Founder

Founder is the common term for laminitis which even without a horsey background you can probably deduce means lame.

Remember Diamond? The senior horse I adopted last year? The bratty senior horse whose girl-friends care more about him than he seems to care about them?

He came up shivering on Monday and was kept in overnight. Tuesday someone noticed that one of his legs was swollen. Then later someone noticed that his hooves were tender.

The coffin bone that goes into the hoof is connected to the hoof by lamina. When the lamina gets infected or inflamed, it causes the coffin bone to separate from the hoof. That's not good. If it does heal, the hoof is likely to founder again. If it does heal, the horse is often times remains lame.

So he is doped up (tranquilized and medicated) and confined to stall rest for now.
Stephanie x-rayed his hooves tonight. She'll have a radiologist at Haggard look at them tomorrow. Harold was there and said he doesn't want to put Diamond down and will give Diamond a chance to decided whether he wants to keep going or not.
The challenge is that Diamond is old. He is 31 and retired. And winter is coming on.
I hope and pray he pulls through.