Another Foot Question

What is up with this white/water line? It doesn't appear to be flared, it's like the line is gritty and made of dirt, I rasp it off, but I never get to a solid spot. I really can't take much more out of the hoof, and to me the angles and trim look fine, not perfect by a long shot, but fine imo. Could it be white line disease? I am mortified right now.

Half way through the trim, white line more or less visible:


Trim finished, white line gone:


Outer view, to show the trim/angles and how I don't think I should take off any more off those walls:

Bit more info:

-hoof wall is very strong and very thick with no cracking or chipping at all
-outer hoof wall is very straight from coronet to break over, I can lay the rasp against any part of it and I get uniform contact, no bulges, indents, or rings
-hoof is a touch thrushy, has slight smell and is being treated with a good scrub daily with detergent and then a mixture similar to the one recommended in my last thread is applied
-paddocks are muddy, there is no solid ground anywhere that he can walk on aside from his stall, and the silly fool pees and then stand on the same spot all night for some unknown reason so it is hard to get his feet to really dry

Looking at the pictures, I guess his toe could probably come back right to the sole which would eliminate much of that seedy space, but looking at his feet, I am hesitant. You can see from the side view how close the break over is to the sole and how very thick the wall is, also how removing much more would make the toe callous more responsible for carrying weight than I think it should be (correct me on that). I'd like opinions before I try to do too much more with him.

It's definitely separated a bit. I find that Dexter's get like this (just happen to be white feet too) if I go too long between trims. When the toe gets too long it prys up and away from the wall and all the crusher dust gets wedged in there. I imagine that probably seperates it further. It's hard to tell from the pictures but it looks like the wall on the toe is higher than the sole at the toe. That would suggest that the toe can come back further (and and even distance all the way around the foot - it's a bit thicker on the outside in that first photo). How often are you trimming now?

I'm curious to see what Barefoot Horsegirl has to say about it.

I have the foot sort of tipped tward the camera, the wall is a bit lower than the sole at the toe but not by much. I see what you mean about the uniform distance around the foot, looking at the photos I can see where It needs to be pulled back, but looking at his feet last night I was like 'eeeeesshhh, I dunno if I should...'. I need to start listening to the hoof a bit more, I think.

I was trimming every two weeks, and sadly went on a hiatus and missed a trim, so it has been four weeks since their last one (bad horse mom). The big guy is ok, he has very slow growing hooves, this little guy's walls grow like dandelions. So as you can see in the first pic, it took a good rasp to get the wall level with the sole again, and then I had to do some reshaping of the contour and heel (he was flush to the frog all around, nothing to wear his hoofies down on around these parts!).

I am going to tackle Amigo's hinds and T's fronts tonight, maybe I will move the toe back a touch and see where we are at. I have a side view of him standing on it and I can see where the toe is longer and not matching the angle of the heel. More pics to follow I suppose!

Last night I was in a bit of a panic watching his white line crumble away... my heart near stopped. I feel like crap for letting them go so long. Especially at this time of year.

I would back the toe all the way back. It seems like you are angling your rasp in the quarters and I think the heels can be brought back more. Can you post a side shot with your camera on the floor?

What about the bars?

That is the best pic I have until tonight. Looking at this over the last few hours I can see how the toe is clearly too long, but with his toe so seedy I didn't want to start cutting him back and have nothing behind it if there is something wrong. I get great joy out of doing this but sometimes it is a little daunting!!

I do angle the rasp slightly at the corners but once I finish the roll I find there is very little concavity on the quarter once the foot is back on the ground, as seen in the side view above. Is this wrong to do?

Also what about the bars? They are ~1/2 inch deep in the collateral groove right now. Would a picture taken from the floor of the heel help? The frog is sitting about 1/3-1/2 of an inch above the buttress (when the hoof is inverted).

that toe could definatly be backed up at bit, but anyway.. you shouldnt really see concavity when its on the ground, the hoof has more elasticity than some may think.
I had the same problem with Bensons last summer, he had gone two months without a trim because I had sent him back to his breeders for a bit while I finished up with finals.. I couldnt figure out for the life of me what was causing it, he was on a good diet, nice dry paddock, his overall hoof looked healthy, .. now that I think about it, that was probably the cause, after a while it went away. Put some anti fungal on it, i prefer tea tree oil.. and if hes not obviously bothered or hindered by it, just wait till his next trim.

When you're backing the toe are you holding your rasp vertically, rasping at 12 and blending at 10 and 2? See how the toe is on this foot:


See how the heels are with this foot:

Now, in this pic, the bars are still a bit high on the inside heel, but it will give you an idea of what I'm trying to say. From your pics it looks like your not getting a totally clean heel triangle. You need to tweak your heels just a little bit. Open the heal, move the head of your rasp back towards you if that makes sense, and keep it FLAT. When your rasping in the quarters, keep your rasp flat, don't angle it.

Its a different trim then I'm used so I may not be the best person to get advice from.

Sorry the pics are so big. Those pics are both of the same foot, at the same trim, just different angles.

Can you take better outside pics, sole and heel shots? Your side pic is perfect.

I do roughly the same thing, not so up and down on the front but amigo might need that to take off the toe, and I put more of a roll on the quarter. But aside from that, I try to accomplish the same thing. My heels look a little different, they aren't so flat, do you use a knife? I don't like cutting into the hoof at all (just not comfortable with it) so with the rasp it is harder to get a good concave into the frog along the bars like in the pic. Something I need to work on!

I will be taking pics this afternoon, had a bit of an emergency and couldn't do hooves last night. Hopefully these will be a bit better.

You will have to get over the fear of the knife! You can see in your last pic in the original post that the bars need to come down below the wall level (there's almost a sharp "shelf" - sorry can't describe it right). That's what mine look like when I'm finished rasping the heels, then I go in with the knife and lower the bars.

If you don't take the bars down there tehy will be weight bearing and ouchy for the horse.

You normally get seperation if the toe is too long..Live with a Certified farrier too long..

Salsasue

LOL not the first time I heard that, Azure. I really really do, but I'm scared of slipping and cutting too deep or cutting my hand off or something. I just sort of slowly pick with the little curve at the end and shave off bits. So sad, and I don't own my own, maybe I will pick one up and get over myself.

Ok, I have follow up pics, Amigo was just darling this evening and after rearing twice in the crossties (he has a crosstie issue, among other 'issues') I made sure they were even and threw in the towel. It just wasn't going to get any better tonight. I did as much as I could with the toes, rasped the quarters down a touch, they don't look much better, but the pony is still alive after his antics so I suppose I did very well!

These pics are from different hooves, but the problem was the same on all of them, and they are all looking the same now.

I snapped this pic while I could, the inside half of the hoof more or less done (obviously the other half was done after this):


Toe looks like I did nothing, I did move it up some, if not back, looks better from the underside I think.


Not that you can see much through the feathers, but I think the heels look a bit better now height wise:


What I think might need to happen is like in the pic BF_HG posted, the wall needs to be sheared off at a pretty steep angle. The quarters however, should I keep rasping them as I do? or shear the separation off? I would think they might need a bit more of an angle over the next couple trims, as I really, really dont like this seedy business and I'm thinking the continual pressure of walking in thick muddy clay is only going to make it worse if I don't get it dealt with sooner rather than later, even if the walls are in check. I can't believe his wall got so long in 4 weeks to cause such a level of all around separation. The big guy looks like I trimmed him a few days ago, his wall is still level with the sole, his heels need work (they always do) and his sole is FLAT as a board along the frog (as it always is) with a massive toe callous. I was done his trim in 10 minutes. His feet don't grow, I'm convinced of it.

When you rasp or cut away at the line, does it look like there's becoming less of it? You reallly gotta use that knife, the bars gotta come right down. Your fine as longas you don't see any pink starting to show.

Here's a link of one of mine before trim, his case wasn't half as bad as the mares, after a few trims it cleared right up.
https://s119.photobucket.com/albums/o126/htrimm08/?action=view¤t=yeeaaa018.jpg&mediafilter=noflash

There's not really less of it in spots. That is why I am worried about it. Mind I didn't do too much this evening as he wouldn't stop performing airs above ground and frankly, hooves be damned if I have a horse fighting like a fish on a line in the barn. The little sh*t head. But anyways this brings me back to the original point, I look at the pics and I see where I need to go further, but doing the hoof I am getting no where and don't want to shear the wall if there is going to be nothing behind it. Also, this didn't happen over the course of several months of super long hoof growth, this was 4 weeks, and I have never had a problem with it before, and it did not look as bad (wide?) as it did before the trim. I literally rasped to the white line, rasped a roll, and the white like crumbled away with every stroke, leaving me with a seedy, dirty ring where it always was tight. I'm thinking this is going to go nowhere fast unless I shear the wall, which is fine at the toe, but not at the quarters. At least angling the quarters and curving them will keep the weight off the wall enough to let it grow in tightly.