The bute will make ulcers worse. Will help with musculoskeletal pain but may only scratch the surface of back pain/kissing spine.
6 Likes
Iâm not familiar with Barley as a horse feed since I live in the US, Could he be having some sort of reaction to his grain? I would also try taking him off grain for a couple weeks and see if that helps, or switching to a lower sugar hay since youâve had two vets rule out other issues.
How do you feel about your vets? Are they good horse vets that have large barns of upper level competition horses as clients? Or do they normally treat cows and sheep?
Has your vet sent off blood to be tested? Since youâre in Europe itâs hard to toss out a random illness since things are different there.
1 Like
They both were equine vets only, especially the second one who takes care of very important show jumpers (1.40m grand prix ecc). The reason why we called him and got hock injections was a different one, which he solved, so he didnt prescribe blood tests or x rays or anything else. Iâll try talking to my trainer to switch feeding routine, but honestly he suggested the opposite 
He said it was better to REMOVE hay cause it could have been the main fuel for the horse. Obviously i didnt follow the advice cause i thought: how could be a grain only diet be good for his health?
Neither EPM or EDM!
1 Like
So to me this sounds like a âsubclinical lamenessâ or a lifestyle issue. I have a friend whoâs GO horse started acting like a freight train on the right lead, and it was the only symptom of a ruptured collateral ligament in the front right foot. Iâd look first to pain. The fact that its recent, and from your words sounds to be limited o one side/rein would have me look there first.
But itâs also not clear if youâve changed his feed and the total amount of exercise. Given the one sidedness you describe I would think it less likely⊠but also still worth investigating if ultrasound or bone scan doesnt turn up anything.
2 Likes
Could he be talking about the type of hay? Some horses get very hot on certain types of hay. I wouldnât want a horse to be on a no hay diet but a different type of hay might help.
3 Likes
He sounds to me like his brain would need much more than a week away from poles. I would say months.Pulled muscles do not show on the lunge. My boy lunged okay but refused to trot in the sand. He had badly pulled a muscle in his chest playing in the paddock , which meant that it hurt to lift his front legs and he had to have months off.
As I said he was perfectly sound on the lunge, but I stopped lunging him in case I was hurting his chest further.
1 Like
I agree with posts that say Your horse sounds like it is in pain and needs to see a Vet who can find out what the problem is. He canât talk but he is trying to tell you that he canât do what you are asking him to do
2 Likes
OP, read this article that I just came across: https://yourdressage.org/2019/10/09/the-neurologic-dressage-horse/?fbclid=IwAR2wXSWdn25zyOyVZP7VUm7uANQSJI1xUjFFnsnjWH2aodXSsy0AayWtnHk
1 Like
Please watch this video. I have seen lots of horses with bizarre behavior changes from EDM. If you have questions feel free to message me.
2 Likes
I have a (now retired) gelding who started to develop unpredictable behaviour as a 6 year old. Some days he was fantastic, but others he would fling himself sideways into the wall (with me on him), or rear straight up. He also could not do a canter/walk transition. It took years to diagnose him: he had evidently previously broken his neck, and as it healed over time, the new bone growth was pressing into and irritating his spinal cord causing intermittent issues. I had many top vets look at him: most suspected his hocks and stiflesâŠnot his spine.
Bute did NOT help this horse. Bute will not help a neurological issue.
Good luck with your horse.
1 Like
Similar things happened to my mare. She has always been pretty chill, but after the people I originally sold her to then sold her to an amateur lady, the New Owner told me stories about how she would be rearing and balking just hacking out, was bolting and spooking and bucking, the lady finally just gave her back to me after she ran her over while leading her (this is COMPLETELY out of sorts for this horse). She was off in the hind end, though, although the New Ownerâs barn owner told New Owner she wasnât (she was). Injected her SI, that helped with the crazy behavior but the offness and discomfort was still there. I ended up having to take her to a vet recommended to me that is excellent at weird lamenesses, and it turned out she has a torn meniscus (stifle injury). The vet here swore up and down it wasnât her stifle. :rollseyes: But bute, previcox, none of that made a difference to her. We only found it was the stifle after a million flexions done a million different ways on hard and soft ground, straight and on a circle, and the vet decided to try blocking the stifle which made a HUGE improvement.
This doesnât sound like bad behavior to me. This sound like something is wrong. Whether it is something biomechanical or neurological, I agree with everyone else that not jumping this horse, or even going over poles, needs to be done immediately. How is he if you just ride on the flat, either in an area with no jumps or with all the jumps removed from the ring? If he is absolutely fine, he might just need a good long break from jumping. But I donât really get the impression that this is just a fried brain. Horses donât act like that unless something is Wrong.
6 Likes
I have a mare who became progressively balky, while also sometimes flipping the switch and taking off. When balking, she would shoot sideways or backwards, leap straight in the air, and sometimes start to offer to rear. I was very careful to never press my luck when she got light in front, as it was clear that I could teach her to rear as an evasion and I did NOT want that. We had days where the goal of the ride was to walk once around the arena on the buckle without melting down. This could take 10, 15, 20 minutes to achieve.
She looked sound. Both my farm vet and chiro vet found nothing remarkable on exam. Bute had zero effect on behavior. When I finally took her to a big clinic for a work-up, she was diagnosed with kissing spine and SI arthritis. I wish we had gone sooner. It would have saved her a lot of pain, and saved me a lot of money.
5 Likes
I have nothing to add apart fro what has previously been suggested.
Horses do not lie.
5 Likes
A titer indicates exposure, not infection. One of the reasons for overdiagnosis 
3 Likes
Since the OP is in Europe, whether itâs âoverdiganosedâ or not (itâs not around here), EPM is pretty much impossible so itâs beside the point.
However the horse is clearly in pain. I second that it could be kissing spine, and the fact the vet has some expensive clients doesnât mean he couldnât possibly have missed it. Another unpleasant neurological possibility-one young horse I knew at a barn got increasing hot and unpredictable, until ultimately she started flipping. They sent her to the MSU vet school where she was put down and necropsied, and it turns out she had a brain tumor.
4 Likes
What about PSSM? Itâs a muscle disorder that is mostly managed by diet and exercise. If he has that, he may have had it for awhile but the sudden worsening may have been triggered by the difference in feed type/amount and hay type of switching to a new barn. I have also heard of it presenting one-sided like this (actually I believe it was in a recent COTH article in the horse care issue). It is diagnosed by either DNA testing or sometimes a muscle biopsy, and treated with strict adherence to a special diet, and daily exercise/turnout (that is a little oversimplified, but is the general idea anyway). If you are a vet student you should have access to some good research materials to read up on PSSM, and could probably even ask your professors what they might suggest as a next step, if you think it could be PSSM.
Correct. Except, showing exposure gives you a tool to work with. And treating horses with said exposure can frequently knock the titer to 0. Iâve seen many of the symptoms go away after treatment. If your horse showed that it had a 70%+ chance of being exposed, why would you not treat?
We had a pony showing symptoms not to far off of what the OP described, and it was a whopping 95%. He is still being treated with Marquis, hopefully it helps the poor little bugger. The one that went nuts a a horse show, and had to be euthanized had a necropsy done, it was EPM
Agreed though, that since the horse is Europe, it is something else. Has it had neck xrays? High up, like at C1? Pain in the poll can cause all kinds of bad things
Taking away the hay would probably give your horse ulcers if he doesnât already have them.
This is a very upsetting thread. The fact that the vets wonât do diagnostics is just crazy.
OP, sounds like you are getting bad advice all around from your trainer and vet. If I were you, I would stop riding this poor horse and just turn him out on grass with shelter for a year.
If youâre lucky, the issue may resolve. If not, you can spend the next year finding competent veterinary care.
6 Likes
I agree very upsetting thread. Get the horse out of there evaluated by a competent vet and FARRIER most likely on ulcer treatment and DEFINITELY HAY. Then consider other issues like tack fit or neurological problem. Get him out of there.
5 Likes
