My turn for a question to the CoTH wisdom-from-experience crowd. LONG!
Background: I have 25 year old Andalusian/ASB mare that I bought when she was 16 months. She’s ridden with dressage principles in mind (straight, connected) and we used to go on longish trail rides moving along at a trot whenever the trails permitted. She’s been shod every 6 weeks by an excellent farrier since she was about 6 years; she had radiographs a few weeks ago and they showed her feet to be clean and properly angled. She is a leggy girl with a long back and weakish coupling, but has never shown lameness. She has PPID and has been on Prascend for about 2 years. Due to my own soundness issues, she’s been in light work or on the shelf since spring of 2023.
She’s always built up a platform to prop her hind hooves up when standing in a paddock or barn, and seems to be making the platform larger in recent years. Her pastern angles are good and don’t show signs of DSLD, so I’ve attributed this to relieving discomfort due to her less than ideal conformation of her back. Last fall she was tested for Lyme (due to her unusual sour attitude toward life in general) and came back with a weak positive, which the vet thought was due to exposure not an active case. A lameness exam showed slightly arthritic stifles, and going on a daily Equioxx brought back her usual contented attitude.
This spring she was brought back to light ringwork as a schoolhorse. She’s been looking
wobbly behind and twists her hocks especially in softer footing. She can look pretty normal for a while then it gets more noticeable after being ridden lightly for a while. She passed the neurological exams. The last vet palpated/manipulated her back above her SI and thought the mare is sore there so we thought the wobbly hind end was due to that.
Two nights ago I got a call from my friend to come out because my usually peaceful mare was acting very strange. She was very “up” and erratic - totally opposite of her usual behavior. She would toss and shake her head like she had something in her ears (wearing an ear-covering fly mask when I arrived, and the behavior didn’t change after I removed it). She lifted each foreleg like she was doing the Spanish Walk or getting ready to paw. Waiting for the vet, I did many laps with her walking the roundpen and while she was obliging, she was walking faster than her usual and remained hyperalert; I’d periodically stop her for observation and she’d either immediately start the foreleg waving or yawn and manipulate her tongue with her mouth gaping, then do the foreleg thing again; she wasn’t able to remain standing still for even one minute.
Vet checked for colic symptoms and concluded that wasn’t the issue. Despite my mare having been in season a few weeks ago (so theoretically she was out now), our next thought was hormones, especially as an unfamiliar gelding had been brought earlier in the day, even though my mare wasn’t showing her usual heat behavior. The vet palpated for manure balls - present - and the ovaries. The left ovary brought a big pain flinch when palpated. Vet ultrasounded ovaries and uterus and didn’t see anything notable; also ultrasounded the abdomen from the outside to see if anything showed up (I think more as a training opportunity for the new vet who was also present, but beneficial as the mare is a grey). Prescribed Regumate, especially as the mare has had a few hormonal episodes every so often over the years; too soon to say yet what effect that will have.
So, finally, my question – has anyone seen a case where pain from an ovary caused a mare to be wobbly/twisty in her hind end? or am I just hitting the lottery with problems for my poor. aging, lovely mare?
