Do you think this horse would benefit from this?

YES! I'm sure your horse would love being worked on by a Chiropractor and/or massage. You might even consider acupuncture. I've had great luck with all of that.

Several years ago, I couldn't get my 3 yr old shown, she just bucking when I'd ask her to lope. Called the chiropractor out, the following week, she won a futurity.

Also had a youngster cast in her stall, took vets SIX months to not figure out what was wrong. Took the Chiropractor two sessions and she was sound.

"My farrier is also a vet"?? Baloney.

A vet might do a little farriering on the side, but he'd call himself a vet, not a farrier. A farrier who says he's a vet is NOT.

So get a real vet out and have the horse evaluated properly. The vet can tell you if he'd benefit from chiro or massage, or if something else needs to be addressed first.

If your farrier is a licensed vet which I doubt or he would not be trimming horses since it pays about 1/5 what a vet charges then he is an idiot a horse whose stifle locks up is a serious joint problem and you really need to have a real vet look at the horse.

My mare also has a bit of a dodgy stifle in her right hind, she has a dodgy hip angle which just means it's more prone to doing it.

My trimmer has some basic training in massage therapy and showed me how to do some basic massage on her and I think it's helped a bit. I can definitely feel that on the side her stifle locks inside her leg is very tight in muscle. She seems to enjoy having it worked with and it seems to help loosen her off so I try and do it every couple of days or so.

I do think unfortunately some horses are just prone to it and it's something that you can treat but not cure. It's often caused by some off conformation or similar and this is just something they live with.

I would assume that because he's working and competing he's probably fairly fit, which will help him no end. But incorporating lots of hill work, raised poles and anything to get him building up muscle in his hind end will all help support the dodgy stifle.

sure, why not try it. It won't hurt to try. He may have damaged his hips eventing, it is tough on a horse. I doubt he has been like that all his life. You also can have the vet give him shots to help it also. If this vet won't do it since he thinks this is the way the horse is, I would get another vet to look at him, there are many treatments for this now.