The barn that I ride at has a 31 year old ex Grand Prix jumper mike. He is practically retired a lesson or 2 a week at max. I have been helping out with the camp that my barn has the last couple of weeks. Mike is the most chill horse I have ever met and I have only seen him canter like 2 times. One day he was out in a paddock and he picked up a extremely fast canter and almost jumped out of the paddock then started pacing we went to calm him down (me and a friend) gave him some treats he seemed fine and they needed us to help lead horses In the ring so we left. We went back to check on him and saw him almost jump out of the paddock again. We almost did it but not quite. We brought him inside to be safe. Anyone know why this was happening and/or how to prevent it happening again?
The barn I'm at is beautiful and the horses all seem well cared for and happy. I went away for 1.5 days and on my way home the manager messaged me and said "Your horse pulled his front shoe halfway off. He is lame. I messaged the farrier". I said he's done this before and the quarter clip sticks into his foot and usually he's fine once it's pulled and that I'd check on him when I got home around 7. To be fair, I didn't ask them to pull the shoe, but also I didn't know he was "broken leg" lame either based on that message...
When I got there he was limping horribly on that front foot from the shoe digging in and kinda stiff all over even in the hind end and he was sweating and that front leg was a little trembly. I was luckily able to pull the shoe off easily but he still seemed off all over. Of course I called the vet to come out immediately. Then I calmed down and checked his walking again and he got much better (weight bearing evenly on the matted aisle, still super sensitive on hard ground) and so I called the vet off for the night.
My first worry is that they just left him in his stall like that and didn't try to pull the shoe. I also feel that they did not make the severity of the lameness clear to me (he was walking like he broke his leg). He was eating and wasn't in super obvious distress but like I said he was sweaty and trembling slightly. I left around 8pm that night and sent her a message saying he still didn't have a poop from dinner and I'd be back in a few hours to check. She had the property owner check and he had thankfully pooped. All I can keep thinking about is if I had been away when this happened, no one would have really kept a close eye and he would have worked himself up into a colic.
He got worse again after a day so I had the vet out. I was in communication with the farrier but he didn't actually come until 3 days after the shoe was pulled. The vet did X-rays and found no fractures and advised me to soak, poultice, and wrap. Luckily about 5 days later he is sound on the barn floor and looks like we have an abscess about to pop. I've been keeping him inside because it is about a 1/4 mile walk on a gravel/rocky road to get outside and he is still very lame when he hits pavement.
I made peace with the fact that this was a miscommunication and that I had overreacted slightly. Then I went outside to pick his paddock the other day and noticed his water bucket had been moved over one. I found out that they moved him to help the grass, I checked the paddock diagram to make sure I was correct that they had done this. So I went in to pick that paddock too since he pooped in there and the footing is so uneven and bad in there. It's hard to describe but it has really clumpy tall grass and it is almost like walking on a mattress with divets. I'm guessing is why the shoe came off and on top of that he is rehabbing from a suspensory injury that I did a PRP injection for ($$$) last year and I don't feel that he should have been moved to footing like that without them notifying me. The BM knows about his injury, but maybe I should have left a note on his door as well? I also find it a little weird that I asked if they saw him do anything dumb that may have caused the shoe to come off and they didn't mention that anything was different at all...
I recently asked if he could be moved to a closer paddock so that he doesn't have to walk so far on the gravel, hoping that I would be offered one with better footing without having to risk insulting the other paddock/their decision to move him there. The new paddock she suggested to me has even worse footing than the one he pulled the shoe in, and it is very wet almost like bog land. I walked around a little and realized that most of the paddocks are like this. I realize this is my error and that I should have looked closer before moving in. The original one he had seems to actually be one of the best there is...
I have the option to move him to my parents house an hour away from me and keep him there for free. He wouldn't get worked as much (well he's not being worked at all right now because of his feet) but I think I'd feel more like someone would notice if he had an injury.
The kicker is that I only got to this barn ONE month ago. I know I'll be paying an extra month if I leave because of the contract.
What would you do?/Am I overreacting?
TL;DR: Horse is at new barn, rehabbing from suspensory injury. He was moved into a new paddock w bad footing and pulled his shoe halfway off, causing an abscess/extreme lameness. I was notified of the lameness but not the severity, and they did not try to pull the shoe.. would you move?
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