Jack Evers wrote:Here’s an extreme deviation and a trim to sole plane with added lateral support. Three year old QH. I didn’t see this horse until a week ago. The owner’s been bugging me since shortly after I broke my collarbone (Sept 1) and I’ve been trying to tell him a) I’m really not interested in new customers and b) I’m broke down and can’t shoe one for a while anyway. He’s a persistent cuss, wouldn’t take no for an answer and I finally agreed to come out with a friend and former apprentice and see what we could do with Alan handling the actual work. Hopefully the orthopod will give me an OK to do my own work next week. A week ago we went to trim his three with it being left to us if this one needed shoes. We said lateral support was necessary, but we’d like radiographs. Owner still wondered if the horse could be straightened although the vet had told him that he should have brought the horse in at two months rather than three years. I agreed and suggested the X-rays so he could really see the problem.
Alan trimmed to sole plane before the x-rays. Last picture is the A-P view showing the problem at the distal end of the third metacarpal. Distal surface of P-3 is pretty level, collateral grooves are close to the same depth. Sorry for the quality, weren’t great films anyhow and we could only hold them toward the light and snap a picture.
Second pic is a shot down the cannon as we normally sight to show how far the T-square method would miss. Next is a solar shot of the shoe, the extra fullering on the lateral heel is just to spread it and get more support. That was my first hot work since the injury and it felt mighty good.
The last pic is the finished foot. It’s deceptive and doesn’t look like there’s as much lateral support as there really is. Should have taken it from the rear. At any rate he walked off better than he walked up. He’s no longer twisting at the fetlock on the sand surface where he lives. I’ll report more after he gets ridden some. Seems like I'm doing a bunch of QH and Paints lately with bad legs.
And David, I rarely build up the hoof wall even on medial support unless there’s an interference problem or a show horse where cosmetics are important.
Just wanted to say thanks for this post it was very educational for me.
As for building up the hoof wall, I do all my work on gaited horses (which are notoriously narrow chested and known for interfering) so maybe that's why I end up with more stepped on shoes if I don't fit tight medially.
BTW: I spoke to Jaye this weekend on the phone, he confirmed the horse I mentioned in the original post does paddle. He also invited me to come watch him reset that horse sunday so I could see how the hoof has regrown over the last 6 weeks. I would love to say photos follow, unfortunately I was unable to make it out due to a water leak and a tree that was about to fall on my roof. So I have one less water leak and some firewood seasoning but didn't get any hooves in hand this weekend.
Thanks again for all the info
David