Beckie Mabbutt

Tuesday June the 24th Anvil Vets in Copsale will be holding another one of their Open Evenings. It will be held at the practice from 6.30 - 8.30pm with Demonstrations from myself, a physio, dentist, horse behaviourist and some dissections to squirm at. Please feel free to join us for a free, informal, educational evening which will also include some sausages on the BBQ. For any more details feel free to get in touch all call the practice direct on 01403 731213.

Below is a mare I trimmed for the first time this week. She had very long feet and I predict hadn't been trimmed for about 6 months. She had excellent quality feet they were just very long and flared. I have added some red lines to the drawings to help show the angle changes that can be achieved with just one trim. Also please notice in the Pre-Trim picture the heels look low and week and are run forward. The way I have achieved the good strong upright heel in the picture at the bottom is by actually trimming all the folded heel off. This is often hard for people to get their heads round as people regularly tell me their horse has no heels and what do I go and do, trim it away! And straight away the owner comments that their heels look much stronger as a result but they can't quite get their heads around how that can be. There is no strength in something that is bend and folded over, so the distortions need to be removed first to get a good solid foundation.

Each spring Dougal a donkey in his late 30's suffers from a condition known as Seedy Toe/White Line disease. A cavity forms between the white line and the hoof wall causing them to separate. Bacteria weakens this bond and the hoof wall crumbles away. Below you can see I have trimmed away  some of the necrotic tissue to let the air get to it. Dougal isn't' lame with this condition and once all of the crumbly horn is removed healthy horn will grow down and in a few months he will have a normal foot again. I will post pictures on my site again in a few months to show this.