For those who have used this for tender soled horses, how long did you use it before you started to notice a difference?
Jana
Cres-Or-Lar Stable
I generally see improvement in 48 hours.
Very soon. I think a couple days sounds right (been awhile).
Okay~ Thank you!
Jana
Cres-Or-Lar Stable
I’ve never used it on a tenderfooted horse, but I do use it on my barefoot mare for a little extra “umph” and love how it reacts with her soles. Durasole is great stuff!
Same here.
Is Durasole more effective for soles than Venice turpentine?
Way better. No comparison.
yup. awesome stuff.
Can you use durasole on a horse that has already has bit of sole bruising? should I wait until the brusing heals or grows out? Sorry if this is a dumb questions but I dont want to do anything that might slow down the process.
thanks!
Occasionally a severe bruise turns into an abscess. So it depends on the circumstances.
IMO if the horse is tender from bruising but seems to be improving in comfort over a few days, then I would highly recommend a daily Durasole regiment. But only start Durasole once it was clear that the trauma is on the mend and not likely to turn into an abscess.
Follow the directions on the web site.
Hey Tom,
Why is Durasole wrong to use if there is an abcess? Just curious because my horse had an abcess last time he was shod six weeks ago. Farrier used Durasole and got purple on coronet band. Reshod and thought all was well, sent horse out on trial. They informed me he was slightly off 1/5 on same foot with reaction to same area of heel with testers.
Horse now back, waiting for farrier to come Sunday. Just to see, I just poured Durasole on his sole, and held toe, and got same purple on coronet. Did I mess something up doing that?
Did you say that because bad to use Durasole prior to abcess opening/draining?
PRIOR to draining an abscess.
If you are going to have a professional treat an abscess proactively by locating it and establishing a drain from a pin- hole at the perimeter of the sole, Durasole is going to work against that happening because locating the “sweet spot” to drain the abscess is dependent upon using hoof testers on the sole to find the weakest, softest spot.
If you are DIY passively treating an abscess with only soaking or poultice, there still remains some good chance that the abscess will slowly draw out of a small fissure in the sole - since this is usually how they start in the first place. Same deal, Durasole is not going to help the process, more likely force the abscess to come out the coronary band - which is excruciatingly slow and painful for the horse.
It sounds like your horse had an abscess that blew out the coronary band some time ago and now anaerobes have eaten away the abscess tract inside the hoof wall from top to bottom. To put some Durasole in the tract once the abscess has stopped draining and the bugs have made it their home - I have done it myself a few times when I’ve encountered this situation and never got a bad result.
I see results within 48 hours of doing daily applications.
Thank you Tom! That all makes sense.
[QUOTE=Tom Bloomer;6959306]
Occasionally a severe bruise turns into an abscess. So it depends on the circumstances.
IMO if the horse is tender from bruising but seems to be improving in comfort over a few days, then I would highly recommend a daily Durasole regiment. But only start Durasole once it was clear that the trauma is on the mend and not likely to turn into an abscess.
Follow the directions on the web site.[/QUOTE]
My OTTB has bruised soles from this winter. The months of Feb and March created a lot of chunks of ice or layers of ice crusts in our deep snow. However, he was ok to ride in the indoor. Left him barefoot during the winter. He is often quite tender-footed.
Bruising noted about a month ago when farrier stopped by to check - probably some in each foot. He was trimmed about 10 days ago. Shod today. He has been moving fine, although almost always a little ouchy the first day or two after he’s reshod.
I just bought a bottle of Durasole myself. (And had been using Keratex on the walls/edges during the winter.)
So from your description, I’m thinking it might just be ok to move ahead and use it?
I think my bruising might be from the same thing. Horse was barefoot since July with no problems but we had a lovely sand ring up until I moved in November. At the new place, ring is OK, not the best but footing is fine. Rode for about a month, no problems then had off Jan-now because lameness/weather. Have a lameness work up done for other problems and find that she’s lame up front but how? She blocked out both feet and xrays were clean as could be. I guess maybe the frozen ground and the muddy hoofprint ridges. Maybe she ran around a lot at some point. She was out with geriatic horses but maybe they had a party at night? Anyways, think shoes are going to have to go on but Ill hold off on the durasole for now.
The timeframe for a bruise to turn into an abscess is very brief. IMO, if a horse has solar bruising due to soft soles on hard ground there is no reason to delay starting him on Durasole.
Conversely, if the bruising is the result of a significant point load trauma like landing on a rock which creates a solar hematoma (like a blood blister under the fingernail) then there is a good chance the hematoma will turn into an abscess in a few days if it is not reabsorbed.
So what kind of bruising are we talking about? Because a solar bruise from a single point trauma that results in a hematoma leaves a horse immediately head bobbing lame.
Solar bruising that results from ground force pressure on thin, soft, soles making the horse tender and uncomfortable, but not head bobbing lame. There is always going to get some immediate benefit from Durasole in this situation.
Great, thank you, Tom!
My horse’s bruises have/are apparent. One from last year you could see growing down his outer wall. And current barn (we are moving from!) has a lot of rocks in paths/pastures. But farrier says a lot of horses in our area this spring have bruises after having gone barefoot for the winter. But he was not familiar w/ Durasole. Horse has three white socks so easy to detect, and he is often fine the next day, even if they are apparent. Even had a couple of abcesses pop open and heal immediately in a previous barn and never showed any signs of a problem(!).
His feet did toughen up over the winter but am still anxious to use the Durasole and hopefully help his feet once and for all. Keratex helped on the the outside. Has been on biotin for over a year, but he just has thin-walled, thin-soled Thoroughbredy feet.
It sounds like an amazing product and I’m going to try it on our Appy mare (if I can find some place to buy it) BUT the instructions for how “To Achieve Fastest Results” seem a bit overwelming…
Clean the foot with a hoofpick, paying careful attention to the lateral and medial sulcus of the frog, followed by vigorous wire brushing of entire solar area. For maximum effectiveness, sole and frog must be clean and dry before product is applied.
Use a hair dryer, heat gun, or similar tool to completely dry the frog and sole, apply Durasole while the solar surface is still warm and disperse with a brush (old toothbrush) until the sole is uniformly discolored, the solar surface of the hoof is fully saturated and product begins to pool instead of being absorbed. You will be amazed at the results!
Repeat the process: Wire brush, heat, apply Durasole, spread with brush until solar surface of foot is completely saturated. After two or three applications, your wire brush will begin to skid across the sole instead of roughing its surface which means Durasole is causing the cell membranes of the exfoliating sole to thicken and swell; in effect, forming a living pad.
Repeat the above process as outlined at least six times daily during the first week; four times daily for the next two weeks; then twice daily as long as the horse is in training. The results will be both immediate and long lasting.
Six times daily? If you started at 6:00 in the morning and did this every 3 hrs your last treatment would be at midnight, and who has time for this? It has to take at least 1/2 an hour each time… Yes, I KNOW that MOST people aren’t doing this and are getting good results BUT it seems like a strange thing to put on your website if you’re trying to sell a product. If I hadn’t read about it on CoTH (numerous times) I’d think that it wasn’t very effective if you have to follow the above instructions for best results. 
