Re: Barefoot and hoof growth

["Susan Garlinghouse" <suendavid@worldnet.att.net>]

> I'll go look up the research docs that I read and get
> back to you.  It'll be a few days because I have a lot
> of material here and I have no references to where I
> read what.

I'll be interested to see what you have, and whether the research documents
are legitimate research, or just theories and some buzzwords.  No offense to
you, as you seem like you're genuinely interested and that's great, but I
define scientific research as a hypotheses, followed by objective and
unbiased data collected with accepted and largely quantitative methodology
and tested via statistics, and then the conclusions subsequently reviewed by
peers in the field who fall all over themselves to look for flaws.  I see
alot of claims of "research" that are not.


 I'm sure I've used the incorrect term when
> saying toxins are used to build hoof material.  But, I
> know I repeated the basic theory correctly:  That the
> body systems have to work much harder to dispell what
> the body was suppose to use to produce hoof horn when
> it can't be diseminated properly due to reduced
> circulation in a shod horse.

I'm not saying you repeated the theory incorrectly.  I'm challenging the
theory itself.  The hoof tissue is made up of normal substrates circulating
in the blood system---not waste products.  Yes, it is usual that there may
be an excess of those particular substrates in the body at certain times
(ie, after a high protein meal).  Doesn't make them something that the body
has to work harder to 'dispel', unless your theory is claiming that
glomerular flow rate to the kidneys is significantly decreased because a
horse wears shoes, which is damned unlikely.  You'll have to show me
peer-reviewed data to convince me on that one.

  The person who is
> responsibile for this theory also made a lot of
> correlations between founder/laminitis/colic and the
> shod horse.

Without real research to back it up, it's just rhetoric.


>
> I have also read from several different research
> scientist/vets, whatever the term, that the hair and
> hoof material is, in fact, not made from the same
> keratin protein.

The basic protein molecule is close enough for the theories you're
supporting.  Only the tertiary structure is different, and only slightly at
that.

>
> I didn't say anything at all about the body
> temperature of a barefoot horse being lower than that
> of a shod horse during exercise or any other time.

Whatever.  You said unshod horses sweat less because they have less toxins
to dispel, or something like that.  It still just doesn't hold water.
Sorry.  Maybe you could define exactly what these substances are that a shod
horse has to sweat so hard to eliminate.


> That would make no sense to me, other than the
> leg/hoof below the carpal joints which IS well
> documented to be much cooler in a shod horse than a
> barefoot horse with proper hoof mechanism.

So how do you know that the 'hotter' unshod leg isn't one with more
inflammation?

>
> Did you differentiate in your Pride project those
> horses that were barefoot?  Can you pass the info on
> when you get time?

I had notes on various foot measurements and things, and I would have seen
something if significant differences if they were there---God knows I've
spent enough time looking at this data.  Am I going to spend hours and hours
of time I already don't have doing correlations that I think will go
nowhere?  No.  Not without at least a physiological theory that holds water.

Susan G