My horse stands weird

My horse brodie has always been a lazy boy. He drags his feet, front and back, but the vet said he was not lame. I've noticed now, that I started jumping, that his hind legs are faceing outwards when he is on the crossties. My mom said he has done that for a while before we started jumping...but I've just noticed it now because I put splintboots on incase he knocks a rail. Quarterhorses have thick ancles which would look swoolen if it was a thouroughbred...but im not sure. Maybe he is lame on his hind foot.

I will put pictures up tomorrow of him hind feet.

My only thoughts, without seeing pictures, would be that he's pigeon toed.

Which means essentially his toes face outward--its a confirmation flaw.

Pigeon-toed is when they point IN, if his toes are pointing outward, it's called toed out. =]

And I agree with that "diagnosis." It's likely a conformation flaw, no horse is perfect. However, I have no idea what this "swollen ankles" thing means. I have a QH with perfectly normal fetlocks compared to other non-QH's. O_O

LOL, its some bird! Pigeon, duck, penguin (haha now im imagining a horse waddling like a penguin)

Anyway, My TB sometimes gets swollen fetlocks, not hugely so, they just get a little warm and squishy on the inside after a hard workout, I guess that's the question to ask? What do his fetlocks feel like? Are they warm all of the time, or just after a work out, are they hard, squishy, swollen on one side more than the other?

He could be standing like that to alleviate some pain in his feet? Especially if he's putting all of the pressure on his heels.

Depending on the severity, it could be that what you see as "lazy" is him avoiding movement due to pain caused by the issue.

Possibly cow-hocked.
Posted via Mobile Device

My guess would be he's cow-hocked, its jsut a conformation flaw, my old horse was cow-hocked, it never effected him.
:)

Horses are often lazy, but dragging feet is a physical problem, not laziness. Could be as simple as a trim problem - farrier not doing a balanced job & toes too long for eg. Or could be a number of other possibilities.

As others have said, it could be innately conformational - cow hocked or such. Also horses are naturally built slightly 'outsy'(the technical term!) in back compared to fronts. But it could also be due to trimming or some other prob. I caught above that you said "has done that for a while", which indicates maybe he hasn't always done it??

I'm leaning towards what everyone else is saying. Probably just a bit cow-hocked. How severe is it? Pics might be helpful.