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Redmare
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Posted: Mon Jan 30th, 2023 05:32 pm |
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| Hello Dr. Deb - any update on the images (or lack thereof!) issue? I just tried to post them again and previewed the post instead of posting it right off and it's still showing just the text and no image.
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DrDeb
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Posted: Mon Jan 30th, 2023 06:08 pm |
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HI, Redmare: Yes -- sorry -- still working on it. If you want me to see photos, I'd love to of course -- Email them to me as .jpg's to: office@equinestudies.org.
This will be our temporary workaround; problem turns out to be more complicated than anticipated. Thanks for your patience -- Dr. Deb
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Redmare
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Posted: Mon Jan 30th, 2023 06:11 pm |
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I figured I would go ahead and give the update/ask my questions sans the photos in the hopes that the photo posting issue is able to be resolved soon.
I am currently trying to determine how much of what discomfort I'm seeing in this gelding is due to his hind feet, versus some compensatory things I'm working to unwind in his pelvis.
I had rads done of the hind feet as I trim myself and needed to get a better idea of exactly where P3 was. I was suspicious that the horse may be NPA because of very (and I mean very) slight bullnosing in the RH. The LH's dorsal wall is straight. What I found on x-ray is that he's not a true NPA, BUT his coffin bones are basically more or less parallel to the ground. So he's not negative, but if he does have positive angle it's pretty minimal. He is slightly broken back at the pastern joint on the rads in both hinds.
This horse DOES land heel first behind, but when I bring him into an arena setting (or anywhere with softer footing - it's winter in Vermont and the ground is pretty hard packed with snow), it's obvious he's trying to get lift under his heels as he'll often stand very narrow behind with his toes into the footing so his heel is higher than his toe. This has become much more apparent since I started some bodywork to help release some fascial restrictions he had going on.
I know this horse has quite a bit of pelvic tension and instability, and the bodywork he's had done really removed a lot of his ways of compensating. I'm taking the winter to specifically help him develop his thoracic sling as while he's not deflated, he's horribly weak and forges with both hinds, the left moreso than the right. I'm doing everything "right" that I can think of and yet I'm seeing increased crankiness from him in just the basic work we're doing on the ground which makes me think he's more uncomfortable now that I'm really addressing the hind feet, drawing those heels back, etc. I am happy to post photos of the trim, the rads and his conformation shots when that capability is restored.
Edit: just saw your reply, Dr. Deb. I'll go ahead and email those photos on over to you. Thank you!Last edited on Mon Jan 30th, 2023 06:12 pm by Redmare
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DrDeb
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Posted: Mon Jan 30th, 2023 10:16 pm |
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Redmare, your bay horse is a fairly run-of-the-mill example of one that is both somewhat (not greatly) post-legged and also definitely cow-hocked.
A cow-hocked horse stands with the hocks closer together than the ankles, when viewed from behind. Visualize this as looking like the letter "A" vs. the letter "H", which would represent correct structure.
The XRays show that the horse is definitely, without question, negative-plane in the hind coffin bones. There is no such thing as a "true" vs. an "untrue" negative-plane; the animal either is, or is not negative plane. The variation is merely one of degree, and your horse is a good five degrees negative. Understand that the NORMAL orientation of the coffin bones, both before and behind, is somewhat downward-tilted; i.e., the toe of the coffin bone is supposed to be lower than the heels of the coffin bone, and the solar surface of the coffin bone is NOT supposed to be parallel to the external sole. Rather it should tilt toe-downwards about 4 degrees. So indeed this is why the horse stands with his toes stabbed into the ground; exactly as you say, he's looking to orient his coffin bones properly with respect to the ground.
He also, because he is cow-hocked and therefore somewhat splay-footed behind, shows medio-lateral asymmetry in the hind hoofs. How much of this is excessive is yet to be seen; a competent and experienced FARRIER would be able to guide you.
When the coffin bones are rotated in the negative direction, it pulls on the deep digital flexor tendon and this in turn compresses the navicular bursa and navicular bone, squashing the coffin joint and raising the fluid pressure inside the capsule. This causes caudal foot pain and will eventuate in the destruction of the navicular sesamoid and the coffin joint.
So yes, you had better do something as soon as possible to give this guy some relief: hind shoes with caulks, hind shoes with wedges, fitted boots with wedges, and appropriate trimming with raising the hind heels as your therapeutic goal.
As to "fascial" problems -- there is no such thing in the sense that you mean it. There is fascia all over the body which stabilizes the skin. If you want to see wierd fascia, go look at a Shar-Pei dog, which has been bred to have the fascial connections only occur in narrow bands; that's what causes the characteristic linear wrinkling. There are such things as adhesions, which usually involve fascia or related connective tissue; they can occur within tendon sheaths or in the area of a scar. These are abnormalities. But breaking NORMAL fascial connections is in general a bad idea. Practitioners who trade on this idea can be very convincing; they go AHA or TA DA so as to get you to agree with them and believe; but mainly, it's to get you to open your wallet.
Redirect your thinking this way: post-legged horses have relatively SHORT hind limbs, and therefore, must rely more on back flexibility, both lateral and in terms of coiling the loins, to perform with the hind limbs. Stiffness will show up in these animals as a shortened hind step and as somewhat of a reluctance to flex the stifle joints.
Anytime a horse shows increasing resentment to whatever things the human is doing with him, or trying to do, is a real good time to stop whatever is being done and reassess; and then do something different, do it more slowly, break it up into smaller segments. We already know that you have a tendency to "push" -- to go for too much too quickly -- so see if just backing off on your expectations is helpful.
Stop trying to "develop his thoracic sling". You cannot do this, and the idea itself is a mis-reading of what is in my books. The goal of training is to improve the horse's posture. What makes you say the this horse is "horribly weak"? The standing conformation shots you sent show that he has rather good posture, so be sure you're not trying to put legs on a snake as the Buddhists say (the snake gets along just fine without legs, in other words). And be sure also, again, that you're not just parroting the words of some bogus hoof trimmer or massage maven. LEARN TO SEE WHAT IS ACTUALLY THERE, not what you think OUGHT to be there or what someone else has said is there.
Proceed immediately to engaging the services of a competent, experienced farrier -- NOT a hoof trimmer, and stop trying to fix this horse's feet yourself. Or any horse's. Horse ownership entails some expenses, and it is far cheaper to pay for the services of a competent farrier and LET HIM OR HER DO THEIR WORK without you criticizing as if you knew better -- because, you don't. I'm not criticizing; I'm just saying -- these things are not in your wheelhouse.
I'm going to try (in the next post) to upload one of your photos, just to see if I can do it as "board administrator." -- Dr. Deb
Last edited on Mon Jan 30th, 2023 11:25 pm by DrDeb
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DrDeb
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Posted: Mon Jan 30th, 2023 11:11 pm |
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Testing to see if photo will post -- this is the best side conformation shot supplied by Redmare.
Attachment: Redmare Crossbred Cob C4M1 Side sm TEST.jpg (Downloaded 16 times) Last edited on Mon Jan 30th, 2023 11:19 pm by DrDeb
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DrDeb
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Posted: Mon Jan 30th, 2023 11:23 pm |
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AHA!!!! SUCCESS!!!!
So -- at least I as administrator can post photos. However, y'all as participants still may be able to post photos, but you have to obey the rules that govern the software:
SUPPORTED FORMATS: ONLY .jpg and .png
SIZE: Not over about 800 kb. The photo I just put up in the above post was 2" wide at 300 dpi, to give you a good idea.
So Redmare -- try another one of your images, size it and format it as above, and try posting it, and we will hope that was the whole problem. Cheers, and thanks to you & everyone for your patience. We're still trying this on to see if it fits, so to speak. -- Dr. Deb
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Redmare
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Posted: Tue Jan 31st, 2023 05:42 pm |
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Hi Dr. Deb - I'm feeling a bit frustrated, and I hope you can understand why.
I have spoken to two farriers - one of whom is a personal friend of mine and while not in my physical area, has been of great help to me in trimming my herd. The other is a farrier I've used in the past for shoeing and I value his opinion and expertise.
Farrier A, my friend, stated the gelding was NPA, but only quite mildly, based on the rads. She is also an equine osteopath, and suggested that the pelvis tension/compensations and/or the hind limb conformation are probably playing a significant roll in what I'm seeing.
Farrier B, who I just talked to this morning, looked at the rads and does not believe this horse is NPA. We talked pretty extensively about what his thoughts were on what to do with this gelding (as he'd probably be the one shoeing him), and the takeaways were:
- he felt the trim was appropriate and doing as much as can probably be done to move the hoof balance towards the ideal given the environment the horse lives in and his conformation
- he said he would not likely do a wedge or heel lift on this horse given the rads. He noted that the horse was a bit "short" through the foot. When I asked him to clarify, he said that he felt some of the discomfort/posture I was noticing was due to the lack of developed foot between the ground and the bony column. His ultimate recommendation was that we start with just a simple flat shoe and see how the horse responds as he thought just giving him some space between the foot and the ground might be of help to him.
I also recall asking the vet who took the rads, and she did not believe this horse was NPA...
I want to do what is right by the horse, and I believe what he's telling me...but it's hard to feel like I'm moving in the right direction when I'm getting conflicting information.
The practitioner I'm working with regarding is not working on breaking normal, healthy fascial lines. She's a structural integration practitioner (and actually very familiar with your work and referenced it a few times in our conversations). I do not believe her work or what I'm seeing change in the horse to be snake oil salesman-type work.
I recognize the limitations of talking through a BB, so perhaps I am not doing justice to what I am seeing: when I talk about this horse's thoracic sling, I am referencing largely two things: the fact that despite being built pretty darn well, this gelding is by a large unwilling to utilize the correct musculature to create lift in the front (he tends to want to use the brachiocephalicus to "hork" the front end in transitions, for example). The second is that he forges the hinds off the fronts pretty consistently, but I rarely hear it outside of the walk. This horse consistently overtracks, so there is no shortening of stride as you described might indicate discomfort.
The other thing that brought me to consider his thoracic sling is something Harry said to me: Harry wanted me to work on "the big walk" with this horse to help him find some swing in his ribcage. I know now that part of his struggles with this last year were due to gut ulcers, which has been taken care of, but the movements patterns I'm seeing are still there: i.e., big overtrack at the walk, overuse of the hamstrings and a tendency to get heavy on his front end in the walk. He can stride out, but he just gets bigger and swingier in the hind end.Last edited on Tue Jan 31st, 2023 05:47 pm by Redmare
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Redmare
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Posted: Tue Jan 31st, 2023 05:49 pm |
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| Trying to post this image, which has been resized per your guidelines. Attachment: Bae RH1 small.jpg (Downloaded 16 times)
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DrDeb
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Posted: Sat Feb 11th, 2023 04:40 am |
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Redmare, I sympathize with your frustration. Ask five experts, get five different answers.
The only resolution to this is for you to decide. I don't care what you decide, or whom you decide to follow or believe; but you should follow the evidence that the horse gives you and then decide. It is the owner's responsibility to make all the decisions, since there is no such thing as 'natural' horsemanship; there is only the relationship we can manage to build with our animals, and the decisions we make on their behalf. As we all know, every single thing that happens to domestic livestock, whether that livestock lives out on range or in a posh stable, is down to the decisions that we make on their behalf.
Note that when the horse elevates his hoof to put it on the rubber block for X-ray, the pastern angle drops. This makes is appear that he's not negative plane.
Use the field tests that I have published several times (they also appear in my new 3-volume work entitled "Horse Conformation: Principles of Form and Function" -- specifically, in Volume 3 pp. 308-311) -- for the purpose of determining whether the horse may be breaking over late. The field test shows when/how late breakover causes hyperextension of the coffin joint, which is painful to the horse and would certainly cause him to be grumpy. Late breakover is an excellent indication that the coffin bone is not (internally) in the correct or normal position.
The other thing I think you would be well advised to think about is what you're in this whole deal for, in any case. Is it to ride the horses or to fret over little things as an excuse to not ride but instead to nurse? Perfectionism is death, and it is one of the commonest forms that "fear of success" may take. Not that the owner isn't responsible for every little thing; we are responsible for everything there could possibly be. Nonetheless sometimes it's a question of doing what the horse is telling you to do (which in this case is to raise the heels a couple of degrees), and then get on with riding. You treat the wedges as an experiment, asking whether the horse seems to go better and/or has a happier attitude. If they don't work, or if they make it worse, you can take them off. What you are probing for is an easing-up in two areas: your own tendency to push-push-push, and the horse's resentment or reluctance, which is his way of telling you that you haven't yet probed enough.
Let us know how it all comes out. Cheers -- Dr. Deb
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