canadian wrote:Shod this horse about 3 weeks ago, has a clubfoot that grows a lot of heel. It was on a 53 degree angle and the other foot was on a 50.
If there was a dish at the dorsal wall of the club foot, and you didn't remove it prior to using a hoof gauge, then your gauge lied to you and the true hoof angle was more than likely much higher.
Took the heel down until they were both 50.
IMNTBCHO it is a mistake to try and match mismatched hooves that are of the "hi-low syndrome" variety.
The non clubfoot was also a shoe size bigger, it grows a lot of toe but the width is about 1/4 wider.
A fairly common occurence.
The owners were not impressed that i put two different size shoes on, apparently the immense weight difference in the shoes would make him lame

even tho they were clearly two different sizes
This is an opportunity for you to provide some intensive owner education.

So i got a call today and went out to look at him, because they said he was so lame he could barely walk.
Often when you try to 'normalize' heel heights this is what happens.
He seemed to walk fine when i got there, ( i must have the magic touch

) but he did have a difference of about 4 degrees in both feet. 53 on the clubfoot and 49 on the other.
This is a fairly normal happenstance, and 3-5 weeks post trim/shoeing is just about the right time frame for this to happen.
I lowered the club down to a 51 and backed the toe on the other so it was a 50.
I think that 51 is probably too low and a bit uncomfortable for the horse.
And there is about a 3/8 inch difference in the heels to the ground.
We decided to let her be without shoes for the night and decide what to do and shoe her tomorrow.
Fairly typical. Again, horses with 'hi-'low' syndrome feet will continue to have mis-matched feet regardless of your best efforts. And, don't overlook the hinds. Generally speaking, the contra-lateral hind will, to some degree, experience the same conformation abnormality.
So now my question is, do i lower the heel on the club to the same as the other foot or maybe even lower and put a 1 degree wedge pad on the other foot to try to keep ahead of the growth and just back the toe up quite a bit?
IMNTBCHO, no. Treat each hoof as an individual. I would however serioously rocker the toe of the shoe going on the low side, or use a set back half-round, etc., and set the breakover where I deemed it appropriate. On the high side, I again would set the toe of the shoe where I deemed appropriate and would remove any distorted toe hanging over the front of the shoe. One other thing I make it a practice to do, is to only trim from the toe pillars back to the heel on the high side, leaving every bit of sole intact in the front part of the hoof. Sometimes, I will add a 1/8- 1/4 leather rim pad to the shoe for the high side. Also, some of these horses need additional mechanical support to the frog(Equipak, Impression Material, etc.). Also, the more sever the club foot is, the more likely I am to treat it like a foundered foot. It is always a good idea to get some radiographs of both feet so you can establish a baseline from which to work.
Im basically just trying to find away to stay ahead of the growth so hes not lame every 3 weeks because the one toe only grows with no heel and the other foot only grows heel and no toe.
Welcome to the wonderful world of dealing with mis-matched hooves.

:)
[/quAnd because he grows no heel on the one foot its getting to be underrun because its never trimmed and the old bent tubules remain there.
He's growing heel, just in the wrong direction. As counter intuitive as it may seem, you have to remove as much of that damaged heel as is safe and then use wedges to put the hoof back where it belongs. And, remember that you will need a shoe wioth longer heels to set the shoe where it should be for proper support. And, it sounds as though this horse will need additional mechanical support for his frog. One way of achieving this is to use a frog support bar wedge pad. Before so doing, use your hoof testers to make sure the horse can handle the increased support on his frog.
The owners also want me to put the same size shoes on him.
And people in H-ell want ice water.......... That said, it can be done, sometimes, depending.
And, last but not least, the horse will be far more likely to pull the shoe on the club foot than on the low foot and it can make you crazy trying to overcome this propensity.