Flat foot to concavity and some of the challenges

Taking your horse barefoot is both challenging and rewarding (when you get it right). It can also be very frustrating when you make a mistake. But trust me, even the most successful barefooter will have made mistakes. This is especially true in the more difficult environments where the ground is often wet and muddy and the grass grows fast and lush.

This post shows that you can make mistakes and recover and end up with a very sound, very happy horse.

The mare is working hard, on a very low sugar, high forage diet and over the summer successfully completes two novice endurance competitions.

In the last post the first three pictures showed a really tiny Western Pleasure QH foot (as well as others).

This is a hind foot from the same horse as it 'arrived' April '08 - you can still see the nail holes from when the shoes were pulled the previous Autumn(ish)./div>

Slightly bull nosed, stress rings and bruising are signs that all is not well.

An injured sacro illiac, some dodgy trimming, too much sugar and an abcess later the front foot looks like this in August '08.

The sole is on the point of bulging (now why didn't the farrier or the vet point this out?) There is flare, there is virtually no depth of collateral groove (so no depth of sole) and the wall is really thin. When the foot was cleaned you could also see blood in the white line. But I was very inexperienced at documenting things then so didn't know enough to clean the foot before taking the photo!

After 12 weeks of box rest for the sacro injury the horse is still lame. So we move her to a mini PP track and within two weeks she goes sound and shortly after that she is rideable.

Feet are still terrible though and being trimmed in ski tip fashion. See Dec '08 below.

The mare spends a month completely off grass and on gravel instead and has one 'proper' barefoot trim. Jan' 09 left below.

Back on grass PP track. The improvement in concavity continues - you can see the sole getting ready to flake and the back of the foot is looking better. But if you look at the heel bulbs (2nd picture) you can see some odd marks/damage. This was little abcesses blowing out of the back of the heel. It went on for some time and then just stopped.

Then we had a foreseeable disaster; which we only saw with hindsight! The grass grew (bad bad grass), the sole splatted and the mare got horribly bruised.

Then because of circumstances other than feet, the mare spent much of the summer stabled, being exercised 3 times a day and her feet started to heal. In the picture below you can see new concavity spreading out from the centre of the foot. The outer rim of sole is still pancake flat at this stage.

At this stage the mare is working hard, on a very low sugar, high forage diet and over the summer successfully completes two novice endurance competitions.

The left hand picture is of a freshly trimmed foot. You can see the thick wall, tight white line and the wear in the heel area. This foot is on the way!

In the right hand picture you can see here how the sole is naturally exfoliating and exposing new concavity. There is a dirty great hole in her frog where an abcess blew out. You can also see how much thicker the hoof walls is, even with a big roll.

Unfortunately it is possible to make the same mistake over and over again. In the Autumn the mare turns out again which is much better for her socially. There is a struggle with grass management and quite inadvertantly a high sugar product is added to her feed.

Once again the feet splat and she bruises her soles. You think we'd get the message by now :-) This mare can't handle sugar.

The results are felt not just in her feet, which lose concavity again, but also in temperament - the mare looks sad and tired even though she is not working so hard.

Her owner though is both fantastic and dedicated. The source of sugar is found and eliminated. The feet start to improve again.

But as the nights draw in and with a saddle problem the amount of exercise is cut drastically.

Now, I often hear how people are worried they will wear their horses feet to the bone. Well actually, if you manage your horse well the problem is actually the reverse. This horse's feet have been stimulated to the extent that they grow so fast the owner can't wear them out fast enough. And then when the exercise reduces you can get the problem as seen in the next picture.

This foot looks like it's trying to emulate the 'tin cans' I worked on in the States. Just because it's gone short of some wear. The sole is in reasonable nick, although the heels are getting long.

We trim the foot and as it adjusts to less wear the growth slows. By the next trim, we have lost the tin can effect, but the heels are on their way to the moon. The horse has developed thrush and the foot is starting to contract again.

You can see the stress rings from the sugar the mare had in the Autumn. The wall is really thick and I've put on a fat roll to enable her to break over properly without suffering mechanical leverage on the flare.

The owner has strict instructions to work the horse much harder, on a variety of surfaces, where ever she is comfortable. I know the owner has the dedication to put in the work.

But there is the rub - unless you are keeping your horse on a PP track with a variety of surfaces it takes a lot of exercise to give the horse hoof the stimulation it needs. Most people don't actually ride enough :-) So far from restricting the amount of exercise you can give your horse, you will probably need to give it more.

You will also need to manage your horse's diet and environment really carefully, with attention to detail and a consistant approach.

A few people have horses or conditions that make it really easy. But that kind of luck is as rare as hen's teeth in the UK.

As you can see from this video - the mare is very sound on gravel and if you can slo mo it you will see she has a solid heel first landing.

Test your horse management skills - every day

Keeping a horse barefoot is really a horse management test. However unlike SATS everyone gets to sit a different paper, sometimes you get examined daily and the course work is relentless and never ending.

So why do we bother? Because some of us have seen a successful end result and want what we feel is better for our horses. Others are driven by desperation as they have run out of conventional methods and their horse is still lame.

The end result of the soul searching and effort is worth it. When you have a particular horse and its situation figured out the results are very rewarding in so many ways. Whether you just want to ride without worrying about the state of the horse's shoes, or if your aim is to prolong your horse's working life, or you have experienced the joy of riding a barefoot horse.

And where does the daily testing come in? You may have read the 'Heartbreak' post which showed how a bit of well-intentioned, but inappropriate feeding damaged a foot very quickly. Well the photos above taken just 6.5 weeks apart show how if you stick to your guns and get the diet right the foot will heal quickly too.

You can see in the first picture how the foot has lost concavity, the white line is stretched and the sole is one big bruise. That is one rather sore and very miserable horse.

In the second picture concavity is returning, the white line is tightening up and bar one bit of damage the sole is back to its healthy colour. Fungal infections are a challenge where this horse is kept, but the owner does a good job of keeping them at bay. I don't have a picture, but trust me, that horse is positively beaming with happiness now. It is so good to see.

If my heart wasn't already broken

Then I think this hoof scenario would do the job. The deterioration in this foot in less than 3 months is distressing. Fortunately the owner is great and knows better than to slap a shoe on, which would mask the hoof pain, but do nothing to fix the cause.

The first picture, which is far from perfect, shows a foot which is on its way to good concavity, nice thick sole, tight white line. Now an inappropriate diet has put paid to that.

The second photo shows bruising extending across most of the sole, which has lost a lot of concavity. You can also see the extensive flaring of the hoof wall. The third photo below shows just how much concavity there used to be.

This is a super mare, practically perfect. Well trained, well made and pretty. Loves to work and will have a go at almost anything. But everything has a downside right? And hers is her metabolic challenges. If she were human we would probably label her diabetic and treat accordingly. Guess what we do to horses - we nail an iron ring to their feet so we can ignore the problem. But thankfully not (yet anyway) in this case.

I kid myself I am upset for the sake of the horse, which is true, but I am also frustrated at the ignorance of some 'equine professionals' who ruin horse and rider alike.

Madam's right front frog and sole

Superficially the first foot (24/01/09) looks better. After all the sole has no bruises. But check out the frog, its very narrow and there is a deep groove in the central sulcus and a big hole on the right. Plus if you divide the foot top to bottom at the widest point you can see the split is 50/50, where it should be 1/3 top and 2/3 bottom.

The second picture shows bruising, but its too late to fret, those bruises will have happened about 2/3 months ago, when we had a mix of soggy and then frozen ground. You can see the frog is improving. It looks wider, generally more robust and the central sulcus is filling in. You can also see that the foot is on the way to the correct proportions.

Both feet are rather flat, but I am hoping that the obviously shedding sole in the second picture means that we will soon have some more concavity. Also note that in the second picture the heels are wider and the buttresses have more substance. We CleanTraxed the front feet today. We can only wait and see if it speeds up the improvement in frog health.

We think the real issue for Madam is diet. She has given us so many indicators, but it is no simple thing to sort out. We change one thing at a time until we hit what works for her. Big no noes are sugar/molasses in any form and actively growing grass. We are experimenting with alfalfa as legumes can be a problem for many quarter horses. I also need to check out the iron content of their water supply as iron can be a problem too.

Foot trim before and after photos - Madam

The first photo is Madam's left fore in April 2008. The second photo is December 2008. In the interim period she had 3 months of box rest for a sacro illiac injury.

Her foot used to be permanently bruised in one place or another, even without any work. Now she does lots of work on a variety of surfaces including the road and on gravel and as you can see there is not a bruise in sight.

What is harder to see is how the sole has thickened as the toe has shortened. You may be able to see how the bulbs of her heel have plumped out as her digital cushion has gained strength and form from regular appropriate exercise.

The back of the foot and the frog still have some way to go. They are still showing the effects of being under additional strain when she had an abcess in the other fore.

These are April and December pictures of Madam's left hind. The sole, frog and wall used to be completely flush, with a glass like surface - and of course the apparently obligatory bruising. Now she is gaining concavity, a bit of toe callous and much better traction.