Vet Check Results

Brrrrr.  It was five degrees yesterday, and I got to spend the entire day (10:00-2:45) in the freezing cold barn.  I do have to admit that as freezing cold as it was, and as hungry as I was by the end of it (poor mare, I ate most of her brand new mints!) I really enjoyed myself.  Our vet was very interesting, and extremely knowledgeable.  She was fantastic about explaining things in a way that I could understand.  My medical terms are somewhat lacking ;)  I’ll give a brief summary of what the vet said:

1)       Her teeth need to be done.  We’d assumed as much, and had blamed some of her head throwing antics on her teeth.  Good to know we were right.

2)       Her feet are in terrible disarray, and the vet was surprised she wasn’t lame because of it.  We knew that as well, but the x-rays revealed just how bad it was.  Cadence’s only had shoes on since November.  She was reshod just before she came, and while she really didn’t need anything taken off of her feet, the farrier took a lot off of her toe.  The studs in her shoes don’t help, nor does the fact she’s had almost zero hoof growth since they were trimmed.  Thankfully, one of the other horses at the barn lost one of his back shoes, so the farrier had to come out today.  My hope is to apply some borium to her shoes, thus allowing us to remove the studs.  Yay!  That and a little corrective shoeing should solve that problem, and correct her bone angles.

3)       Being half warmblood, she has some navicular.  The vet essentially said that it’s not perfect, and a little outside of her acceptable zone, but not enough for it to be a problem.  This is the only thing that really worries me.

4)       She has a small round chip in one of her front legs.  The vet said its very small, and well rounded, so she’s probably had it since birth or shortly thereafter.

5)       She has a very small spur in one hock.  Again, vet said this is a non-issue.

The naviclar does worry me, because while most horses with that level of navicular never have issues, there’s no 100% guarantee that it won’t worsen with time.  Either way, she was essentially given a clean bill of health, with the exception of her teeth and feet, both of which we knew beforehand.  

 

 Pre vet-check mare

 Just drugged mare

 Drugged Mare

(She's never this well behaved in the crossties!)

 Mare waking up

 Mare waking up

Mare getting angry that we're looking at x-rays, and not her!