Are you shod or barefoot?

Which are you...?

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My horse is shod on all 4's. I had hoped to make the barefoot transition last month but new farrier came over (I was really unhappy with my last one) and this guy is a genius! He advised there are a few things that need to be corrected and that it would be faster and safer for the horse to do it while shod... as soon as everything is where it should be, I'll pull her shoes. Can't wait for it!
 
My BWP came to me unshod with overgrown flakey hooves. I trimmed him barefoot to get the smaller cracks sorted then shod him on all 4 :)
 
Three horses and no shoes, although one horse is unbacked.

I have kept a couple of my mares shoes from when she was shod and they are massive compared to the tiny hooves she has now.
 
Bare foot as if yesterday...... Have been waking on some stones when going to and fro. The field, the odd one made his eyes squint but all in all not bad..... So far...
 
All competition horses shod all round. Some broodmares shod in front mainly thoroughbreds, all youngsters obviously barefoot, most rehab horses either shod in front or all round, depending on injury.
 
Cob/Fell mare was bought with driving shoes on.

Farrier's first visit he took a look at her hooves, removed the shoes as she didn't need them, as she had "very good feet" and been barefoot ever since.

A mix of lots of road work with some off-road keeps her pretty much self trimmed, with a tidy up every 6-8 weeks. Never needs to have much off by farrier.
 
I've just done a quick count up of the horses who live on my farm and there are 52 horses here atm. 51 are unshod and require no boots etc for riding out/competing etc. 1 new horse arrived a week or so ago and he is shod but owner is considering having his shoes taken off. She has to if she wants him to live in any of the herds as I don't allow shod horses in with others.
 
Bob is a PITA to keep shoes on! At the moment he's barefoot, purely because he keeps on losing shoes! Farrier is due Friday, I'm going to have him trimmed and measured up for hoof-boots. Once the ground had dried out (if it ever does!) I'll probably have him shod again, but at least I'll have the boots in case he does lose another shoe!
 
Alf was shod in front only. I took his fronts off to see how he coped, but he struggled - and I didn't feel I was being fair to a 15 year old horse with other issues to give him sore feet as well, so I had him shod in front again.

Recently had a vet/farrier/me three way discussion about the back end, where all his problems are - and decided to try shoeing him, as he was 3/10 lame behind despite his suspensory issues being virtually resolved. He had hind sports bars on two weeks ago, and trotted up sound straight away.

I appreciate the principles of barefoot - they make sense to me, and I will concur that shoeing him could be masking the problems, rather than allowing him to resolve them himself, but he is an older horse, who has been a saint all his life, and deserves a comfortable semi-retirement, so if having hinds on makes him comfortable, then that works for me.
 
Barefoot! :D

I actually would never keep a horse that physically NEEDED to be shod and believe the vast majority are better barefoot... My farrier agrees!
 
Barefoot, even for competing. I do own some hoof boots but I can't remember where I last put them...

:)
 
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