Fixing Sonny's feet, From Foundered to Fixed



Fixing Sonny's Feet, From Foundered to Fixed



Sonny's Management

this page is still being written!


Update  7March 2013.
Sonny is galloping around the paddock now & I have started riding him lightly again. He wears front boots for riding only. We are still getting heaps of rain & the ground is mostly very soft but his feet are looking vastly improved. It turned out he was foundered in both front feet & may have been foundered in his back feet too. They are also improving out if sight.



boots,  vet recommendations,  trimmer,  nutrition,

Vet Recommendations & Stabling

Cameron Hoskings from Cooroora Vets at Cooroy is the vet who did the xrays & advised me of what strategies to adopt to best help Sonny. We have had 2 really heavy wet seasons in a row with almost never ending rain inbetween those wet seasons. So the abscess tracks have never had a chance to heal & bacteria has got in from the soil helping the white line to separate almost totally.

So it was important to get him dry which posed lots of problems for me as there are no sheds or stables or any sort of cover here apart from my flimsy temporary carport. So I had to give it up for Sonny!

On the left below is my carport & on the right is the new shelter I made a few weeks later specially for Sonny at the front of my house so he still had access to the white gravel turning & parking area for a clean dirt free pen.






I made a stable using electric fencing & lined the sides with logs & filled it with old grass hay I had on hand. Cameron said he needed to spend several hours daily on deep bedding without boots so Sonny spent 6hrs daily from 9-10am in there. Then when he was out of that 'stable' he had to be booted to exclude dirt & moisture & to protect his soles & the bones within.

With the help of some extremely generous friends I was able to buy RX easyboots with thick soft pads for his front feet. I already had a full set of easy boot epics so he wore those on his back feet.

As a result of the first farrier's visit (who advised to put shoes on Sonny's front feet)Sonny got a dose of a really manky thrush which ate away lots of the horn under the shoes which all had to be cut out. Those are the holes around the base of the RF hoof. Now they are growing out well. Cameron applied copious iodine which I continued to do for 2 weeks until there was no more crusty horn to scrape away. It was only after that when I could take a photo which is why there is an almost 2wk gap between the xrays & the first photo of the sole of the RF in it's foundered prolapsed condition.

So now it is a daily ritual of Sonny coming in for breakfast about 9-9.30am. Into his new shelter with boots off about 10am with a hay bag of Rhodes grass with a little lucerne mixed in. Out with boots on for a pee about 11.30am & a short play session. Back into the shelter with more hay & boots off until 3.30pm at which time I put his night boots on & let him out for a meet & greet with the other horses for an hour. Then dinner time, then out to his next part of the house yard to eat for the night.

So far the grass is ok to graze at night only as there has been no rain but frosts imminent which will change things.

More to come............Sonny is calling!


Easy Boots

I started with his usual boots which were Epic easyboots with gaiters. However it was important to keep the RF dry & clean so I ordered a pair of RX easyboots. Unfortunately Easy Care Downunder only had 1 boot size 2. So I ordered that boot along with extra comfort pads & the new BFB 12ml soft pads.

He wore 1 epic & the RX. Eventually he started loosing the epic due to his hoof being ill shaped. Then he learned how to get the velcro undone too. All in all he lost & broke all his epic boots. Rather than order a second RX which is really only a stable boot, I thought ahead to what he would need to wear once he can be exercised again even if only at a walk & light trot. I have ordered the new easyboot offering which is called Easyboot Trail & is a cross between the epic & the Old Mac & does up with wide velcro tabs at the back of the boot. The first ones I ordered turned out to be too small & as off 4June2012 the replacements have yet to arrive. So currently he is only wearing the RX on the RF & the LF doesn't have a boot at all. Luckily that hoof is a little behind the RF in that it's rotten parts haven't yet reached the ground & become exposed to dirt etc. But by the end of the first week of June there will be quite a lot of separation & rot apparent around the toe which will need to be protected from dirt moisture etc.


7March 2013  I will soon have to order a set of the smaller sized Easyboot Trail which I now use with thick firm pads inside for riding only.



Bare Footed now

Since about April Sonny has been barefooted. It was too hard to work with the boots in the end & he was sick of them. He learned how to get the Trails off by undoing the Velcro. His feet are doing much better & there is very little moisture infiltration. One hoof has some medial wall weakness but I deal with that by applying Thrushbuster. It will take a long time before the blood supply is re-established to that part of the coronet band to allow good wall to grow.

Also he has been living in the paddock with the others all this year. He hates being separated from them & I was sick of fixing the fences after he busted through them! He's getting a lot more exercise out there anyway. On the odd occasion it was too wet I bought them all up into the house yard & put them in the driest part to help his feet dry out.



September 2013  Not being Ridden Yet

I did start very light riding but he seemed to get sore easily then he got grumpy about being ridden. I realised his feet were more sore than he was letting on. Even if I just rode a tiny bit for example to demonstrate something to one of my students, he would end up with hot sore feet the next day. I tested his feet with testers & discovered they are ok down the middle but still very sore around the edges. That might indicate the coriums aren't growing back yet.

But he doesn't get off scot free though! He still has to help with lessons. I put his EB Trails on & he helps with liberty ground work demonstrations. He is more happy to have a cavort these days, will go for a gallop with the others & his feet don't get hot the following day. Actually they are quite cool these days which must be a huge improvement.



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