| Rehab Blog: Beautiful Caritas |
Caritas is a beautiful TB, and our latest addition to the family. He is a four years old and never raced, just race trained, but his feet were so bad with severe white line disease that he could not continue training. A dear lady took the time to send me his information. I had just lost my "regular" job and was not in a position to be able ship him here, so I posted his information on Facebook and another friend saw it and offered to ship him to me. God has a way of making beautiful things happen and this horse has truely been a blessing to our farm. He has been here almost a week and has already won the hearts of everyone who meets him. It took a few days for my gelding, Lyrik, who was a stallion for 7 years, to accept him and I had to seperate him and Lyrik, but once "Big Daddy" as Lyrik is affectionally referred to accepted him, all was well. Caritas follows Lyrik around like a puppy who has finally found a kind master. They eat nose to nose. It is so sweet.
Caritas had shoes when he first came, and I left them on a few days, but he has absolutely no quality hoof wall, and the shoes were about to fall off so I pulled them. He had not been lame with the shoes, but did not want to trot or canter. After the shoes were removed, he has been a bit sore on the right front, which is his worst foot. I trimmed him a bit when I pulled his shoes, but he was sore so I got some bute and will trim him again this week, trying to pull his toes back. He's got about 1/2 inch of healthy hoof growth at the coronet band which I am hoping will continue down the hoof wall to the bottom.
This is Caritas blog and I hope you will follow along with his rehab. He got a massage tonight and really seemed to enjoy that. He seems to be a magnet for horseflies so Morgan and I sprayed him really good with some new fly spray and got a fly sheet for him that we hope will help protect him without making him too hot. Morgan got him to go through the barn tonight, which was a first as he was afraid to go in. He's got a fan to stand under but hasn't really wanted to take advantage of that yet.
Carot does not like carrots, apples, alfalfa pellets, minerals, barely, horse treats or grain. He does like hay and grass. Actually, he will eat grain as long as Morgan holds his feeder....Please enjoy the following pictures.
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March 23, 2010.
A proper blog is listed in order or date, most recent posts first. This blog is backwards, so I'm turning it around right here.
We have moved the farm to Brookneal Va. Caritas (I apologize for not including pictues today) is doing well. I just trimmed his feet a couple of days ago and there is no real necrotic tissue in them anymore and his soles have thickened up quite a bit. It's easy to tell however, from looking at the outside of the hoof, that there is still a problem with the coffin bone inside the hoof, especially his FR. We've done two sets of x-rays, and won't do anymore for a while, and they showed bone demineralization. I'm not sure that this is reverserable, at least not all the way. He's not lame though, even though he's been out of his padded boots for over two months.
The boots were essential on our former pasture which was full of rocks and then frozen mud. His new pasture has no rocks and that has been wonderful for him. He's still not completely comfortable, and to me looks like he has general heel pain, although no navicular changes were noted on the x-rays. The only time he seems tender is when he's forced to move fast, like when one of the horses chases him off hay, and it's slight, not very noticable at all, except to someone who knows he's had problems.
I'm encouraged by his thicker soles, as that was the main stumbling block to comfort. His toes, although short, do still defiviate, although healthy growth is seen at the coronet band and about 1 inch down. He's grown one new hoof capsule already. I hope this second round of growth takes him where he needs to be. At least he's not necrotic and rotting inside these hooves, and moves comfortably. I'm happy with that for the moment.
The current plan is to put him back into light re-training this fall, if his hooves are healed enough for bearing the weight of a rider, and he needs to gain about 100 pounds.
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| Caritas at the track in Kentucky |
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| Caritas about 4 hours after arriving at our farm in Va |
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| Aug. 28th, 2009. Right front, prior to shoe removal |
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| Caritas Right front prior to shoe removal |
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| Left Front |
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| Right Front, 2nd trim, after soaking. New angle is becoming evident at coronet band. |
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| Right Front. Lameller wedge exposed after soaking |
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| Lameller Wedge exposed after soaking. This hoof has a LONG way to go to healthy! |
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| Right Front sole |
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Sept. 8th, 2009
Caritas has been here for about two weeks now and is doing fairly well. I've got him to eat more of his grain. I had originally tried to do a low starch from blue seal, which he didn't really like, but I got some of the senior feed he was used to and have been mixing the two and he's eating it all now...except for the minerals he leaves in the bottom. A client and friend donated a 50 pound bag of Equipride for Caritas, and I was hopeful I could get him to eat it as it has lots of beneficial enzymes and probiotics and vitamins and minerals to improve hoof and horn quality, like zinc, copper, and selenium. I had some luck adding oil to the feed and then the supplement sticks a little better, but this is something I am still working on.
My goal is to eventually get him off the stuff with molasses, or at least to a much lower molasses feed, as I feel too much sugar may impede his hoof/horn connection as his new hoof in growing in. We've weigh taped him three times, and he's continuing to stay right at 1018. I was afraid he would lose weight, but he's on good grass 24/7 and even though he would not eat his grain at first, he has continued to eat the grass.
At the moment, Caritas is favoring his right front so I keep it booted and padded, with a few hours a day exposed to air. When I take the boots off, there is a deep depression in the front of the pad, where his coffin bone is aimed downward inside the hoof capsule. His rotation in that hoof is severe, although I do not have xrays to give me an exact degree. He continues to show new growth at a healthy angle at the coronet band, so as his hoof is growing down around the coffin bone, as it is connecting heathfully at the coronet, it should pick up that coffin bone and rotate it back into it's healthy position inside the hoof capsule.
This is a very heavy horse and the weight he puts on each hoof is signifigant. A lighter horse might not be affected so much by the rotation as they have less weight to bear, but a heavier horse must bear a larger load on each hoof, increasing the chances of permanant damage.
I've seen other horses with this much ratation and hoof caspule deformation regrow a healthy, connected hoof, but often they seem to have a bit of snubbing of the coffin bone, which is permanant, and will continue to distort the bottom third of the hoof capsule. My hope with Caritas is that since he's young, he's not permanantly damaged the tip of the coffin bone and will be completely sound in a few months. He will not be asked to carry a rider or do anything above a walk until that time. He's currently on about 7 acres and walks the whole thing while grazing. The herd is turned out with him for half the day. They've been feeling pretty frisky in this early autum air, running and bucking, and at this moment, Caritas is better just slow walking and not getting caught up in their silly behavior, although he enjoys watching them.
Besides having his bad foot booted, Caritas is also getting his hooves soaked a couple times a week. He seems to enjoy the process of soaking, brushing, massage, etc. I'm currently using Oxine with citric acid crystals in warm water in his padded soaking boots. The Oxine is activated by the citric acid crytals and is a food-grade chlorine that is often used in such products as orange juice. It is a sanitaizer. It kills bacterica, but does not harm or kill healthy, living tissues. My hope is that it will kill the bacteria deep inside Caritas' hooves and help to slough off the necrotic tissue wedged between the coffin bone and hoof wall. I will not resect these feet, but will attempt to get rid of the problem for good, which may require weekly soaks forever.
At this point it is not possible or advisable for Caritas to go completely barefoot all the time. Ideally we would have a large paddock lined with thick stall mats for him to live on until his feet were healed. A sand paddock would also be nice and comfy, but since we have neither, boots and then casts in a week or two are our best option. The downward-pointing coffin bone needs protection from the hard ground to prevent deformation. The drawback to boots at this time is that Caritas has long toes, although I have brought them back quite a bit. Along with that he's got a tall heel, which cannot be lowered a lot because we would end up in live tissue at the back of his hoof. These two things are counter-productive to good fit in the RX and epics boots I am using. After one more trim he should fit nicely in a glove. Casts were ruled out for the time being as he as too sore on his Right hoof to stand on it while we did the left hoof, even with bute. The benefit of the casts is that they can be soaked through, and form fitted to a less than perfectly shaped hoof.
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| Caritas has a soaking and grooming session. He's falling asleep here. |
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| RX boots for turnout. These are great boots, but unfortunately do not provide a perfect fit for deformed hooves....perfect feet seldom need a turnout boot, so RX boots should be made to better fit less than perfect feet. |
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| Sept 8th, 2009 |
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Sept. 26th, 2009
Caritas is seeming to be a little more comfortable these past few days. I was able to trim his feet this morning much easier than normal. I actually feel like I was able to do a decent job on all four, instead of just hitting the big stuff as fast as possible. He is really growing on me. He's just a wonderful horse. My arabs run circles around him, and unless he see's reason to act goofy, he just looks at them as if they've lost their minds and goes on about his business. Smokey the mini horse has adopted him as his godfather, and is usually right on his heels whever Carot goes. As I've been trimming his feet, I've noticed more "junk" than I first thought there was. He has severe thrush on all four hooves, much of which is/was hidden beneath junky sole. I cannot trim off much sole because even though there is a lot of junk down there, it is protecting his coffin bone. He's got a large flap on one hoof where the frog and part of the sole began falling off when I removed his shoes. He's worn some of that flap off, but some of it is still hanging on. I've begun using a version of Pete Ramey's "Goo", consisting of neosporin ointment, desitin, and monistat, all mixed together and applied thickly over the whole bottom of the hoof, especially in the frog sulcus, the collateral grooves, under that flap, etc. His front feet now go into a size one easy boot, although the RF is still a little misshapen. He's getting soaked 2x weekly, fed low starch feed, and is grazing on our fall grass. He is continuing to grow in a healthier new hoof. I've thought about taking him off grass at least 1/2 the day, and free feeding hay to see if it would help his soreness, but he really does not seem to have any inflamation at all, no heat anywhere, etc. and he's getting so much more exercise out in the pasture walking around grazing than he would in the dry lot. The pasture grass is starting to dry up anyway, and soon everyone will be on free choice hay. Carot is the only one who gets grain, everyone else is fat, fat, fat! I realized today that he has no winter coat at all, while the rest of the herd is getting quite wooly, so he's going to need to be blanketed when it starts getting cold. I do have a blanket that fits, but I'm not completely happy with it, and will need to order him a new one very soon. On the subject of blanketing, I'm not against it, but I think it's often overdone, and I'm guilty of that myself. I feel it's better to let a horse grow a winter coat and have really good, draft free shelter available and be sparing with the blankets...one less thing to worry about. Lyrik actually fell through the ice on the pond last year wearing his blanket...when I found him he was wet and shivering terribly. I think he tried to follow a cat across the ice and went through. I found the cat later under the ice layer. Luckily I found him when I did and was able to put him in a stall with a heat lamp and a dry blanket and lots of hay and warm water.
These pictures of Carot were taken today, (sept. 26), right after I trimmed his feet. He looks thin at this camera angle, but he's taping the same weight as before. It's raining today, and he's wanting to stay inside. Can't blame him, it's a pretty cold rain. But I guess it is that time of the year.
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| Sept.26th, 2009 |
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| Sept. 26,09 The mats help Carot stand on his worst foot while I do the better foot. It also helps to have the horse on an even surface when they are sore. |
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| Bottom, right front. Not much here to work with. |
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| Right Front, Sept. 26, 2009 |
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| Sept. 26, 2009. He is finally in a size one epic! The size 2 were actually too big, but since his toe was so long, and his heel on his RF was so high, that's what he had to wear. They kinda flopped like flippers when he walked. These are much more comfortable for him. |
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| RR. Sept. 26th, 2009. White stuff is "Goo." I don't know if you can see it, but this hoof is actually twisted, or rather, the frog is twisted. It shoots toward the left side of the hoof, and there is less sole between the frog and hoof wall on that side. I'm not sure at this point if it's permanant or not. |
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Caritas seems to be doing better. Yesterday he did something I have never seen him do. His pasture buddy Lyrik was trotting around with his tail up, acting silly, when Caritas must of decided he wanted to get in on the action too. He began bucking and rearing and acting plain goofy. It was hilarious. It was not a graceful thing at all, but just the fact that he felt good enough to do it made me happy. He's been getting a little bit of winter hair the past week, but still not much and I've been watching his comfort level in the cooler weather we've been having. This morning I went out to feed him and he and Lyrik had been out in the rain and were wet and Caritas was shivering pretty good so I brought him into his stall and put a warm cooler on him. It's the only thing I had that sorta fit him. It was still raining after he ate so I put Lyrik's blanket on him over the cooler and left him and Lyrik in the stalls while I went out and trimmed some horses. I had never done that before as my stalls are really much too small to lock a horse in for very long, especially a horse as big as Caritas. (They are 10x10). I had ordered a new blanket for Carot, and luckily when I got home, it had arrived, and actually fit, so I was able to turn them back out. He cribs a little when he's locked up if he runs out of food, so I'm very careful to make sure he has plenty of hay for when he finishes his grain!
We've got Carot on a new feeding program, well, not really new, but I've been adjusting it slowly and here is where we are at right now. he's getting this twice a day. He thinks it's yummy. I can tell you, it does smell great.
oats, 1 scoop
plain beet pulp 2 cups soaked (I'm gradually increasing this, at first he did not like it)
1/2 cup freshly ground organic flax seeds
added to this is an herbal mix that I just started giving him. some of the herbs will continue for three months, some for a longer period of time, and some for just a few weeks. i am doing research daily to help me decide which herbs to use and the best way and best dosage to use them at.
comfrey: a soothing demulcent to gastric ulcers. Stimulates bone repair. 1/2 cup of the cut herb
meadow sweet: for damaged gasric mucosa and body aches and pains-for horses suffering from ulcers. calms inflamation of intestines. 1/2 cupful (my book called for 1 cup twice a day, but I did not order that much.)
Fenugreek: for debility and convalescene where digestion and nutrition are poor. strenghthens hooves. 1 TBL
Slippery Elm bark powder: soothes digestive tract and regulates intestinal flora. 1/2TBL working up to 2 tbls.
Marshmellow root: binds and eliminates toxins. (at the track they tend to get lots of drugs from what people tell me) 1/2tbls.working up to 2 tbls.
msm and glucosomine powder: 1.5 tsp. joints, etc.
Organic cinnamon powder: for taste and insulin regulation
marigold flowers, dried: loves them! added for flavor and antioxidant value.
licorice, powdered: 1 tsp daily. anti-inflammatory action similar to pharmaceutical steroids and useful for treating respiratory problems and heaves. can assist a horse recovering from steroid abuse. helps address systemic skin problems and ulcers, esp. if fed before the main meal.
I also add a little canola oil and as much equipride to his feed as he'll eat. I had to back off on the equipride all together for a while as he refused his feed with it. Also, 1 grated carrot mixed in.
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| October 13, 2009 We're gradually seeing the exposed lameller wedge recede as the hoof is growing down. This hoof was soaked then trimmed, and it's easy to see the damage. The damage is no longer occuring, so hopefully soon he'll be able to be comfortable without boots and pads. |
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| October 13, 2009 |
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| Oct. 15th, bottom right. The bottom is cleaning up a little. The big flap that used to be on the hoof is gone. His hoof is packed with "pete's goo" and put into padded boots for comfort. A sand paddock at the new farm is being planned for Caritas if he needs it, and for any other rehabs that come to the farm. |
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| Two-part pads after just four days. These are from easy care and are very comfortable. I used the same size frog pad. These pads had to be replaced at this point because they were completely compressed at the out perimeter and no longer providing cushion or support. The black 12mm pads seem to last longer than these. |
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| Frog pads out of the two part pad system. One benefit of using these type pads is that they provide a little more cushion than a regular 12 mm pad, although that cushion is shorter lived. It's also possible to provide frog stimulation by using a taller frog pad. A taller frog pad could be used on a horse with contracted heels and small, thrushy frogs that do not get any ground contact. The one thing Caritas has going for his feet is that his heels are NOT contracted and he has big, healthy frogs, so we do not need additional stimulation for him in the heel area. |
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| Home-made "smart packs". My own invention! With all the various herbs that Caritas is getting, I couldn't imagine trying to sort them out twice a day, so I took 30 minutes and made up a weeks worth of zippered bags. Everything is added except the ground flax which I grind in a coffee grinder twice a day. The oils in unstabilized flax goes rancid quickly, so I prefer to grind it at feeding time, which takes only seconds. |
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| Caritas modeling his new blanket. It's a Rhino Wug in a size 75 and fits him perfectly. He's sniffing the other two smaller ones we had just taken off, as if to make sure they weren't somthing he needed. This horse is really, really comical. |
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| Caritas and Lyrik, plus the Alpine wether, Finland. Finland could really use a new home. He is our buck's companion, but the buck beats him up so he has to stay with the girls (my milkers) and he hogs all their grain (which he should NOT have). He gets along great with horses, and is extrememly loving, personanable and friendly. If you'd like to adopt him, let me know. |
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