Shivers

[Farosh]

Hey what are people’s experiences with horses with shivers? Just want to know because I’ve never had one with it.

Tried a horse with it and the horse is amazing. Like incredible. Has been doing the 1.15m/1.20m job with a super amateur kid extremely well within the last month since it went to consignment. Horse is so scopey, perfectly forward but not hot, extremely adjustable, goes in a snaffle and jumps 10+ every time. Can jump around 1.30 like nothing and I don’t need it to do that, need it to take an amateur to the 1.0m in 2 years.

Grooms say they lunge it for 10 minutes always before ride, kind of think it’s a warm up thing more than a quietness thing. But if it is a quietness thing I don’t care I’m perfectly fine with the horse being hotter than it was when we tried it I really don’t mind spunk at all.

But the horse is so fabulous and it’s got a big price tag, doing a big PPE on it but just curious what peoples anecdotes are about shivers because I have none of my own. If it wasn’t for that horse would be on a trailer already.

[Mouse_amp_Bay]

I had one with shivers, started noticing it at about 8 or 9 years old. Very slight, slow hesitation to pick up rear leg, on side worse than the other.

It never really progressed (horse is 20 now and retired for other reasons).

I wouldn’t hesitate. They all have something (just like all humans have something). My vet, who himself had a high level jumper with shivers, was not concerned but always recommended lots of vitamin E (think 5,000 to 8,000IU per day) to prevent progression. I don’t know if that is what helped but perhaps??

[Bluey]

Depends on how bad he is now or has been progressing.
We had a super lovely horse that when we fed, rubber bucket on the ground, would start to reach down and then stretch backwards, wobbling, trying to get his balance and finally stand back up and start eating.
Worst was getting his feet trimmed or shod.
When you picked a front foot some times he would again stretch backwards and almost go to his knee with that foot, then stand up and be ok for a bit.
With hind legs, some times he would raise it high, high up, like he had a cramp, then slowly relax it back down.
Farrier always stood him by a wall, so if he started to fall, he would have a wall to steady him.

We never had a real diagnosis, he didn’t do it that often, I had videos of it and eventually the vet called it possibly shivers.

Horse was a wonderful horse and very safe to ride, but don’t know if it progressed how that would go.
Last I heard, horse was still doing fine a few years later.
I don’t know how that would work if a horse has to do strenuous work, if that affects shivers?

I would keep asking your vet and maybe get a second opinion, they know the horse in person and may have had experience with others with shivers.

[CBoylen]

I’ve had two. My junior jumper had shivers. It was never an issue. He showed all over the country at the 1.45 and retired and died from other issues without it ever progressing.
My current hunt horse has had shivers since I got him at five years old. He needs to be sedated to be shot behind if you want to be kind to your Farrier. Performance wise it’s not an issue. It gets slightly worse if he is in the stall more.
The ones that I’ve heard of where it progressed to be an issue it was always a shoeing issue and not a riding issue.
The lunging you mentioned should have nothing to do with shivers at all. They don’t need extra warm-up for it.

[GoodTimes]

I would say it depends how fast it’s progressing. It sounds slow in this horses case.

Years ago when I was a junior my mom and I bought a nice young thoroughbred hunter. 5 yo gelding. He was fit, sound, jumping small courses, but had trouble holding the right hind up.
Unfortunately for us it progressed very quickly. Within a year he developed fairly significant muscle wasting. We retired him to a trail home.

[Xanthoria]

I had to put down a 7 year old with shivers (and neck OA and MFM) so I’d never go down that road again but as others say, depends on the horse, and speed of progression.

If you’re ok with retiring the horse early fine. But the price should reflect this issue.

[JB]

If he’s 15 and working that well, I wouldn’t be nearly as bothered as if he’s 7. Shivers is a progressive disease, but the rate of progression is variable.

[DLee1]

I had one and never again. Of course I didn’t know WHAT it was when I first got him, his odd behavior with the back leg was blamed on an old pastern injury/scar. The only horse I ever had vetted before I purchased him and he passed.

Absolutely the biggest, sweetest guy (TB) that I never really got to do anything with. He was 5 when I bought him, 11 when I put him down.
I agree it seems to vary dramatically in severity and we were just not one of the lucky ones.

[Ponyplusaninch]

I’d be unfazed if it had a proven record and routine and was over the age of 10.

Did the vet indicate anything about severity?

Most horses it’s mild/moderate. For sure there will be severe cases but IME it’s combined with something else, not just shivers alone.

[atr]

Is shivers a symptom or a diagnosis, in reality? There seem to be multiple root causes.

[Kimstar]

The last info I saw was that it appears to be a lesion in the brain that causes the Shivers symptoms.
Common denominators: Shivers horses are often male and over 17 hh.

My last horse suffered from Shivers and I had to euthanize him at age 15 due to the severity of the tremors. No medication helped at that point and his had progressed fairly rapidly since its onset at age 5. We were hampered by the fact that we could not get him as fit as he should have been because he also had hock arthritis (hocks would not fuse).

ETA: After my experiences, you could not pay me to own another Shivers horse.

[Atlas_Shrugged]

I have two fancy wbs with shivers- I would try to avoid it unless it is a seasoned horse that has held up regardless.

[Farosh]

This horse is 12 and has been showing consistently its whole life

[JB]

12 is pretty iffy territory. Is there any video showing the (non)severity of the disease 3 years ago, 5 years?

[GraceLikeRain]

@Farosh

Grooms say they lunge it for 10 minutes always before ride, kind of think it’s a warm up thing more than a quietness thing. But if it is a quietness thing I don’t care I’m perfectly fine with the horse being hotter than it was when we tried it I really don’t mind spunk at all.

I’d take a close look if you end up doing a PPE. A must warm up on the line on a seemingly quiet horse would make me wonder if they’ve found a routine to address a reactive back.

[M_al]

I saw a really interesting readout/research (years ago) on a shivers horse who was being lobbied as a competition horse - and was consistently spun by judges as unsound. The owner was trying to make the case that this was an underlying condition affecting gait and should not be penalized as unsoundness (much like stringhalt).

He had amassed a HUGE amount of research, the most fascinating to me being the graphs of nerve impulses getting to the muscles in a shivers horse vs a normal horse. The shivers nerve impulses were far more erratic. Unfortunately, I think he was working with his local Ag University and I couldn’t find anything online that was like the graphs he had.

Loss of muscle tone in the back end is a given, although perhaps with EMS units or other modern alternative means of directly (non brain-mediated) contracting given muscles/exercising the ones that aren’t “getting the memo” might help?

I would really go over this with your vet, dive deep into the research to see if this is a good fit for what you want to do, how to manage it and what the stepdown runway looks like up front to see if the pros/cons help your decision.

Good luck!

[Farosh]

Anyway update is that client called insurance company and they said they won’t insure the horse unless we made some ridiculously low offer they will never accept so he got too spooked by that and said no. I’m sad because it’s an excellent horse but yeah with their budget they can find another great one so I’m fine with that. Hope someone nice winds up with this horse because he’s a super nice guy

[Farosh]

Yeah I thought about that but I took care of a few horses like that as a groom and they were great horses for a long time.

[Farosh]

Yeah I mean this horse has like 5 years of videos everywhere along the coast being a SAINT anywhere between .85m and 1.30m. I’ve watched every single video of it showing consistently and maybe having like 3 stops total in 50+ videos of bad ride after bad ride. The horse is godly I have no doubt. But like I’ve said, client is a no go because of insurance.

[222orchids]

My horse has shivers. It never affected him as to walk, trot, canter, jump. It is not a lameness. It makes it difficult to impossible for the horse to hold a hind leg up for even a few seconds. My horse started showing it at about 12. I rode him to age 23-24, and then retired him to 100% pasture life. He is now 30. And looks like a million bucks! After about age 15 he could not easily be shod. From that age on, he was barefoot in back. Trimming was often difficult and required some creative effort. But he was taught to just raise his heels up, and rest only the toe on the ground, and the blacksmith could access the hoof to get the job done.
It is not a condition I would want to have again, to be honest. But if a horse is 12 with only mild symptoms, and the price takes the condition into account, I might be convinced. Best of luck if you move forward with this, with eyes open.
Personally, I have zero regrets. That horse gave me 110% of anything and everything I asked for.