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For some time now I have been riding one of my horses (Rocky) with easy
boots. He is un-shod otherwise. He does quite well in them, with all four
boots on he never interferes. I had been wrapping his feet with vetwrap to
help protect his heel from rubbing on long rides, and to keep the metal
gripper plates from scratching up his feet. I had stopped using the vetwrap
and his heels did great without it, just as good. However, the sides of his
hoof wall were getting marred and scratched up somewhat (which upset my
farrier, and we can't have that now, can we?). He suggested I continue
using the vetwrap to wrap the foot each time I ride. Everytime I boot up
all four feet I go thru a roll of vetwrap, and sometimes I'll put the boots
on and off two or three times in a week. So I came up with another idea...
Socks. Yep, plain old regular 100% cotton ankle socks. Sports type. I had
a few old pairs, and thought I'd give it a try. So I went out there,
cleaned up his feet, put his socks on over his hooves and then put the
boots on over the socks. I turned him loose in the big arena and
free-longed him and he ran around for some time and all the boots stayed on!
I wasn't sure if the socks would help the boots stay on, or possibly send
them into orbit. After the field testing in the arena, we tacked him up and
took him out for a conditioning ride. We walked, trotted, and cantered,
thru hills and sand and rocks. The boots stayed on 100% of the time, and he
looked mighty cute with the red boots and white socks, I might add! :). The
socks are dirty, but definitely re-useable. He didn't get a single scratch
mark from the gripper plates and his feet look great.
So my experiment worked! It's only appropriate that a horse wear socks with
their shoes, don't ya think? <g>
Happy Trails,
Karen
in Gardnerville
& Weaver --> Happy B-Day Weaver!! XOXOXOXXO Lucky #7!!!!
& Rocky :-)
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