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[RC] Shoes and a flat hoofwall - k s swigartHoward said: The other problem I have with the shoe is, on a shod foot, the hoof wall that meets the shoe has to be, or should be, perfectly flat. It most certainly does not, in fact my shoer trims down the quarters slightly so that the surface that contacts the shoe is slightly concave. The purpose for doing this is it prevents what Howard mentions: Those blown out quarters that happen with horses shod all the time are caused by those nails. It weakens that section of the hoof. With a barefoot horse, the hoof wall does not have to be pefectly flat. You can file down the quarters to the sole, and let that part of the hoof wall rebuild itself. You can do this before you put shoes on too. Lots of shoers do, and, in fact, it is one of the basic premises of Gene Ovenick's four point trim (which, if you ask me, many people over-use). And I have certainly known of plenty of horses whose hooves are so chipped and cracked up from having gone barefoot for too long :) such that there is no way to make the hoof wall flat before nailing on a shoe. In these instances (depending on how cracked up the hoof wall is) the nails may need to be driven a little higher to get it to stay on, or a nail in that area just gets left out entirely because there is no hoof wall to nail into :). It is a mistake to think that the hoof wall needs to be flat in order to put a shoe on. What a farrier should do is to trim the horse's hoof as if it were barefoot and then nail the shoe on. kat Orange County, Calif. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Ridecamp is a service of Endurance Net, http://www.endurance.net. Information, Policy, Disclaimer: http://www.endurance.net/Ridecamp Subscribe/Unsubscribe http://www.endurance.net/ridecamp/logon.asp Ride Long and Ride Safe!! =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
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