Bizarre feet of Legend

This week I thought I'd start the blog with some bizarre looking feet. These belong to Legend, who has been here 8 weeks now. He came here because of a long term navicular lameness but had also suffered from mechanical laminitis while in remedial shoes. 

When he arrived here he had very distorted hooves. He had been out of shoes for about 6 weeks but the nail holes are still visible. He'd just started to grow a better connected hoof capsule but it was clear he had massive changes to make. 

Here he is 8 weeks later, with a reasonable amount of new hoof capsule grown in. The problem is, though, that he has a double whammy of issues: weak heels, frogs and digital cushion and related soft tissue injuries (a safe assumption) from the navicular PLUS thin soles, long toes and solar and laminar pain from the laminitis. 

In practice, this means rehab is a slow, difficult process - even more than usual - because while his weak palmar hoof needs movement to strengthen it, the work has to be done in a way that doesn't damage his thin soles. 

However, despite having restrictions as to what we can let him do in the way of exercise, he is making some good changes to his feet. You can see in these photos that his heels are becoming more supportive and - although his toes are shockingly long still in the lateral shots - the foot is becoming more balanced. 

Here is his foot from the front, day one versus today.  The new hoof capsule growth is clear in the lower shot and I hope you can see that the medio-lateral balance is better too. 

There is always a danger in posting photos of really odd-looking hooves. 

I suspect that a lot of you will be thinking that he would be far better off if his feet were trimmed and particularly if the toe was taken back. 

Believe me, I would like nothing better (cosmetically) than to take a pair of nippers and a rasp to these feet and make them look pretty......BUT feet that look prettier in photos on the blog are no good to me or - especially - to Legend or to his owners unless he is also sounder on them and moving more freely. 

Of course, in one way it would help his biomechanics if he had a shorter toe...BUT if you whack off the toe in a trim that will immediately overload the palmar area, not good for a DDFT and collateral ligaments which are already under strain and which are in the early stages of becoming stronger. 

Also, if you look again at the solar view you can see that there really isn't that much which you could trim without being invasive - its not that his white line has stretched, its his whole hoof capsule which distorted with the remedial farriery - so again, although the appearance of the hoof from above tells you to trim, everything else is telling you to leave well alone. 

Legend is doing a great job of changing his feet and improving them as fast as he possibly can, but if we try to accelerate that by "rebalancing" his feet today then all we will do is put the tendons and ligaments within his hoof under even more strain than they are already - and he will be less sound not more sound - though his feet will appear "prettier" and may look less bizarre on the internet - but (for me) that's not a good enough reason to trim!