New girl Ruby arrived yesterday all the way from Scotland. She couldn't be more different in appearance to our first rehab Ruby (a coloured cob who was here last year) and we are continuing the chestnut TB theme which was started by Felix at the weekend.
As you can see, she has been out of shoes some time (since October last year) and there is lots to like about her feet but she is landing flat/toe first in front and that's something we need to help her sort out. She has some issues with medio-lateral balance which have been confirmed on x-ray and MRI with corresponding collateral ligament damage and damage to the coffin joint.
Remedial farriery didn't improve her and though she did become sounder out of shoes her lameness recurred earlier this year and she has been recently assessed as variably 2/10 lame bilaterally.
From this angle its clear her palmar hoof isn't perhaps as robust as it needs to be and that's, as always, where we will be looking for the biggest changes.
As with the LF, an asymmetry which usually points to a medio-lateral imbalance - in both feet its the medial aspect which is weaker, as is often the case.
A slightly long toe and again a weak digital cushion but then again I've seen an awful lot worse, so here's hoping the second Ruby does as well as the first. There will be more on her soon.
2 comments:
My boys feet look quite similiar to this, I will be watching with interest!
I'm fairly new to your blog, but I plan to start following more regularly to see what I can learn. My horse has decent feet, but there's definitely room for improvement. I had planned to start teaching myself to trim this summer, until I was thrown and broke my collarbone a couple weeks ago. Now those plans have sadly been delayed, but I still want to learn eventually so that I can help him get the feet he deserves. Bright side I guess: since I can't actually DO anything right now, it's making me take even more time to research and observe and learn more that way over time.
Looking forward to seeing how you handle Ruby and others!
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