I got such a great rush today! I recently got a new client that I started
trimming for. She has a riding school and I came out to trim a couple of horses
so that she could decide whether or not I would work out for her. After
trimming a couple of them, she told me about a TB that she had that lost shoes
constantly. Each week the shoes would have to be replaced and each week, he'd
lose them again. Every time the shoe came off, it took a little more of the hoof
wall away and the horse was constantly lame. I told her I would take a look at
him all the while gleefully rubbing my imaginary hands at the prospect. I've
been wanting to prove all along that horses whose feet fall apart with shoes
really have the shoes to blame and that they CAN go barefoot. I went down to
the pasture he was in and I pulled the one remaining shoe off his foot. He was
very lame and hobbled his way up to the barn for me to trim. The hoof wall was
completely destroyed and the front feet were very flared and flat. Not a
surprise. I took off the excessive hoof wall that was still there and just gave
it as much of a roll as I could. There wasn't much to work with.....The horse
was so sore I had to put a Davis boot on the opposite foot just so he could
stand for a few minutes at a time. The back feet were not as bad. He had lost
the shoes about a month before and they just ended up leaving them off.
Needless to say, the back feet were doing better than the front...as usual. I
suggested they boot him, but they were worried that since he was out in pasture
most of the time, he would get too much moisture inside. They opted to bute him
twice a day at first. Two weeks later I came back to do some more of her horses
and I just touched up the edges of the walls on him. No real change, but he was
able to walk better out in the pasture and had even run around a bit. Awesome!
I called her recently as it had been almost 3 weeks and I wanted to recheck him.
She told me that they had taken him into the newly dragged arena and had been
able to walk, trot and even lope him a bit with her daughter on him. He was a
bit on egg shells when he first got in there but walked out after just a bit.
He was by no means sound, but he was willing to move. More yay! This is just
two trims...one full trim and one bevel of the walls and a breakover put on for
the second. I went out today and trimmed him in his pasture. Not only did he
allow me to pick up the feet without a boot on the opposite one, but lo and
behold, he is starting to shed sole and get a concavity! OMG!! I'm really
happy now. It flaked off on it's own with just a light touch of the hoof knife
and under there was fresh healthy sole that had a slight concavity. Not a lot,
but enough to start getting that sole off the ground. He's no longer zero at the
toe of the frog! We actually had hoof wall to trim off and bevel and I was able
to take his heels down some more. He's still too high by a long shot, but the
collateral grooves are too shallow to take as much as he needs and he is walking
on the heels. I don't want to stop that! All in all, I'm reassessing this
horse. He may just come around a lot faster than I thought. I was honestly
thinking that it would be 6 months to a year before he could be ridden in boots.
Here he is on his third trim already showing signs of improvement in his feet.
He walked off from this trim with almost no signs of soreness and he is now only
getting bute every other day, once a day. I am STOKED!!