Barefoot and bruised toes?

[pines of rome]

I have decided to give barefoot another go with my navicular horse, he has had shoes off for six weeks in which time he has been turned out in boots and pads as to sore to cope without them!
He has improoved other than the days when he has hooned around like an idiot and has looked sore afterwards. Anyway farrier came to trim today and I gave him strict instructions to leave the sole and frog alone which he did, but he needed to take off some toe as they were a bit long.
As he did this I noticed red in his toes, farrier said it was bruising, should I be worried about this? I was hoping to keep the boots off for tunout soon ,but maybe I should leave them on a while longer and I did want to start small walkouts in hand.
Could any of you experienced barefooters advice please!

 

[LucyPriory]

Hi

When you say red in the toes - do you mean red in the white line, the hoof wall, or in the sole area?

If it is in the white line you need to consider that your horse may have suffered some degree of laminitis.

 

[pines of rome]

Hi Lucy,
Well the red is right near the toe edge in the centre on both feet, I did wonder if the white line had been stretched due to the long toe,but farrier was sure was just bruising, this would coincide with him galloping around on that hard ground last week!
My boy is a little T.B, he is not overweight and has never had laminitis, no pulses, but does sometimes have warm hooves when he is sore, he has come in ok tonight, the question is how do I proceed with him now regarding booting and walking out, my farrier was not very helpful!

 

[LucyPriory]

Probably got a thin sole then. Short term I'd boot for walking out and if needed use a comfort pad as well.

Medium term need to figure out why the sole is thin (usually diet) and sort that.

Long term - if all goes well you should be having fun