> Yes, after a hard race (which obviously
> has more stress to it than daily conditioning) you may likely see
> filling, muscle soreness, etc. But your daily conditioning should not
> routinely cause stocking up. I have done this to horses myself. I've
> learned the hard (dumb?) way. I was left with horse with permanently
> thickened ankles and/or major windpuffs. I know now that I pushed
> these young horses to hard. I believe the big culprit is impact
> related, unconditioned bones and joints besides tendons and ligaments.
My experience and observatons with regards to exercised induced "stocking
up" and permanently thickened ankles and/or major wind puffs is that they
are caused by insufficient cool down after exercise.
Rarely ever do you see ex-racehorses with windpuffs, and I suspect that
the reason for this is that racehorses have grooms who properly cool them
out after exercise, not because racehorses are never asked to do too much
too young (NOT).
Movement until the horse's heartrate has returned to its resting rate and
the skin and joint tissue of the lower legs has tightened up (it stretches
and becomes more elastic with the heat of work) is what helps the blood
and other fluids return to the body, instead of pooling in the legs.
Endurance horses are especially prone to stocking up and (over the long
term) windpuffs, because it is hard to take the time to sufficiently cool
out the horse after work. YOu have just gone out and ridden your horse
for three hours on the trail (which you barely have time to fit in), you
don't have time to hand walk the horse for an hour.
....And we have even less time/ability to do it ater a race. You've just
ridden your horse 50/100 miles. The last thing you (or your horse for
that matter) wants to do is walk around to cool out; he needs to eat and
drink, not walk around. But even so....we do try. Why else do you see
people up at 2 o'clock in the morning hand walking their horse around.
Not just to keep those muscles loose, but to prevent stocking up.
I am still trying to figure out a way to manage this after a race, how
does my horse walk and eat at the same tim...ice on the lower legs (lots
of people have begun using Ice Tight and other braces) helps alot.
But...when it comes to your exercise training program...schedule in the
time to cool your horse out properly. If you have a large
paddock/pasture...the horse will cool himself out while walking around
grazing...ideal. If you don't; you're going to have to hand walk the
horse (my experience is for AT LEAST 1/2 hour and that's only if you
walked the last part of your training ride. If you trotted back to the
barn, figure on at least an hour).
Your other option is to just live with the wind puffs. Rarely ever do
they cause any clinical lameness (although I am not convinced that they
are harmless...I am inclined to believe that there is some damage to the
leg structure that contributes to weakness and makes them more prone to
other types of injury, most notably--I am not a vet, here I am
guessing--arthritis).
kat
Orange County, Calif.
>
> One other possibility by the way is a change in shoeing. If a farrier
> has trimmed and shod your horse out of balance or changed the
> angles/degrees of the feet it will stress the leg structures.
>
> Bonnie Snodgrass
>
>