Here's what's going on with Isabella, as emailed to a horsey friend of mine. Mainly for my benefit to look back to this lameness issue:

So we deducted that Isabella is off on the lower left foot area. She wasn't lame trotting straight, but circles to the left she was off on hard ground and she was off to the right on soft ground. Negative to hoof testers. He said that indicated in 80% of horses, that it was 2 different problems.. down in the foot somewhere and a high suspensory problem on the same leg, ugh. So he did a lower leg block and she was sound going both ways, which indicated it was just a lower leg problems. That's good..

So, in the dark (at 7pm!) he took about 6 xrays of her lower left front. What could it be? I'm ruling out ringbone because she wasn't positive to hoof testers.. maybe pedal osteitis? *sigh* I won't know till he calls me back today. If the xrays don't reveal anything, it's ultrasounding next. I kind of wish now I took her to PenEq so I would know already, but ah well. I trust Ashton and his experience..

After Ashton's phone call:
So, nothing found on xrays, ugh! Next step is ultrasound... Ashton says there are 2 gals in Davis that are very good at ultrasounding that have a drop in schedule in Fridays. The deal is Isabella goes in, they do their stuff, then I go home and they talk to Ashton about their findings. Wierd, eh? But it only costs $100 so I'm going to go for that option...

Other options were: Carol Gillis, an excellent ultrasonographer in Petaluma (?) and another vet named Matt something based down at Steinbeck vet clinic in Salinas. Both probably much more expensive.

I did a little trim on her feet yesterday.. her toes were horribly long and she had a lot of sole up at the toe that runs flush with her hoof wall, so I was wondering if she had some foot pad bruising.. but Ashton said she would've responded positive to the hoof testers, which she didn't. I'm going to continue to trim to see if I can get her feet into decent shape after all this shoeing, and I have a certified hoof trimmer coming out in November. After shortening her toes, I trotted her in the round pen and she was still off.. so it probably isn't a hoof issue.

I have tomorrow, next Monday, and next Friday off, so one of these days I'll bring her up to Davis.