Horses should be sound - properly sound, rather than just 'serviceably sound'.
The hoof below belongs to a horse that is properly sound and working and you have to admit - for a hoof it is kind of good looking too. :-)
Many thanks to the owner of this horse for allowing me to share this with you and congratulations to them for what I know is a product of hard work and attention to detail.
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| Domestic hoof kept at livery in UK |
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9 comments:
Very nice looking foot . . .
(You can turn off the annoying word verification if you wish - see my blog for a link.)
That is a beautiful hoof! I love keeping my horses barefoot.
As far as feet go, that is special!
Something to aim for! I think that's the first photo of a UK hoof I've seen clearly showing the swollen area of the frog.
What an achievement!
Ok, I'll ask the obvious question if I may?
What is the difference between "properly sound" and 'serviceably sound'? I'm assuming 'seviceable' is the horse sound on all the surfaces the horse goes on...
Serviceably sound used to mean a horse that had minor blemishes that had no impact on horse's ability to perform - ie caused no pain or infringement of movement eg a wind gall.
This definition has slipped in some interpretations to mean a horse that can get by on low dose pain meds or manage very low level hacking but nothing more. A horse can be serviceably sound in shoes but dog lame without.
It wasn't that long ago that if a horse was only sound in shoes they were considered lame and the shoes were taken off until the horse came sound - and only then was the horse reshod.
How times change.
So for me, for now 'properly sound' is healthy enough to perform higher effort activities, such as endurance, eventing etc without the need for shoes or pain meds.
Thanks for clarifying that Lucy.
I think that a horse lame or struggling without shoes isn't sound myself. I agree this has somehow become a reason to keep shoes on and not address the reasons for the need of shoes to remain sound or even comfortable.
Sadly from what I read, this is a one way road for the horse...
Good website!
Very jealous of those feet, I thought I was doing ok with my high maintenance cob feet...now feel quite inadequate!
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