first thought was- wow, that seems really extreme, but I’m glad they found something to make the horse a bit more comfy.

My second thought was- I wonder why this horse needed such extreme measures to improve.

That question was answered pretty quickly when I saw an image of said horse out in a large green pasture of fresh grass.

Up to 90% of laminitis is endocrinopathic. Meaning up to 90% of laminitic cases should not be on grass. Meaning up to 90% of laminitic horses will continue to founder and their laminae will continue to fail until their diet and metabolic issues are addressed.

And we can do all we want to their feet- and some things may help, and some won’t, and some may work for a time until the horse can’t compensate anymore- but ultimately NOTHING will stop the laminae breakdown until the root cause is addressed.

I see so many turn to bigger and bigger interventions, more drastic approaches, when the root cause isn’t even addressed. And don’t get me started on the fact that half of these posts I see are trying to sell a product for these horses.. without even addressing the cause of the issue. Let’s sell a bandaid to people desperately trying to save their horse.

I’m trying not to become too preachy over here, but to be honest just sitting here typing this I’m getting a bit worked up.

Because when we focus on the feet in isolation, we are missing the forest for the trees.

Hooves are attached to an animal and the hoof reveals the health of that animal -in laminitis cases especially.

Doing things to the feet may (at least temporarily) help with comfort, but it will not stop the internal damage until we remove the trigger for the laminitis.

And maybe, if we got to the trigger first and removed it right away, we wouldn’t even need those interventions at all.

Now I’m not naive to believe that every single laminitis case is this straightforward. In fact, I absolutely know they aren’t. There are some where a toxin leads to SIRS laminitis and those feet almost melt apart. Supporting limb laminitis can feel like a car crash you don’t know how to stop. And some metabolic cases can be so tightly managed and still have refractory high insulin.. or we increase pergolide just a few weeks too late for the seasonal rise and those horses just crash and then we are chasing ACTH levels.

There are some who need every single tool in the toolbox and some who we just can’t make comfortable.

But at the very least, we need to start with the basics. ECIR emergency diet. Looking for the root cause. Removing as many triggers as we can think of. AND work on getting the horse comfortable.

But don’t just look at the feet and forget the horse and their living situation.

/rant. (And apologies for the drama).

11/01/2024

White feet are not weaker, but they do tell you a lot more. The white horn allows serum leakage and bruising to be visible in the outer wall. Any wall defects you see like this have grown down from the horns origin at the coronet band. People often don't notice bruises until they are further down and trimming reveals them, and then think they are new, when they are then often nearly a year old at that point.
This shows three different stages of damage to the coronet. The first is blood serum leakage from inflammation due to low grade Laminitis. The second and third are two hind feet on the same horse, showing heavy lateral loading, over pressurising the coronet band.
I have written points I'm thinking about when I see these. Remember, it's likely still there in the dark pigmented feet, you just can't see it

10/01/2024

04/01/2024

Some progress left to right on a hind foot on an 18hh Knabstrupper, he's a bit stiff but some bodywork really helped and seeing improvement in heel and flare angles 🥰

11/12/2023

Lovely progress from shoe removal 4 weeks ago to today. Lots of changes to make, mostly in angles to help hind end comfort

08/12/2023

My work mobile unfortunately went for a swim, if you need me over the weekend I'm contactable via email or FB

26/11/2023

'There's a lot of noise about laminitis on facebook at the moment. If you want to learn about laminitis and get a really useful Christmas present at the same time, you could do worse than buy this book from colleague and mentor Dr Richard Vialls.'

Laminitis, a horse-centred approach describes in depth the current mainstream thinking on laminitis and suggests ways of reframing our understanding of this challenging condition. New thinking based on putting the horse at the centre of the problem is presented, allowing a better understanding of...

14/11/2023

I had such an amazing time at Equine Affaire MA, and met thousands (yes, literally thousands!) of awesome horse owners wanting to chat about hooves, track systems, pathologies and lameness, and even possible podcast guests. To all of you I was able to meet- thanks for stopping by! I enjoyed talking to each and every one of you; it’s always so fun to meet more hoof geeks ☺️

There was one thing I noticed, that irked me a little, when talking to some dealing with lameness issues, and I’ve been mulling on it a few days thinking about whether to write a post on it. Well here we are.

As people would come up to browse at the Doppelhoof or a cadaver limb or Paige Poss’ anatomy books, Vova or I would ask if they’re dealing with hoof issues. Most would say yes, some would say no. But some would say, “no, I’m dealing with farrier issues.”

When expanding on that comment, there seemed to be a lot of people convinced that 100% of their horse’s issues were due to the farrier’s [trim, shoe job, etc].

Now let’s get this out of the way - are there uneducated hoofcare pros out there? Sure. Are there people who need to do more continuing education and learn more latest research? Of course. Are there newer hoofcare pros who need more time and practice to hone their skill? Always.

Looking at pictures of my own trims from 8 years ago and I shake my head.

But for every comment made about “this farrier just ruined my lame horse’s feet,” I can only imagine the other side of the story… the hoofcare pro saying, “I tried for months with every tool in my toolbox to get this horse sound and we just couldn’t figure him out…” or “Even just a super conservative trim had this horse walking off sore,” or “the feet didn’t respond in any way they were supposed to when we did [XYZ].” Or even “that horse had a metabolic related founder that wasn’t being controlled and nothing I did could get the feet in line.”

There is not one person who wakes up in the morning and sets out to “ruin feet” or lame horses. We all set out to do the best job we can with the knowledge we have at the time. Most of us got into this profession because of a lame horse or a desire to help other horses, and there will always be a time that we come to a horse that doesn’t fit the textbook.

Now sometimes is that knowledge insufficient? Sure. Sometimes does a horse need someone with a different set of skills or experience? Of course. That’s true across the board. We all have our comfort zone and strengths and weaknesses. Some are more comfortable with certain disciplines of performances horses. Some thrive working on founder and laminitic cases. Others love navicular puzzles. Some are just happy doing maintenance work and keeping horses sound that way.

Not to mention that sometimes, it’s not anything the farrier is doing or not doing that is causing issue. A metabolic problem or incorrect diet can cause excessive toe growth. A founder/rotation case most often grows a ridiculous amount of heel. Foundered minis can grow literal Coke can stilts.

All of those issues are controlled with proper diagnosis, diet and management, but can sure make a hoofcare provider look silly when that management isn’t in place.

Now, I’m not trying to let hoofcare pros off the hook and I’m not trying to throw owners under the bus.

I just would love owners to open a dialogue with their hoofcare pro about what they see, but also be willing to listen if that pro is thinking there is something else going on.

The amount of pictures I saw this weekend where an issue like a long toe or high heel was blamed on a farrier but the pictures strongly suggested rotation, or metabolic issues, with chronic event lines, flare, and deviation from growth at the coronary band is just one example.

Now owners- this doesn’t invalidate your experience with your hoofcare pro. You should work with someone you are comfortable with (and believe me when I say, we only want to work with people who trust us and are comfortable with us. It limits our compassion fatigue and burn out and makes our job much more enjoyable!).

But just remember that we all have the same common goal. We want to help horses. We want to see our horses sound and comfortable. If you come at conversations that way, it will go better than the “blaming” route.

09/11/2023

Seaweed for horses, is it good, is it safe, is it worth it?

There has been much debate about the potential benefits to be gained from feeding seaweed to horses. On one side, we have seaweed being reported as a multifunctional supplement that will act as an anthelmintic, antacid, immuno-stimulator, anti-inflammatory, anti-cancer, anti-bacterial, anti-ulcer, h...

04/11/2023

It seems to be the week for abscesses! This prolonged wet and warm is doing our horses no good, with more mud fever and rainscald around too

-If you can each day give your horses an hour or so on somewhere dry to stand
-Think about delaying the move to your winter turnout, the grass is still too rich for this time of year
-get on top of any wall separation with your thrush treatments to prevent them deepening
-watch your horses move each day (ideally on a hard surface) to check for soundness

You can always get in touch if you're worried 🥰

31/10/2023

A Laminitis Journey
Initial acute attack spring 23, this is July-October with the feet starting to show the damage by being oversized, likely sinker but we have worked without radiography.
The soles were fascinating in this case, at one point the whole sole had a cavern behind revealing layers of wormy looking repair horn underneath. We are nearly there now and just have to keep growing out the laminar wedge.
Through the July-October period the horse has been sound and moving well. In acute cases once the negative stimulus is removed they can recover quickly

29/10/2023

Great day up at BFBA for the Equine Podiatry Association.
Loads of really positive conversation about what we do and who we are 😍

17/10/2023

We have been dealing with laminitis with this PRE, which is making good progress, then yesterday I noticed how much better his palmar structures are looking. For an older horse who's had contracted heels for a long time, progress is slow, but it's getting there. He's never going to have huge squishy frogs and digital cushions, but he can certainly be more functional, protecting his navicular region.

13/10/2023

Come say hi! I will be on the stand on Sunday with some amazing colleagues

Looking forward to seeing The Equine Podiatry Association at Focus this year.

17/08/2023

This lovely boy is off to a new home, for a retired dressage thoroughbred who had been shod most of his life, his feet are progressing well. His new life may bring around shoes again, but his feet have had some time to build soft tissues to have a healthier future

09/08/2023

Lovely functional foot of a 28 year old pony off to do some 90cm eventing 🤩

10/06/2023

Clubbed feet are relatively rare, and these ones are likely due to the horse having a lack of movement.
We have lots still to do with these, especially as we have to move slow to not overstress the tendons, but this young horse should have relatively normal feet in a few trims

10/06/2023

3 weeks between shoe removal and bottom RH picture

The ground is hard at the moment, the grass is rich at the moment. And now it's raining! If your horse is going to show inflammation, it's in these next few days. Check digital pulses if you can, I can always explain how. Reduce grass intake if they become unsure about surfaces they are usually fine on

05/06/2023

Lovely Delilah will be looking for a new 🏡 soon, such a sweet girl who could excell in everything from higher level dressage to happy hacking ❤️

01/06/2023

https://chronicprogressivelymphoedema.com/

Information on Chronic Progressive Lymphoedema (CPL) / Lymphedema, feather mites and associated conditions

20/05/2023

Now is not the time to be making any changes in your horse's environment. I would reduce any strip grazing, keep everything as stable as you can.
I'm seeing so many horses that wouldn't usually show signs of laminitis becoming uncomfortable inflamed.
Watch for increased crestyness, puffy sheaths, puffy above the eye, looking stiff to move etc and reduce grass intake instantly!