Tuesday, 18 December 2012
Its all about how the feet land
New boy Remi arrived at the weekend. As always, I'd heard a lot about Remi from his owner and his vet but its only when you finally see the horse in front of you and watch him move that you get the real picture of what is happening with his hooves.
Despite the internet being sloth-like, I've managed to get his footage up, so here it is - let me know what jumps out at you!
Toe and outside of the foot first, and toe out. Base narrow, pigeon toed?
ReplyDeleteMaybe should take rug off to walk up - then you don't have any interference from the chest piece?
He looks lovely. What a patient face. Assistant has a good heel first landing though.
Dead right, Bruce ;-) Think you have a good point about the rug - those Premier Equine ones are cut so low they are more like a long dress!
ReplyDeletePoor chap must really feel that on his knees.
ReplyDeleteyes, a bit base narrow but not very alarming at all. If one inspects the asymmetry in the feet of wild horses, many are slightly base narrow. Gene Ovnicek explains it well, I think:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_W8Uphj3pEE
Not sure I like how far the hock extends past the seat bone either. Is this a case where you would try to raise the heels in the hind limbs?
ReplyDeleteI agree, MHB, insofar as base narrow wouldn't worry me if he was landing properly.
ReplyDeleteGinelle, well spotted, as he has hind limb issues too. Currently its hard to tell what is cause and what is effect so we will focus on getting a better loading and landing in front and then see where we are with his hinds. They are already landing much better than the fronts, of course.
can we get hoof pictures?? My expectation would be that this horse is going to shorten its lateral sides and then land flat. Is this what you think too, Nic Barker?
ReplyDeleteI've got hoof pics but won't put them up till I've got others to compare to - probably after Christmas.
ReplyDeleteYes, I think he will improve his landing but I suspect that rather than shorten his lateral side he will grow a medial deviation - this seems to be the commonest way horses re-balance. Time will tell :-)
Probably needs to open out at the elbows a bit too and relax through the shoulders. Would be another interesting one to see a chest shot.
ReplyDeleteThis is going to be interesting for me because Ace has a similar action in front. The knee comes out and the foot sweeps in. Like Ace, he also brings one foot more central to his body and loads laterally -same leg too!
ReplyDeleteFirst of all Ace developed a completely windswept foot, in order to land flat medio-laterally. Then in order to stop the windsweeping from getting any bigger, he grew a brace on the outside edge of the toe. It has taken all my nerve to leave him alone and watch these changes happen over two years. I can't look at his feet without wincing - I just itch to get a rasp on those long toes, but he definitely walks better with them than without them.
Ace also arrived with bullnose hinds and probable negative pedal bone rotation, requiring a heel rebuild to correct itself. That took months as well.
I'll be waiting for updates!
C