Wrap It Up, Part 2

Part 1

I certainly had a unique leg wrapping issue on my hands. How was I going to solve this? I searched a few online tack stores, but I wasn't happy with the pastern wraps that they had. I was concerned that they would slide around, or get too tight, or just not work out somehow. No, I needed a variation on what I know would work - a quick standing wrap, and a separate pastern wrap.

I checked out Schneider's, since it's close to the barn, and they had these little numbers -


Dura-Tech Rapid-Wrap No Bow Bandages. Here's the link -

http://www.sstack.com/Horse-BootsWraps_Therapy/Dura-Tech-Rapid-Wrap-No-Bow-Bandage/#

They're bascially a no-bow wrap and a standing bandage all in one piece. At $29 I didn't think I could go wrong. I got the longest ones, the 16" so that I could be sure that they would go down far enough over the pastern.

And they worked GREAT. The inside of the wrap is very soft, thick cotton, and the outside is canvas that shavings won't stick to. All of the Velcro straps have elastic on them, so they can be put on nice and snug and they don't slide around. And it's super easy to do, so anyone can put them back on in less than a minute. Part One of my problem solved!

Now to simplify and improve the pastern wrapping issue. For the first few days I used narrow strips cut from thick heavy cotton bandage material as my pastern wrap. This worked well, but it got dirty and full of shavings very quickly. So I started to think - what if I covered the cotton strip with fabric and put velcro on it? That way it wouldn't get shavings stuck to it, and I could take it home and wash it.

This is what I came up with -

I took a strip of cotton batting -



and covered it in heavy duty cotton, and sewed seams through it so the cotton would stay in place, and it would bend around the leg without bunching up. Then I added velcro on it like a polo wrap would have for easy fastening.



Then I wrapped it just around the pastern like this -



and then put the Dura-Tech Rapid-Wrap No Bow Bandage on top of it, making sure it was snug enough to keep the pastern wrap in place.



Believe it or not, it worked very well. So well, in fact, that I made another pastern wrap and bought another set of the standing wraps so I can always have a clean pair. It keeps the swelling out of that pastern, but it's gentle enough not to bind tightly. Now it's easy to wrap Kaswyn every time he goes out or gets worked. Just wrap the pastern, then wrap the whole leg. The other leg doesn't have a pastern wrap, but thankfully the standing wrap stays in place just fine.

After a week in the wraps, Kaswyn's pastern was virtually free of inflammation. Even the scar, which was hard, ugly, and raised, got smaller, softer, and stopped getting crusty. I can't explain why this happened; all I know is that the wrapping has made an improvement, so I'm going to keep it up.

I think this looks great compared to what is was -




If Kaswyn's happy, then I'm happy.