Endurance.Net Ridecamp Archives

I've got one horse with this problem.  He's done fairly well in 
endurance, this is his tenth year, he's got around 7500 miles and has 
several wins and best conditions.  Good horse in spite of the hoof 
flaws.  Out of the four horses I've got he's the only one with that 
problem and while he may have what some view as the best record (the 
most top tens, wins, etc.) I don't view him as the best horse out of 
the group.  During most of his career managing his feet was always a 
big issue.  Competing like he was he had to be reshod every three or 
four weeks.  It wasn't easy to try and get him to all of his rides 
two weeks into a shoeing, no more than three and definitely not 
four!  Luckily I had a very good farrier who kept Rocky going and 
taught me a lot (since I've had Rocky since he was a few months old) 
about how I needed to manage him so that he would stay sound and be 
able to compete in endurance.  Due to the defects in his feet nobody 
ever thought he would make it as an endurance horse and several 
people told me that including ride vets.  It's sort of funny 
now.  Since then I've been fortunate enough to have gotten horses 
that don't have those kind of feet issues and believe me it is so 
nice.  I love Rocky and he was what I had to work with at the time 
but I would never choose a horse with those flaws again, when there 
are so many out there that don't have them and then won't require the 
micro-management.  It's not just the feet that you have to deal with 
but how that translates into the rest of the horse.  Now that we've 
had Rocky barefoot last year and this year it's easy to see why he 
had to have such frequent shoeing and why he would be uneven three 
weeks into a shoeing cycle -- because in only two or three weeks time 
his front angles may change by several degrees.  It's much easier to 
manage him now because I don't have to worry about the shoeing 
schedule for him and can keep his angles and hoofcare more up to 
date.  Still though, his feet suck and having him shod or barefoot 
either one doesn't and hasn't changed that.  It was all a great 
learning experience for me, but it's not something that I want to 
know any more about (ha).

Here are some photos of his 
feet. 
http://sunriseranchrides.com/rockysfeet/ROCKYOCTOBER2005FEET.HTML 
Looks like from last October, so almost a year ago.  A couple more 
here (click on photos to see larger) from a week or so 
ago: 
http://easycareinc.typepad.com/karen/2006/09/shamuerrrrrocky.html 
They look a little better, and probably are stronger since he's not 
flaring.  But he has things happen to his feet that don't happen to 
the others, like they chip and crack when he goes from the pasture to 
the dry section.  So you can see that with good hoofcare, you can 
manage a horse with these issues, but it does take more effort.

Karen

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