How do I care for a foundering horse? Will she need to be put down?

Question

She is not mine, and has been foundering on both front feet the past 2 wks. It was caught early and the people want to put her down because they don't have much room to keep her. I want to buy her... Will it be expensive to properly car for her? Please HELP!!

Answer 1

depends... not the answer you wanted but heres why. after her feet have gone "cold" radiograph the feet to determine the degree of rotation in the coffin bone. founder in and of its self is not a death sentance, it is not always a debilitating issue either. that will depend on the amount and degree of rotation in the coffin bone. the more rotation the more you will have to do to keep the horse comfortable and the more effort it will take to prevent flareups. many people confuse laminitis with founder, if there is no rotation there is no founder. laminitis is the prerequisite condition for founder. all it is- is an inflammtion of the laminea in the hoof. sometimes it only happens once and never again, sometimes it reoccurs over and over until founder and death are inevitable. secretariat was euthanized because of recurring untreatable laminitis. rotation can be as little as a percent of a fraction or as severe as double digit rotation. if the horse has an otherwise healthy hoof and minor to moderate rotation supportive care should be minimal. i owned a mare with very minor rotation that had no crest, no dishing or ridging in the hoof and she stayed sound with no issue barefoot and could be kept on grass with no muzzle. you just had to remove her from spring grass and corn. i have seen others that require egg bar shoes, daily bute and were barely pasture sound. as for future care you will always have to watch what you feed, and the horses weight. her feet will remain a top priority and must be done regularly by a competant farrier. talk to the farrier and vet if possible about the horses condition. if they believe she isn't terribly foundered theres a good chance she'll be fine for trail and pleasure riding. this issue will never go away and will require hawk like vigilance but it can be managed and dosen't always leave you with a cripple. more often than not the foundered horses i have encountered remained useful and painfree with minimal care, many didn't even need shoes. again it all depends on her rotation and general hoof health. if she already had foot problems they certainly wont improve after this. as a rule forage will have to be monitered carefully for the rest of this horses life. that means you will have to inspect your pastures carefully for clover, alfalfa and to keep a general idea of the lushness of your pasture. you will have to adjust exercise and grazing to match what you have and what she needs. you may have to stable her at nights or use a grazing muzzle. you will have to watch your grain, many foundered horses cannot have any grain. if for some reason you must grain you have to watch what you feed. no corn, no molasses and low sugar content. beet pulp and a small amount of 10% pelleted safe feed is what i would feed. ask your grainery about feed for foundered horses, they probably have a blend or brand they carry that will be safe to feed. again only grain if you must. hay must be monitered for mold, alfalfa and density. not all hay is created equal. bermuda, timothy, or orchard grass hay are fine to feed, but weigh what you feed. 1 sliver of one bale may not be the same weight as another. its easy to overfeed if you just eyeball or guess. with a foundered horse you must know what your feeding and how much. as for anything costly the horse may need special supportive shoes or pain medication for flareups and bad days. normally thats about the worst of it. foundered horses require time more than anything., if the horse is severly foundered i would let the owner euthanize, it sounds mean but a life in pain is no kinda life to me. so in short you have to ask lots of questions to see just how bad it is and weigh whether or not you want to spend that much effort in caring for a foundered horse.

Answer 2

Foundering happens for a lot of different reasons, but the basic idea is that the blood vessels that help bind the coffin bone to the hoof start to die and then the ligiments at the back of the foot pull the coffin bone away from the foot.

With that said, you want to increase blood circulation to the hoof. Most vets will give "Ace" or "Isoxopriene" - Ace is the most important. Both are fairly inexpensive. A vet might also try "Nitroglycerine" cream or patches to help increase blood flow. Some vets and farriers recomend recessing the hoof (cutting away the front part of the hoof drastically) to promote fresh growth. It is also recomended that the farrier put some type of pad under the horse's foot to give extra support to the coffin bone. Cold water bathes on the hooves will help. "Icthamol" cream at the coronary band will help, but unfortunately some of it comes down to dumb luck.

The really bad part is that most horses that have foundered once will probably do it again. Personally I wouldn't want anything to do with that horse because it will become expensive fast and probably end in heart ache, but maybe it is a really great horse in which case I wish you the best of luck!

Michael Hockemeyer
Kicking Bear Mustangs

Answer 3

When you place a horse down it manner it's being positioned to sleep, or killed. A horse does the whole lot on its legs. If a horse have been to put down for too lengthy its intestions would twist and the pony might die. I am so sorry to your buddy, you and of direction the pony. :'( If you're curious approximately the method of placing down a horse learn on. Though if now not i wouldnt hold studying. First the vet will supply the pony a sort of anestetic to make the pony lie down. that method the pony wont fall. (this isn't continuously performed however it's performed most often) then the pony is given the shot with a view to give up the guts. it's painless even though. However the pony will attempt to stand, flail and cry or neigh within the method. It may be very and tremendously unhappy and tough to observe. If your buddy is there for it i might definatly alleviation her afterwards. Ive noticeable it performed and i will be able to under no circumstances fail to remember it. :( Best desires, simply aid your buddy bear in mind the horses pleased lifestyles

Answer 4

hi

foundering is kind of like food poisoning to a horse, too much rich grass or feed can become toxic to a horse's system. It can also happen in severely overweight horses. The horse's feet are never the same again and they are much more likely to founder in the future. What happens in the legs/hooves is that the coffin bone starts to separate from the hoof wall and then starts to rotate. It causes severe and dehabilitating pain and inflammation.

It is treatable. She must be taken away from the trigger. Gorging on the new spring grass must be stopped. Other triggers are by poisonous plants in the pasture: nightshade, leaves and acorns from oak, black walnut, wild cherry, red maple. Not all horses are effected The ones who do not founder tended to be more active, ie, they have more circulation.

Gorging on the rich new spring grass, or on concentrated carbohydrates, both raise the acidity in the gut suddenly. This sudden increase in gut acidity results in a massive die-off of normal gut bacteria. The poisonous by-products of these dead bacteria, endotoxins, cause inflammation and edema in the laminae. both the new grass--and foundered horses--have higher lactic acid levels.

The vet will be able to suggest her best form of treatment. The fastest fix is giving UAA Gel (activated charcoal)....coupled with a correct barefoot trim and plenty of movement in a turnout situation.

My friends horse foundered so badly that he was down most of the time, and was eating and drinking less and less after pain-killers gave him ulcers. What turned this around was correct trimming, a couple doses of activated charcoal, more activity and discontinuing pain-killers.

IT'S SO NICE TO HEAR THAT YOUR WILLING TO OFFER THIS HORSE A SECOND CHANCE.
HAVE FAITH, GIVE HER LOTS OF LOVE AND GOOD LUCK.

Answer 5

First of all, she is not worth buying. Ask them if you can have her. I'm sure they will just give her to you if they plan on putting her down. She needs to be stalled and treated with banamine or bute. No grain, no grass, no alfalfa hay. Depending on how bad she is, she needs to be stalled with no turnout. Exercise allows the laminae to detach even more. Find the pulse down at her coronet band. You will find it back around her pastern area. Keeping track of the pulse is a great indication if she is getting better or not. There should be no pulse when she is fine. Good supplement to put her on is MSM, it helps to get the blood circulating and NEVER take her off of it. There is feeds out there that you can feed the mare that is not sweet feed and its a low starch high fiber diet. Pennfield makes a great feed called Fibregized. Pennfield.com and its a speciality feed. I don't know where you live and if you can get your hands on it or not. Only feed her a handful, it won't hurt her. That will be enough to get her supplement down. Have the farrier come out and trim her, she will need to be trimmed every two-3 weeks or at least looked at. If shes real bad shoes may help her out but thats for the farrier to decide if he is educated enough. There's so much to taking care of a foundering horse depending on how bad the case is. What you may think is bad, isn't what I may think as bad. I hope this is enough right now to give you a idea of what you will be dealing with. With any luck she will have no rotation and will be sound again soon with tedious care. Contact me if you'd like

Answer 6

Have this mare's owners give her to you, if you get her at all. They should be grateful that someone is willing to take a horse that probably will need to be euthanized off their hands for nothing. Then, you are going to need to have the mare examined by a vet and also by a farrier to determine just how much damage ( e.g. coffin bone rotation) has been done, and how much pain the mare is in and will be experiencing in the future. Depending on the severity of the damage, you will have to make a decision as to what the mare's future will be- and you will want to take the cost of caring for a horse that will probably never recover into consideration.
I cannot make such a choice for you- I can only say that in my own experience, attempting to save a foundered horse is rarely worth it. The horse needs to have part of her feet cut away, so her hooves will grow back in a normal way, and she will need special shoes. She will also need to be on painkillers and ulcer meds for the rest of her life, and these drugs aren't cheap. This mare will never be able to eat large quanities of ANYTHING, ever again- part of the reason she foundered in the first place was probably carbohydrate overload. She will also need to be restricted in her exercise once her feet have been operated on, so the wounds can heal without infection and further damage. Horses who founder are at considerable risk for infections in their feet, mainly due to abscesses from pressure. ( It was an infection of this type, compounded by a fresh attack of this disease, that killed the racehorse Barbaro last January.) You need to ask yourself if you can afford to cope with this kind of situation, both emotionally and financially. I know that I could not, and cannot, but perhaps you are different. I have never been able to stand seeing an animal suffer needlessly for no reason, and keeping a foundered horse alive is usually a cruel thing to do, in my experience. I once knew a mare who was so crippled by this disease that she was WALKING-that's right, WALKING, on her KNEES!!! Her front feet were hideously deformed and she couldn't possibly use them- and she actually had to wear special kneepads to prevent her from getting ulcers and abscesses on the knee joints. The poor mare was in constant agony, but her owners were keeping her alive so she could have foals for them- which was cruel in itself, because she could NOT keep up with her babies when they got older and started to learn to run and play. This may not be what happens to this mare if you get her, but it is worth thinking about- what happened to this mare I knew could happen with this horse you are thinking of getting. Could you deal with something like that? I hated seeing that horse suffer- and her owners should have been more compassionate and put the mare down years earlier, but NO, they wanted the money that her foals would bring, and could have cared less that she was in agony most of the time. I do not share this experience to be preachy- heaven knows you have a hard enough decision to make- but I want to make sure that you think long and hard about what you are planning to do. Good luck.

Answer 7

Foundering maybe due to Cushings Disease or just too many carbs. Once a horse has foundered it should not be turned out to pasture without a muzzle and have no grain, EVER, meaning for the rest of it's life as it may reoccur quickly the 2nd time. When you get her back in shape remember that it is a lifelong change in diet. We had a horse with Cushings, he did well for 2 years on diet changes. He was not able to take the medicine, he would stock up on any dose we gave him, tried 2 medications. He was given to us because of these problems and was a great horse, near the end he was very lathargic and continually had hoof abcesses. Then we knew it was time, sure do miss him.... Sweet feed should be outlawed, it is not natural to feed this to horses, only sets them up for metabolic problems later on.

Answer 8

I wouldnt consider buying her. But see if they would GIVE her to you.
Well i have not been able to see how bad this horses founder is, so can not really say how much it will cost for everything. I would ask a farrier or vet to come down and look at her front two feet. That will be the best answer that you can get from anyone.

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Answer 9

My first thought is if they want to put her down, then they could give her to you, after all they are saving the cost of either disposing of her or looking after her. Time to look at it with a 'sensible' head on, if you want to but a horse, buy a sound one, with no issues.
If you really want to take her on, the best thing would be to talk to her vet, and see what he says the prognosis is.
Founder itself is not expensive to control, just restricting her time out at grass when the first growing flush is in. She will need to be in a starvation paddock some of the time.

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Answer 10

CALL THE VET! It's often connected to laminitis which is caused by overloading the stomach with carbs-- It cuts off the blood supply and basically you need to stop letting your horse eat so much =) Cut back on grain and possibly stop it all together, don't let her eat grass in the pasture and put her on a good hay! But don't feed her too much-- You probably won't have to put her down!