Why don't you just put shoes on her?

If only I had a dollar for every time someone has asked me why I don't just put shoes on Freya, I would be a wealthy woman!

Before I go down this particular rabbit hole, let me clarify how I feel about shoes.  I don't like them.  I have had shoes on my horses in the past, and I never found that they improved my horse's feet.  In fact, they are probably the reason that I lost the horse I had before Nimo.  I have watched horse after horse in various boarding barns gradually lose the optimal structure of their feet the longer they wear shoes.  I see toes that are too long and heels that are underrun and hooves that are simply too high and contracted heels and atrophied frogs and chronic thrush and all sorts of deformities.  I listen to the stories about how the horse just can't seem to keep shoes on, and I've spent a not insignificant amount of time helping people look for lost shoes in the pasture and praying that my horse doesn't step on a horseshoe nail from said lost shoe.

All that said, I also see a lot of those same problems with barefoot horses.  So obviously part of the problem isn't the shoes, it is the way the shoes are applied or the length of time between trims and resets.  The farrier controls part of that equation, but the owner also influences the timing.

I also recognize that there are medical reasons for why a horse would wear shoes.  Navicular, laminitis, surgery, and other physical issues can create serious problems for horses that shoes may be able to help with, given a competent farrier and vet.

So it isn't that I think all shoes should be banned or that anyone who puts shoes on their horse is an idiot.  I just think that the way they are typically used doesn't actually do what people says it does in a lot of cases.  And I think that too many people become farriers without proper training and continuing education.  I can't tell you the amount of BS I have heard come out of farriers' mouths.  But I also know that there are plenty of competent, educated farriers who work hard to improve their skills and take their craft very seriously.  So this isn't meant to be a farrier-bashing post.

In Freya's case, I know why people ask me why I don't just put shoes on her.  She struggles to move soundly without hoof protection.  The biggest game changer in our care of her was when I put hoof boots on her at the recommendation of a farrier I consulted with last August.  I felt incredibly embarrassed once I'd put the boots on her, because it was immediately obvious how much better she moved.

You may remember that when I bought her, she had front shoes on.  I almost didn't buy her for that reason because I really didn't want to try to deal with shoes on a horse again.  Also, the shoes had been on for so long that her hoof angle was significantly distorted and the sole had grown so much that it filled in the space between the shoe.  When I had her shoes pulled, the farrier probably trimmed about a half inch of sole and revealed a blackened area underneath.  It was not pleasant.  He expected me to say that I wanted shoes put back on, but I knew I couldn't put shoes back on those feet in the condition they were in or I'd just be perpetuating the problems she already had.  And I did not then and do not now have regular access to a farrier that I consider to be competent at shoeing a horse.

Freya was sound for a while after the shoes were pulled and I felt comfortable not putting them back on because her previous owner had said they hadn't been on that long (maybe a year) and they weren't put on to address soreness.  But she developed a case of central sulcus thrush in all four feet a few months later.  I didn't realize how serious it was until it was at first because it appeared as thin heel cracks when the environment was dry.  Unfortunately, it was quite advanced and Freya was quite sore before I figured it out, and it took about 5 months to resolve the infection.  Treating for 14 days with the cow mastitis antibiotic Today and following up with daily treatments of No Thrush was what finally worked after I tried an assortment of recommended treatments, including White Lightening and Pete Ramey's goo.

After the infection cleared, she never moved quite right.  For several months I chalked it up to her not having great balance under saddle and having some dysfunctional movement.  But I was not happy with the angles on her feet, particularly the fronts, and it was clear she was struggling under saddle.  I had made a lot of progress trimming them myself, but in all honesty, I wasn't a competent farrier either, so I reached out to a farrier I trusted to get a remote consultation.  That was an eye-opening process.  I learned a lot about how to take pictures of hooves and how easy it is to create the appearance of distortion or minimize distortion inadvertently.  (If you want to start learning about how to take pictures of horse's hooves, check out this article: https://www.theequinedocumentalist.com/post/why-do-photos-lie-and-how-not-to-get-misled and this one: https://www.theequinedocumentalist.com/post/how-to-document-images-and-radiographs-for-successful-hoof-care-and-promote-soundness-in-horses.)

Here is an example of one hoof that I took pictures of for the consultation.  By the time I was done doing pictures of all four feet, I felt like I was lost in the Bermuda Triangle with no sense of direction.  I think I even managed to somehow get the right and left front legs mixed up and mislabeled despite my best efforts.  It was a very humbling experience.

I learned that my trimming was not bad, but there were a few improvements I could make, like trimming her bars more frequently, leaving a little more vertical wall, particularly at the heels to address her NPA, and more assertively dressing the distortion of the hoof.  The farrier also recommended hoof boots for her front feet.  

And I thought the farrier was a nutter.  I was like, this mare lives in a grass paddock and spends her days in a well-bedded stall.  When she is ridden, she walks a short distance over a smooth bluestone parking area and then works in sand.  How could she possibly need hoof boots?  I mean, hoof boots are to provide protection from hard or rocky ground, right?

But I did happen to have a set of Easyboot Epics that I had bought for her a year before.  Because when she first started to move with discomfort, I thought she might need hoof boots.  But when I discovered she had thrush, I figured the infection was causing the discomfort and I never used the boots.  (You guys!  I could seriously smack my old self in the head!!!)

Anyway, since I had paid for the consultation, I dutifully dragged the hoof boots out of storage and put them on.  And proceeded to be blown away by how much more comfortable Freya was.  Instead of mincing steps, she was taking big strides.  Instead of short-striding behind, she was almost tracking up.  I definitely had to eat a lot of crow that day, and I've spent no small amount of time beating myself up for letting my endurance-colored glasses influence how I cared for Freya.

And shortly after adding the hoof boots, I added pads to the boots based on a recommendation from another farrier that I didn't realize I knew.  Well, actually I knew her from my endurance days.  We'd become virtual friends over time, and I knew she trimmed her own horse's feet, but I didn't know that she was an actual farrier who specializes in teaching people how to trim their horse's feet.  She travels quite a bit and even works with vets to help them overcome their archaic treatments for navicular and laminitis cases that often make things worse instead of better.  She has even rehabbed her own horse that she rescued when the horse had a severe case of laminitis, resulting in a coffin bone that had penetrated the sole.  The mare now has great feet and happily goes for miles out on rugged mountain rides.  She wears hoof boots for rides, but is otherwise barefoot.

Thankfully, she decided to take pity on me and provided quite a bit of guidance as I entered the world of booting a horse that really needs hoof protection from more than just rocks.  I'm still learning, and my next step is to learn how to stealth the boots so Gemma can show in disciplines where hoof boots are not allowed (I mean, why?  Shoes are allowed, so why wouldn't hoof boots?)

As for why I don't put shoes on Freya, there are a few reasons.  One, I don't have access to a farrier that I trust to put the shoes on properly.  It's hard to believe that I can't find such a farrier in northern Virginia, because it is major horse country, but few farriers are taking new clients these days, and I question whether any farrier would be willing to give me as much control as I want over Freya's feet.  Two, her angles are still not right, so she needs frequent trimming (like every 2 weeks) to keep her hooves as balanced as possible while I whittle away at the returning the correct angle to her foot without taking too much off.  I need to bring her toe back a bit more, but she also has thin soles, so I'm trying to take what I can without making her uncomfortable.  Three, her heels are still contracted and her frogs are still atrophied (on her front feet, not so much her hind feet, which were spared the incorrect shoeing practices), so she remains prone to thrush.  This year, we caught it sooner and treated more aggressively faster, but she still got sore.  Because of the frog atrophy, she would need pads if she were shod, but if she wears pads with shoes, I can't treat for thrush (unless she gets a screw on plate, which is really not practical).

I am considering the possibility of using one of the Easycare hoof boots or shoes as a glue-on once we can get out of thrush season and the ground is drier to see if there is a positive impact for her wearing hoof protection 24/7.   The trick is to find a way to glue it on so it isn't necessarily set for a 6-week cycle and I can get it off after, say 2-3 weeks, without causing a lot of damage to the hoof wall to keep up with her trimming needs.  I really wish the Megasus Horserunners hoof boots had made it past the kick-starter phase, because those would be perfect for what I need.  Those hoof boots worked by gluing on tabs to the horse's hoof (sort of like the new EasyShoe Versa Grip Octo) but you could click the bottom part on and take it off at will.  

I have tried leaving Freya's hoof boots on overnight during turnout to see if she benefits, but the wet Virginia clay acts like lubricant and the boots end up twisting a little and Freya is not happy in them.  So I could potentially leave the boots on if it was dry, but I think a better solution would be some kind of temporary glue-ons where I could either use pads or do a pour-in pad.

So anyway, the saga continues as I work to find the best solution for Freya using the resources I have available to me.  And her feet aren't the only piece of her story.  I have spent the past several months doing a deep dive into classical French dressage, the Balance Through Movement Method, Science of Motion, bodywork techniques like the Masterson Method and Tami Elkayam's work, plus therapies like red-light therapy and magnets.  I wish I could tell you how the story ends, but Freya is definitely still a work in progress:)