Re: RE: Darolyn and Barefootin'

["Heidi Smith" <heidi@sagehillcmk.com>]

> Pinching off the digital arteries, which shoeing does by default after a
> short period of time, does act like an anesthesia because it effectively
> cuts off the circulation to the nerves in the hoof.  It does this to such
> an extent that alternate artery routes will form in the coffin bone in an
> effort to continue the blood flow needed by the nerves.  However, in the
> cadaver hooves that I've looked at, they never get to near the size of the
> main digital artery pathway, which would indicate the blood flow is still
> inadequate for what mother nature had arthitected.  Not to mention that
> rerouting blood (show very graphically in Pollit's videos) tears down
> coffin bone material which weakens the coffin bone which is the main base
> of support inside the hoof.

While I can buy a certain extent of this from poor shoeing methods, please
explain why so many horses live sound and useful lives into their late 20's
or early 30's wearing shoes and die with completely normal feet????

I am not against riding horses barefoot.  But some of the anti-shoeing
propaganda gets pretty amazing.

Heidi