Re: RE: newbie-pulse lower at canter?

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

> "hoof mechanism" back in his feet.  Therefore creating much additional
blood
> flow and circulation in his feet, making him more comfortable and lowering
> his pulse.  Remember, the circulation in the feet is like 4 little hearts
> down there.


It's very common for *any* horse's HR to drop going from a trot to a canter,
regardless of shoeing.  Without going into the whole physiology thing, it
has to do with a natural 'groove' for each horse within a gait, based on
oxygen transport, joint strain, etc.  It's easier to picture it as analogous
to gears in a car.  You can force a car to stay in second gear and
accelerate and it can do that---but the engine is winding higher and higher
and putting more strain on all the components even though it's still
traveling in a lower gear.  If you let it shift into third where it really
wants to be, the rpms drop and strain is reduced on all the components.

Pretty much the same thing with a horse being asked to stay in an extended
trot rather than being allowed to shift into a canter.  The "rpms" will stay
low if the horse is in his natural groove for that gait---but once you push
him past that comfortable speed, you're losing efficiency until you allow
him to shift gears and drop into the natural groove for the next higher
gait.

FWIW, Cal Poly did some research a few years ago looking at what factors
change the speed at which individual horses naturally seem to want to shift
gears into a different gait.  The presence of shoes did *not* make a
difference, so I'm not convinced that any comfort of being barefoot or not
has a measurable effect on heart rate, assuming the shoeing job is not
causing outright lameness and trauma.  If the shoeing job is causing
outright pain (and I'm talking things like a hot nail, not just any shoeing
job), then I could reasonably see that affecting heart rate.

JMO.

Susan G