Can anybody offer and insight or experience with horse being lame at walk but sound at the trot? Lameness seemed to resolve for a few days but then came back. He seems to work out of it and looks better with turnout and worse after standing in stall. Had vet and blacksmith out to exam and at that point horse seemed sound. The next morning back to very lame. The day after that he looked better, not sound but better. No heat or swelling anywhere. Today still a little gimpy coming out of stall but looks better after a few steps. Will try to attach video
Easy. Walk is 4 beats. Each foot carries the whole weight of the horse by itself during the sequence. The trot is pairs sharing the load with the diagonal opposite leg. Horses often limp on a leg working alone but not when weight is shared with a partner. You don’t get the head bobbing trot if the sore leg is in the back either.
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Looking for insight on what could be the cause of the lameness. Anyone that may have had similar presentation and what turned out to be the issue. I’m thinking something up high. Shoulder, neck, or pole issue?? The legs and or feet have no heat or swelling. Hoof testers revealed nothing. Palpating legs didn’t reveal anything. We were going to try blocking the foot but then he looked so much better that blocking wouldn’t be helpful at this moment.
Horses don’t carry all the
There is more shared weight there than at the trot. 2 feet are solidly on the ground, and a 3rd is lifting off or setting down (or is still on the ground, depending on the horse and impulsion), while the 4th is in the air
It’s also a gait where the horse can tone down the walk enough to not have the lameness visible, and there’s no moment of suspension so there’s not the extra weight of the horse coming down vertically on a sore leg.
Because the neck does move, thinking it’s in the neck or poll is a reasonable place to look. I can imagine a sore nuchal ligament could be extra stressed at the walk.
[IMG]https://i.pinimg.com/originals/e6/0f/d9/e60fd965ddd346f42162602c30366988.jpg)
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Lameness in a hind leg can result in a head bob.
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How do things progress:
lame at the walk, then sound at the trot, and then…lame or sound at the walk again?
video on grass was the first day of lameness (Saturday 7/27)
video on dirt is what he looks like now about a week later.
his walk is a lot better but still not 100%. Lameness had completely resolved by last Wednesday (day 5) but on Saturday he was just as lame as day one. Yesterday he looked better and today a little better even than yesterday. No medication given since last Tuesday morning (robaxin). Even though he was pretty off Saturday I tack walked him for about 25 min on grass and on dirt and he got a lot better so I tried the trot for a minute and he felt sound. I made him stand for a minute and asked to walk again and felt off again but got better the longer he walked.
Today, he walks better and better the longer he goes but if I have him stand awhile and start again he walks short again to start. When he trots the step looks normal. Back to walk and it looks short again on right front. Other than the tack walk on Saturday he hasn’t been ridden, just turnout. Being in stall seems to make him worse.
Possible abscess in the right front? Has a farrier taken a look & used hoof testers while hes lame/ouchie? Abscesses can cause lameness to come/go.
Farrier has checked him twice and so far doesn’t seem to have anything to indicate abscess.
Well, if not hoof (and abscesses can play hide and seek - then they suddenly blow, and voila! lameness solved), then I might think shoulder/elbow strain.
But I do want to say, what a very pretty boy you have!
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I’m seeing left hind
Definitely left hind in the second video. Harder to pick up in the first video, probably because of the sand.
see… I would say right hind. in the grass video, the right hip dips and rises much more dramatically and he steps incredibly short with RF compared to LF.
Have you noticed anything odd about the way he stands at rest? (ie, resting a particular leg, maybe standing with the hock twisted beneath the body and toe pointing outward?) Or disuniting at the canter?
I haven’t noticed anything unusual about the way he stands. He doesn’t rest any one leg more than any of the others.
Well just my 2cts, as I have dealt with a similar situation.
Whether the issue is right or left hind, depends on how you look at it. He short steps on the left hind, but there’s a delay in bringing the right hind forward, the leg stays quite a bit behind him, so which leg has the problem?
In my case it is thought to originate from a tightness due to old SI/ileum ligament scar tissue, which the horse works out of when warmed up.
He’d be hitchy at the beginning of ride, totally fine trot/canter, very solid lateral work at both trot & canter, good lead changes, easy to collect for more diffcult work and actually normal walk at the end of the ride, albeit at times the odd hitch may still be noticeable, depending on how much work he had.
Giving horse a good massage (croup region) in hindend, or use Magnawave or overnight BOT at times totally left out the initial hitch at the walk.
I was told to just ride the horse. When he’s in a program ridden daily with a fair amount of turnout, it’s less to the point sometimes not there at all. However give him several days off in a row and it’ll be very noticeable.
Same here, horse not resting one hind more than another and nothing noticeable immediately after the ride, nor in turnout or walking in hand, only when on lunge or under saddle. So maybe yours is a little more pronounced since it’s noticeable in freedom.
See what your vet says, but maybe work could improve on this.
In the video on grass, if it’s the front foot that’s going to be the right front based on his head bob, but the right hind also doesn’t move quite right.
So maybe…maybe… since it’s his right side that bothers him, it “goes away” at the trot because he’s got the opposite limb to help compensate at the trot? Totally a crazy theory on my part but a theory.
When they seem to “work out of it” (and he’s worse being in a stall) then it’s usually more stiffness type issues from old injuries and/or arthritis. Obviously, in those cases, regular exercises is going to be your best bet and pasture turnout.
For the video in the sand, does he normally throw his head around like that? My boy Red does the same thing under saddle and out in the pasture, and he’s barely sound enough to ride this year. :eek: Just stiff, stiff, stiff. Also feels better after he’s good and warmed up. He kind of always done it (but he’s kind of always had body issues) so I think that’s his “way” and showing that he’s uncomfortable. … random thought anyway
