Report on use of Tenderfoot  Formulae 80 and 4162

 Horse Casper, 16.3hh TB Gelding, 30 years old.  Chronic low grade laminitic.  Shoeless and sound but with poor hoof growth and tender on stones.  Recent (unconnected) blood tests confirmed that all of his vital organs are functioning normally.  Until this experiment Casper was living on the recommended amount of Top Spec Anti-Lam, Spillers Happy Hoof and Spillers Horse and Pony Cubes.  Before this he constantly had digital pulses in his hooves (indicating inflammation) of 2 - 3 out of 5 (where 0 is undetectable and 5 is so strong it is visible).  On Top Spec Anti-Lam these pulses came down to 1 out of 5.

 Before beginning the experiment I stopped the Anti-Lam for 3 days, feeding him only the Happy Hoof and Cubes.   His pulses went up to 2 out of 5.

 Formula 4162

 Taste           When offered the supplement neat, he was not interested.  If mixed into dampened feed, he would eat the feed but leave residual water which had the supplement in it.  However, if I dampened the feed an hour beforehand and left it to swell and absorb all of the water he would eat it all.

 Results        At the beginning Casper was moderately tender on large stones and had pulses of 2 out of 5.  At the end his pulses were 1 out of 5 and he was mildly tender on large stones.

Tenderfoot 80

I left a gap of 3 days between the last supplement and this one.

Taste           When offered the supplement neat, he was not interested.  If mixed into dampened feed, he would happily finish up everything, regardless of whether the water was fully absorbed in the feed.

Results        At the beginning Casper was moderately tender on large stones and had pulses of 2 out of 5.  At the end his pulses were undetectable and he was confident walking on any surface.

It should be said that in the middle of his Tenderfoot 80 trial, Casper suffered a very serious illness, the cause of which has still not yet been found.  It resulted in a very high temperature and moderate Ataxia (were the messages travelling along his spine were significantly weakened), effectively making him very wobbly on his legs.  The Tenderfoot 80 was stopped for 24 hours and he was just given a little Happy Hoof and a scoop of Pony Nuts, then was re-introduced the next day when his appetite returned.  Although we still do not know the cause, the vet was very surprised by the speed with which he recovered from the initial illness and high temperature, although he is still Ataxic, but improving slowly.

 Jayne Hunt

Equine Podiatrist

Mob 07979 354 658