I m sitting at the airport heading home, I had the opportunity to be in Wellington and met up with a few farriers for coffee at the beginning of the last few mornings at the bagel shop and training barns. I was amazed to hear from several how bad the thrush and white line is down here and to hear that ,in their opinion how rampant the same is in the higher level horses coming in from Europe. Understand, the term was from Europe ,no particular,exact country, something I probably should have defined. I m a little confused ,based upon observation here bout how few pads are used in England and Ireland based I m sure a lot on the often wet moist climate. The horses I m talking bout are in the wash racks several times a day, but that ,in my mind does not compare to some of the wet environments seen in The British Isles. The other surprise to me was that many, and again many was used in a general description,arrive ,if wearing pads had a v cut out exposing the frog, and that often the frog is non existant or seriously impaired. the farriers here do that also because of the ring/sand material getting up under the pad. In this set up no hoof packing is used. To me a perfect neighborhood/setup for fungus to thrive. So I ve decided to make a leather pad impregnated with copper particles and a hoof packing bound with a material that will not absorb water but will hold copper laced Venice turpentine in place ,hoping to seal the area under the "full pad" keeping the vt in place to attack the fungus. Sound reasonable? Thanks in advance Ray
Wellington, FL? There's a Saddlebred farrier I know of that soaks his top layer of leather in some mixture rumored to contain copper sulfate and iodine. I realize that doesn't really mean much being as his solution is "proprietary", but it seems to have little influence on the "gunk" in horses I've worked on behind him. I keep a jar of Copper Sulfate crystals in the truck. Drop a piece of Forschners in and knead in what sticks. I don't use it prophylactically because I'm lazy, but it seems to work well for me.
I use copper sulfate under impression material, usually. I don't bother to knead it in. I just sprinkle it on the hoof side of the IM and make a "sugar cookie" to go against the foot. Regards
It's been wet here since Oct. and will be through May. All of the above sounds good, after, the foot has been well dosed with Durasole. A lot of then time that's all I'll use and find it right where I left it with minimal or no thrush. It's a great fungicide too.
My thinking with the copper penetration into the leather is that unlike water soluble applications such as cu sulphate and or lighter than water oily applications ie iodine and or cu napthanate etc. that might be displaced by the water the cu impregnation would stay in place thru the life of the shoeing cycle and be activated by the very cause of the failure of the other materials used..... water. Talking to these folk led me to believe that none of the remedies that have been stated have worked, so i m thinking out loud here. I ve had good success with with full pads, packed with a Venice Terpentine/ leather dust mix,covered with a piece of Hoof Phelt. I believe that the leather /plastic combo pad gets better results than my straight leather pad. I say this because I think the straight leather in veg tanned and the leather used in the thin leather plastics is chrome tanned and then re veg tanned. The chromium is a heavy metal, and is anti fungal . As told to me the VT leather dust down in the Wellington(show horse) environment bunches up causing brusing because the VT gets washed out of the leather dust. I suggesting a water proof filler material in place of the leather dust. thanks for your ideas/suggestions/etc ray
Interesting Ray. Tell me are the many pads used over there for lameness or prevention? I am going to use a pad tomrow, haven't used one since August before that.
My 99% of the time set up is plastic pads and soft Equthain, with the foot well soaked with Durasole. Ocationaly, if I think I need to, I'll add powered copper sulfate. The equthane keeps out sand and mud fairly well.
David, pads are used for a # of reasons here, lameness intervention , prevention, and gait enhancement/ control, snow, ice control/ impact, release etc. and of course ,quick fix or if one does not have an answer , put a pad on it! that said, these farriers are looking at a problem and they have asked me, got any ideas? My problem is that I "got" lotsa ideas. These guys don t use pads if they don t need to but one top gun has used up approx 120 pair of my leathers in the last 45 days! and probably some of another manufacturer, if that gives you any indication. Remember , in that area, they shoe for go, that is, their customers expect to show up at the show ring tomorrow, no matter. If they ve been trucked in, flown in for this meet, the customer expects to compete and the attending farrier had better get them to the show ring. Horses from Asia, USA, Europe, they don t show up to be stall bound or on recovery ! Bill, these guys tell me that your solution, though sound and practical, doesn t cut it there! Different sand box.............literally Ray
