Does anyone want to look at my horse's feet again?

[lenapesadie]

I hear you! Trying to keep everyone on the same page is like herding cats; nigh on impossible lol.

Do you have other pets? I ask bc if you maybe had a more solid relationship with a small animal vet they might be able to personally recommend a large animal vet. Or maybe a horse friend / previous trainer that could recommend a vet / farrier? I’m not saying that your current vet isn’t lovely, but rather IMO it’s crucial to have at least one actor in the soap opera that you trust implicitly. And I can see how it might be hard to have that level of trust with providers that are new to you; particularly if your pony has been having issues!

My vet is human and thus I expect him to make mistakes (in 20 yrs he’s made one), but I trust him completely to be straight with me, do his best and to have my animals’ best interests at heart.

[sportyspicepony]

@BoyleHeightsKid

Per 2 oz of the Mega Cell you’re getting 75mg of copper and 250mg zinc and only 1 mg biotin. You need to at least double up on that to get the levels of copper and zinc you need. For the same cost (or cheaper) you can switch to a supplement like California Trace and get more bang for your buck. They also make this supplement in pellet form if your pony doesn’t like a powder.

Sooo I’m not against trying this at all, but when I enter in the details of her diet it does say that she’s actually good to go on copper and zinc, I think bc Omega Horseshine contains it and so does Purina Ultium Competition. Just a lil low on iodine apparently!

[BoyleHeightsKid]

So if she’s not getting much of the Ultium where are all those calories coming from? The bulk of those calories would have to be coming from the forage. Hay and pasture is typically very low in copper and zinc. She’s not getting much in the way of copper and zinc from the OHS either… Say she’s getting 6oz of OHS a day (about a cup) she’s only getting about 18-19mg’s of copper and 48-49 mg’s of zinc. I’m sort of just thinking aloud here… I’ve used feedXL in the past and for a horse that’s not on much concentrate that is a lot of calories… just going off my experience using the program in the past… my results changed a ton after I had my hay tested.

[lenapesadie]

Ehhhh. The amounts your feed xl report lists as your horse’s total Cu/Zn intake is the same as the supplemental Cu/Zn that I’m giving to my current hoof rehab project on top of his 10 lbs daily of Triple Crown Senior (which is formulated to be a complete horse ration if needed so has full serving of Cu/Zn in about five lbs), grass, alfalfa hay and Timothy hay.

A Cu/Zn supplement is cheap and might do your horse a world of good.

[sportyspicepony]

True, I just put that she’s on like mixed grass pasture but I have no idea what’s in my grass vs. what’s in the grass on FeedXL… I forget that that’s like a big grain of salt to take these analysis results with.

I will explore a new supplement! Definitely can’t hurt.

[BoyleHeightsKid]

FeedXL is great if you have a hay/pasture analysis… it can get you going in the right direction, but unless you have a hay analysis then you’re kind of just shooting in the dark.

Personally I would discount anything the program says you are getting in the way of vitamins/minerals from forage and only go off what you know she is getting from feed/supplements etc unless you can get the hay/pasture tested.

[JB]

@sportyspicepony

when I enter in the details of her diet it does say that she’s actually good to go on copper and zinc, I think bc Omega Horseshine contains it and so does Purina Ultium Competition. Just a lil low on iodine apparently!

what is the iron level? While there is no universally recommended “proper” ratio of iron:copper:zinc:manganese, there is a generically accept optimal ratio of around 4-10:1:3-5:3-5.

Meaning, if you have 168mg Cu, but iron is 2520 for a 15:1 ratio, I would be adding enough Cu to bring that down to at least 10:1. If you did that, then you’d re-evaluate the cu:zn ratio, and it it’s too out of whack, add Zn (or even add more copper, but that’s less likely)

OHS contains very little of any given nutrient, so while that’s contributing, it’s not a lot.

I am surprised this diet shows low iodine, when it should be in sufficient amounts in the Ultium

[Libby2563]

I have no personal knowledge but here is a farrier recommendation from a friend who lives in Charleston, FWIW:

“Honestly the best is probably Mick Doyle. He is actually based out of Tryon but comes to Charleston once a month. Hard to get on his schedule.”

Maybe he could help you get on the right track and/or recommend someone more local?

[sportyspicepony]

Thank you!!! I think I have definitely heard his name before. I will def look into him!

[sportyspicepony]

I don’t have the premium subscription so I dont have access to the iron level, for some reason that one costs extra and I actually just tried to look on the individual products’ labels but they didn’t say! However you all have me convinced to just try increasing copper and zinc anyway so as soon as I’m out of the Mega Cell I will do that.

[imaginique]

I have been trimming my own horses for almost a year now because of poor trimming by ‘professionals’. I highly recommend the facebook group Hoof Talk For the Barefoot Horse. Although your horse is not completely barefoot, they can help you sort out the trim.

[BoyleHeightsKid]

If you can get a rough guesstimate of iron levels the ideal iron/copper/zinc ratio is 4:1:3. If you can reduce iron levels at all by filtering water etc that would also be a good idea.

[Exracehorserider]

I have a horse with not quite rightness for years and the shoes made his hoof issues worse as his feet grow sideways and the pressure of the the shoe being nailed in and the inside of the foot growing sideways caused huge cracks. Shoes did not help the hooves grow into a better hoof. I am also puzzled why the farrier is putting huge bevels on the hooves with shoes? And imo overall the heels on the front look too high. But either way, if you utilize the winter for barefoot rehab ( which is what I did) the conditions have to be right. That might mean hoof boots for turnout for a few months, your horse needs to be walking about for most of the day ( no tiny dry lot pens for a few hours), the bedding need to be be dry, ( i added extra and mounded up in the pee area so it did not soak through over night) and other little details that make a difference. If you board and the pastures are muddy and full of manure at the gate and the horses stand there for hours, the hooves will never be in great shape unless you are willing to add hoof clay daily and do extreme hoof picking daily or pay someone to do it… Also at my barn the outdoor arena gets hard in the summer so I only walk on it and always have hoof boots on. One little stone bruise can make a horse " footy". My horse recently has been foot sore after the trims. My Vet advised to leave more sole even if its flaky.