The first is what Encore got, the second is what the credit card got, and the third is what my head did.
Hold on, back up....what?
Oh yes, my theory holds. And by that I mean my theory is that if you have one horse, you will just have a lame horse and no spare; if you have two horses, you will just have two lame horses and no spare; three horses, yep, three lame horses and no spare...you get the picture.
I've been noticing that Encore has a bit of a bobble on his left front at the trot. Not always, but I can see it and I can feel it, especially on the longe. Well, he's an underweight, undermuscled, crooked ex-racehorse with bare feet in recovery who flexed clean so it was hard to say it was a true lameness. But last night, it was a definite, though slight limp (insert head explosion here) and I decided to take him to visit Dr. Bob (or rather Dr. Brian, the sidekick of the very busy Dr. Bob when you call last minute) this morning.
Of course, by the time I parked my truck in my driveway yesterday evening, I was already sure that he had ringbone and would either (a) never jump again or (b) snap off his leg and die. Cue Anxiety Girl.
We flexed again and we shot a couple radiographs and then we tucked Anxiety Girl back into her bed:
(1) Despite my diligent, yet sporadic application of Durasole, the sole on his left front was soft enough that you could see it flex beneath the pressure of Dr. Brian's fingers. Owie, so not comfortable. You're getting front shoes, my boy!
(2) I wanted a lateral view of each front ankle and foot anyway -- the rads are such a powerful tool for understanding what exactly you are dealing with mechanically. Both fronts were remarkably clean. There are a couple of osselets on the right front that are old and set and a small P1 bone spur on the left, also old and set, no problem. Otherwise, P1/P2/P3/navicular bone have clean joint spaces and nice edges, yay!
(3) I would never guess it from looking at his feet from the outside, but Encore has a TON of toe which needs to be lopped off. Said lopping will hopefully go along way towards correcting...
(4) P1/P2/P3 should line up on a nice straight axis. They don't -- each has its own angle in there (can we say cattywompus?!). The rear end of his coffin bone sits too high and things are jammed up. By slowly changing the hoof angle, we can realign this whole support structure to avoid problems in the future (cattywompus = bad).
All in all -- fixable. No ringbone, no legs snapping off. We will put our lovely farrier to work and hopefully go on about our business. And may farriers who don't pay attention to bone angles find their underpants invaded by fire ants -- no one likes to fix your messes!
Hold on, back up....what?
Oh yes, my theory holds. And by that I mean my theory is that if you have one horse, you will just have a lame horse and no spare; if you have two horses, you will just have two lame horses and no spare; three horses, yep, three lame horses and no spare...you get the picture.
I've been noticing that Encore has a bit of a bobble on his left front at the trot. Not always, but I can see it and I can feel it, especially on the longe. Well, he's an underweight, undermuscled, crooked ex-racehorse with bare feet in recovery who flexed clean so it was hard to say it was a true lameness. But last night, it was a definite, though slight limp (insert head explosion here) and I decided to take him to visit Dr. Bob (or rather Dr. Brian, the sidekick of the very busy Dr. Bob when you call last minute) this morning.
Of course, by the time I parked my truck in my driveway yesterday evening, I was already sure that he had ringbone and would either (a) never jump again or (b) snap off his leg and die. Cue Anxiety Girl.
We flexed again and we shot a couple radiographs and then we tucked Anxiety Girl back into her bed:
(1) Despite my diligent, yet sporadic application of Durasole, the sole on his left front was soft enough that you could see it flex beneath the pressure of Dr. Brian's fingers. Owie, so not comfortable. You're getting front shoes, my boy!
(2) I wanted a lateral view of each front ankle and foot anyway -- the rads are such a powerful tool for understanding what exactly you are dealing with mechanically. Both fronts were remarkably clean. There are a couple of osselets on the right front that are old and set and a small P1 bone spur on the left, also old and set, no problem. Otherwise, P1/P2/P3/navicular bone have clean joint spaces and nice edges, yay!
(3) I would never guess it from looking at his feet from the outside, but Encore has a TON of toe which needs to be lopped off. Said lopping will hopefully go along way towards correcting...
(4) P1/P2/P3 should line up on a nice straight axis. They don't -- each has its own angle in there (can we say cattywompus?!). The rear end of his coffin bone sits too high and things are jammed up. By slowly changing the hoof angle, we can realign this whole support structure to avoid problems in the future (cattywompus = bad).
All in all -- fixable. No ringbone, no legs snapping off. We will put our lovely farrier to work and hopefully go on about our business. And may farriers who don't pay attention to bone angles find their underpants invaded by fire ants -- no one likes to fix your messes!