Rump shaker. Not really.

I went to lunge Hamper before our ride today since it was a bit chilly. As soon as I asked him to trot, I gasped in horror. He was off.

OF COURSE. Seeing as how the day before I dropped my entry in the mail for our first recognized show.

Now, sometimes he has a tendency to get very slightly hitchy on super cold days. I blame that on a tight back. But today it was ... different. It was worse, and I had a hard time telling which hind leg it was. It did start to get better the longer we went and especially as he began to snort and blow and stretch over his back. I took that as a good sign.

I decided to hop on to see what I felt under saddle. He felt normal at the trot. Normal on both diagonals. Willingly picked up both canter leads. No problems at all. Hmmm.

Finally, I asked him to leg yield to the left (so away from my right leg). AH! Some obvious resistance there. Well at least I had found something. He was happy though, and was willingly forward. After I untacked him, he also was a bit of a dickhead about picking up his hind feet for me to pick out his hooves and otherwise root around for any issues.

It concerned me enough that I grabbed the vet (who was already at the farm) for a lameness exam.

I trotted Hamper back and forth. We flexed him. We palpated his back, hips, stifles, hocks. I lunged him again for the vet without tack. He looked considerably better by now.

The vet pronounced him sound. Passed the flexions. NO REACTION at all to palpating his back or hips. No swelling on his legs or any other obvious problems. This sort of baffled me as I maybe would not have pronounced him SOUND at this point. He's not exactly lame, but he is hitchy and off.

The Hamper gets what the Hamper wants.
Massage? Coming right up!

The conclusion is that Hampton needs the chiro ASAP. My gut feeling says his hips and or sacrum is out again. Possibly other things. That appointment, plus a massage for His Highness, will happen ASAP. In the meantime, lots of stretchy work for him and we will back off on collected work. It never hurts to just work on stretching and suppleness anyway. I feel like I should keep his muscles moving.

So much for those new tall boots I had my eye on! :/